From the documentary, Hiroshima. I had mixed feelings about posting this obvious piece of dramatized propaganda which manages to promote the message that the Americans were total a-holes for using the A-bomb on Japan. The BBC is behind it.
found by Bill Reising.
For Kindle and with free ePub version. Only $9.49 Great reading.
Here is what Gary Shapiro CEO of the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) said: Dvorak's writing sings with insight and clarity. Whether or not you agree with John's views, he will get you thinking and is never boring. These essays are worth the read!
Subscribe to Main Blog feed here:
Subscribe to Comments too (below):
Bad Behavior has blocked 5805 access attempts in the last 7 days.
#9 – “The BBC is behind it”. Yes, another piece of fair, balanced and accurate reporting from those Commie pinko subversive truth-tellers.
Whoa dude! Are you okay? I heard a pretty loud SNAP there when your knee jerked…
I don’t see how this is anti-American.
Would Jezus drop the ABomb in Iraq. I’m sure he would. Why we haven’t is no mystery.
This clip is great, I like the special effects
Nice to see some of the Japanese give a first hand account and knowing Japanese I doubt much had to taken out.
One thought I had and considering all the whining and self licking that’s gone on about it by the USA, wonder how different things would have been if instead of a couple of planes a nuke had been used at the twin towers in New York.
Not sure why criticizing the BBC is somehow “anti-British”.
Millions of UK citizens can’t stand the BBC either.
Same here, sh. On the day of the surrender, my dad was in Philadelphia, waiting for his ship to be prepared to be sent across the Pacific.
Morram –
Would you have preferred that New York City had been nuked on 9/11? It sure sounds like it.
Blows my mind when people criticize our use of a couple of nukes. Just amazing. War is not pattycakes.
It should be simple: Attack us, cease to exist. It’s the less than overwhelming response that emboldens our enemies.
The US was very aware of the destructive nature of the A-Bomb. There was no guessing.
The US made a grave error in dropping two of them on mostly civilian sectors. The Japanese were already out of steam and usrrounded. We did not even need to invade. The US so fearful of what MIGHT happen reacted in the wrong way. We had already proven we could decimate any nation without invading it with Germany and most of Japan anyway.
The problem again goes to expediency. The main reaon why humans fail so frequently. Haste made waste. Truman and the Joint Chiefs were too impatient.
Cursor_
Obviously the US was aware of the destruction that could be done by the blast alone, but was unaware of the damage that would be caused by fallout, since the only nuclear bomb that had been exploded previously was done less than a month before, in an unpopulated area.
And you came to this conclusion – exactly how? What history book did you read? Did you miss the previous post WRT to the battle of Okinawa?
Again, what history book are you reading?
Germany WAS invaded – Germany did not surrender until Berlin was captured and Hitler had committed suicide.
“dramatized propaganda which manages to promote the message that the Americans were total a-holes for using the A-bomb on Japan.”
A-hole is in the butt of the beholder. I saw this show in its original form and could not disagree with your appraisal more.
-iNova
I’m actually surprised there are some posters that did not reflexively blast the US as the source of all evil in the world. TIHZ_HO has made some excellent points, and actually sounds educated and reasonable – a rare combination indeed on this blog.
I only want to add to the many good points presented that the Japanese and Nazis both had active nuclear weapons research programs. The US simply beat them to the punch, thanks in part to the many European scientists whom Hitler scared into emigrating to the US. Although Germany was already defeated by Aug 1945, can anyone honestly doubt that the Japanese would have used nuclear weapons had they obtained them first? If not, then isn’t the use of nuclear weapons in order to end the war before Japan could build a bomb of their own enough of a reason? (In addition to the countless US and Japanese lives saved)
#12
> there was no need to drop 2 atomic
> bombs on the japanese.it was done
> as a live test to see what it did
> in real application and as show of force.
Nonsense. Japan did not immediately surrender unconditionally and after the way they started the war, we were definitely not going to take them on their word.
#15
> I’m sure if they’d dropped the bomb in
> some desolate area in Japan it would have
> had the same effect on the Japanese government.
