60th Anniversary of Hiroshima Bombing

Sixty years ago today, the U.S. unleashed the atomic bomb for the first time. Roughly 140,000 people died instantly or in a few months from radiation after the Enola Gay dropped its cargo on the city below. Hiroshima officials have actually estimated the number to be much higher because they included cancer cases and other illnesses that would be caused by massive amounts of radiation. They estimated roughly 237,062. That is according to MSNBC.

I look back with terrible feelings about what happened on that day and three days later with the bombing of Nagasaki. I know that it was necessary to end the war and I know that the Japanese did a terrible thing to us at Pearl Harbor, but was this amount of destruction necessary? We drop a bomb on a military base. It killed thousands and thousands of completely innocent men, women, and children. It's hard for me to imagine that it was the only option. I know there will be hardcore patriots saying that they deserved it and it was the only way, but I don't believe that. Attacking the Japanese military would have been more than acceptable, but the mass killing of thousands of innocent people is pretty barbaric.

Some people believe it was a necessary evil and I can deal with that. They have their opinion just like I have mine. The navigator of the Enola Gay, the B-29 that dropped the bomb, says that he feels no remorse over dropping the bomb. No remorse. He goes on to say that he pities the people who were there though. You can see that article here.

Pity?

It's not like they even had a chance to leave. It's just a pity that they were there. *Poof* Let's go back home.

It really kind of angers me.

Anyway, what are your thoughts regarding this? How does it make you feel now? It is still very, very close to the Japanese that are still feeling the effects of the bombing today.

I remember studying this in high school. It was upsetting then and it is upsetting now. Yeah, I did get angry when I studied the Hiroshima Bombing at high school, and now that you've brought it up again, I'm starting to remember all the sick and horrible details that I learned about... it makes me sad...

I think it's a sore spot in American history. I really can't wrap my mind around the whole experience and how many people died. If I think about it too long, it makes me sick. I don't think anybody deserves a fate like that. Rather than focus on the horrific experience, I try looking at the positive side (if that's possible). Think of the advancement in our technology that we gained from that bomb.

I do indeed think that it was bad to drop the A-bomb, but I think it was the best option considering:
1. Japan started the fight, not the U.S.
2. Japan did not believe in surrender. The war could've lasted for several more years if the U.S. didn't drop the bomb.
3. The only other option to end the war would be another D-Day only this time on Japan. If they had done that, it would have created about 1,000,000 more casulties.

The use of atomic weapons is literally a non-issue. Through conventional raids alone we killed many, many times the number of people killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Quite simply, if the United States had opted not to use nuclear force, more people would had died from saturated conventional bombing over an extended period of time.

Moreover, a conventional campaign and land invasion would have almost certainly involved Soviet occupation, and Japan would not exist as you know it today.

That said, the real issue is the targeting of civilians - Something which hardly started with Japan.

I read a book once. It described the bombing from the perspectives of five people who lived through it and were interviewed by the author. I think one of them was a mother of several kids, and another was a doctor who had to try and treat all of the people who flooded the hospitals. There were thousands of people who didn't die from the bomb itself, but from only days/weeks later from radiation sickness.
It sad, how many lives were lost. Those poor people weren't even soldiers; they were civilians. The guy felt only pity? Excuse me? Oh yes, we'll just drop the bomb, and run "like the devil trying to get away from that fireball and cloud." Didn't it occur to him that he was ending the lives of young children?
http://library.thinkquest.org/27458/...mi/cranes.html
^ Sadako was twelve. Twelve. At the age of twelve, you should be having fun, going to school, and all of that other stuff, not dying from radiation-induced leukemia.
I, for one, do not think that the advancement of nuclear technology was worth hundreds of thousands of lives.

I find it sad but necessary. Though I really feel bad for them, we did save a lot of lives elsewhere on Earth. Stopping violence with violence.

Necesary? Yes. Friendly? No. I choose to think of it as part of history; it's over and there's not much we can do -- nothing, actually -- about it anymore. And think of it this way: no bombing, no Nintendo. I don't mean that it was the best thing we could do, but there wasn't much of another option, and I'm just looking at the bright side of things.

I guess thats easy for us to say- it's all in the past. But I think if we were Japanese, our views would be different. It's like the Jews and the Hallocaust- it's something close to their history and a part of history that still hurts many of them. I'm not Japanese, but I think if I was, I would not excuse the Bombing of Hiroshima so lightly.

Living in the past never helps. Move on and live. It's history, and there's no changing it.

The Atomic Bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were totally necessary, and saved the lives of millions of Americans, Russians, Chinese, and yes, Japanese.

First, let me stop anyone from saying otherwise: Hiroshima and Nagasaki were military targets.

Let me also say that there were alternatives to the atomic bombings, which did not include Japanese surrender: Japan's military refused to surrender because they thought they could defeat an attempted landing by the Allies and then be able to get better than the unconditional surrender that was demanded of them.
Alternatives included:
- Invasion of the Japanese homeland, which would have cost an untold number of Japanese and American lives. Japanese civilians were prepared to defend their homeland to the death, and surrender was not an option ever. They had children prepared to strap bombs on their chest and run underneath tanks to take them out. They had women armed. Civilians were going to fight the landings. If the landings were successful, Japanese cities would have all fallen, grenade by grenade, life by life, bullet by bullet, never surrendering. Had the landings failed, the Russians would have landed, and then there would be a North and South Japan - it would be trying to recover like Germany is today; it wouldn't be an economy competing with America.
- Slow starvation of it's peoples by blockade. It's interesting to note that since Japan is an island, most of its food is from the sea - laying mines in the fishing waters and blockading the island would have been easy since Japan had no Navy left, and America was rolling off a Carrier every month. This would also kill innocent civilians, but the cities would only be hit by the bombing raids using napalm. Unless Japan surrendered before Russia finally finished 'liberating' China and got to the mainland, this wouldn't have done any better. Remember that the Russian army was not hospitable in any way, and commonly raped and pillaged. Afterwards, Japan would most likely have been communist at least in part.

Civilian casualties, while horrible, were not limited in any way to the atomic bombings, or even to Japan. Please compare these figures, generally accepted, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties:

Allied Military Casualties: 12,300,00
Axis Military Casualties: 7,200,00
Total Military Casualties: 19,500,000.

Civilian Deaths in Allied Countries: 45,500,000
Civilian Deaths in Axis Countries: 3,800,000
Total Civilian Casualties: 49,300,000

The war was a war where civilians really got hit a lot, by both sides. Granted that a lot of the Allied casualties are Russian, are russian women and children different? My point is that civilians got hit during the entire war, by every country, not just by the two atomic bombs of America. Total Casualties: 68,800,000. Sixty-Eight Million, Eight-Hundred Thousand human beings. Think, for a second, how much higher that would be if either America or Russia had invaded and taken Japan apart building by building. It's unimaginable.

As far as their deaths go, if I had to die, would prefer be instantly vaporized than slowly bleeding to death or burning away in napalm or gassed in a chamber. Radiation sickness is bad, but there are plenty of things conventional invasion can do that are terrible too, and the actual figure of those who got radiation sickness is 1% of those who survived the explosion. People in Hiroshima and Nagasaki died, but the political aftermath was enough to convince Japan to surrender with a lot more intact and all under their rule, democratic and not communistic. Compared to how Europe was after the war, Japan was spared a lot of chaos.

So while I join you in mourning those that died in the atomic bombings bombings on this 60th anniversary, I ask that you not limit your mourning to those victims alone. That entire war really screwed up a lot of lives, a lot of human lives. Think of those that fought, those that suffered, and those that died, no matter what country. For they were humans just like you and I.

Thank you.

Originally Posted by ElijahSharp

Living in the past never helps. Move on and live. It's history, and there's no changing it.

I have to highly disagree with that. It's very important to acknowledge what happened. It is over and there is no changing it, but it's hardly something that can be brushed aside.

And there's a quote that will be true until the end of time regarding history.

Originally quoted by George Santayana
Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.

Originally Posted by Tiberius

So while I join you in mourning those that died in the atomic bombings bombings on this 60th anniversary, I ask that you not limit your mourning to those victims alone. That entire war really screwed up a lot of lives, a lot of human lives. Think of those that fought, those that suffered, and those that died, no matter what country. For they were humans just like you and I.

Thank you.

You're right. I made reference only to the Japanese, but there were so many who suffered.

I apologise.

I just think........Pearl Harbour was a terrible thing.......but were the people who did it punished.....no they were not. The people in Hiroshima were just civilians, going about their daily lives, people caught in between two struggles for power. The atomic bomb snuffed out so many people out of existance. Just like that. And many of the survivers were left with truely horrific injuries, and died slow, lingering deaths.

How can anyone say they deserved it? Nobody deserves that. There were people cremated alive, or had their skin burnt off. The atomic bomb is a by-product of a truely sinister industry, the means to slaughter as many people as possible in as short amount of time as possible.

War is a just a massive waste of life. And it's only after so many innecents have died, that one of the people responsible topples.

And I don't think acting violence with violence is a good thing. For those of you who disagree with me, I am just going to repeat something Gandhi said:
"If we all took an eye for an eye, we would all be blind."

I had no idea that yesterday was the 60th anniversary of the Hiroshima bombing.

I studied that period of history before.

I felt sorry for the Japanese civillians that had to go through the bombing and later had to suffer the radiation.

I agree with Feline Witch, who truly deserves to have their skins obliterated in a single blow? Who truly desrves to be cremated alive? No one deserves that.

Blame Japan's power-hungry government back then. They were given several warnings that great force would be used if they did not surrender. But they declined, repeadetly. They had it coming for their stupidity.

Originally Posted by Gecko

Blame Japan's power-hungry government back then. They were given several warnings that great force would be used if they did not surrender. But they declined, repeadetly. They had it coming for their stupidity.

Yeah, and Japan's government is still power hungry despite that. That said, it is very sad to think about what happened, and I mourn for all those who lost loved ones as a direct effect of the bombings.

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...9?OpenDocument
I pretty much agree with what these brave vets of WWII have to say about the bombing of Hiroshima, it had to be done if WWII was to end. Japan showed no sign of surrendering, even after we made air raids on their cities. Mind you, many more civilians could have died if the atomic bomb was not dropped on these 2 cities. Oh and another intresting article to read about Hiroshima:
http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/new...1?OpenDocument

I know that it was nessesary, and I know that many more Japanese died in other bombings, but I still can't help feeling like it was wrong. I remember I read Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes, a true story about an innocent girl who was infected with the radiation while in her mother's womb, and died an early and slow death, and it was so incredibally sad. I still wonder how the bombers can feel no remorse... Oh well. I'm antiwar anywho, so I oppose any violence. It was awful what happened, but I know that if we didn't end the war, much worse things could have taken place.

The bomber can feel no remorse because he did his duty.

The bomber, believe it or not, probably had plenty of friends that were killed in the war. The bomber, being human too, was probably grieved by these deaths. The bomber likely had a friend caught in the Bataan Death March. The bomber likely observed the effects of the Japanese kamikaze pilots. The bomber likely remembered how fiercely the Japanese defended each inch of land forcing us to fight so fiercely back just to take a foot of soil. The bomber also likely had the added impetus of Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor.

Now, we can play this game where we try to bring everyone into a gratifying human light. The game where we, for instance, expose how horrible some victims of the atomic bombs had it. At the same time, this can be done for virtually any soldier, including that bomber. Imagine being the person whose duty it was to kill a quarter of a million people! No, I don't feel angry at him. I feel sympathetic with him. It's one of the many horrible tragedies of war that he had to do this. You want him to have to burdern his conscience with their deaths? I don't wish that on any man. He says he feels pity, and indeed, that shows that he doesn't consider their lives to be useless.

War destroys lives. It destroys the lives of civilians and of soliders. It's scars people's bodies and minds. It is sad, but I see blaming the pilot as unnecessary.