You discount that a primary reason for dropping the atomic bomb was for the psychological effect which would have been substantially diminished had the area been unpopulated.
#39
> The US made a grave error in dropping
> two of them on mostly civilian sectors.
> The Japanese were already out of steam
> and usrrounded. We did not even need to invade.
Nonsense. The way to win a war is to break your opponents will to fight. Dropping the first bomb was not enough to do that and we were not going to accept anything other than immediate, unconditional surrender. The Japanese were preparing to fight to the last person in order to protect their homeland and they proved themselves capable of this on Okinawa.
> The US so fearful of what MIGHT happen
> reacted in the wrong way. We had already
> proven we could decimate any nation without
> invading it with Germany and most of Japan anyway.
We did devastate Germany through bombing (see Dresden) and we *still* had to fight down to the last man and that took hundreds of thousands of men who were not happy about having to do it again in Japan.
> Truman and the Joint Chiefs were too impatient.
No, haste makes death. The longer you drag on the war, the more lives are lost and the more expensive it is. It is *always* better to end a war as quickly as possible. Frankly, Truman was not going to accept anything other than immediate unconditional surrender and anything less than that was a sign that their will to fight had not been broken.
Let’s just call John Dvorak with his anti-Brit posts ‘John Mel Gibson Dvorak’ and be done with it.
The bomb saved American lives, and even more Japanese lives, but dropping it was nevertheless a horrendous war crime. Is this possible?
#39 – Both targets were yet to bombed and so the Japanese moved their war machine there.
War is hell – if you don’t like it surrender.
Twist and turn it any way you like but the fact remains that the Atomic Bomb in 1945 was a..BIG-HOLY-FUCKING-SHIT-THAT’S-A-BIG-BOMB bomb. The Japanese weren’t ready to surrender and they were going to their death – one last kamikaze mission on a national scale. Don’t forget those Kamikaze guys – showing the US that Japan was never giving up.
Do the math…
The first test A Bomb July 16, 1945 was a ground test and yes there was fallout but reasoning was that an air burst would have little fallout. the exact amount was still conjecture. These guys had slide rules – not computer models and Hiroshima was bombed just a few weeks later.
So here we, that’s what happened, and both targets are now bustling cities.
Cheers
#46
Only twisted sophist logic can conclude that dropping the atomic bomb was a war crime.
This docudrama was shown on US PBS a while back. It should be shown on all the worlds televisions to let those who dream of having the bomb, understand what it does and what retaliation would look like.
Will Tehran burn in the same way? Then I’d call the documentary an attempt at foretelling the future.
Why are all you ‘patriotic Americans’ defending the massacre of civilian populations?
I’m not making any excuses for the atrocities committed by the Japanese military, far from it.
“Precise figures are not available, but the firebombing and atomic bombing campaign against Japan, directed by LeMay between March 1945 and the Japanese surrender in August 1945, may have killed more than one million Japanese civilians. Official estimates from the United States Strategic Bombing Survey put the figures at 330,000 people killed, 476,000 injured, 8.5 million people made homeless and 2.5 million buildings destroyed.”
These people killed were mostly civilians going about their everyday lives. Their Government involved in a war which they had no say over, much like we are today.
Japan had been defeated by the beginning of 1945. Despite their refusal to surrender the Japanese had over extended and the bulk of their navy and airforce had already been destroyed.
Aerial mining had effectively cut off the Island of Japan from any of the bases in China and Korea, and the low level fire-bombing conducted by Curtis LeMay had almost entirely destroyed Japanese industry.
Then we dropped two atomic bombs on large civilian population centers. Very civilized…
GOUSA
The Jewish media keeps the focus on the suffering of Jews at the hands of the Nazis while the Japanese atrocities have been utterly ignored.
American servicemen used as slave laborers were denied reparations and the men who took Japan into WWII were put (by the US) back into control of Japan soon after the end of the war in order to keep the biggest secret to come out of WWII.
To gain an understanding of how “we” became “them” read “Gold Warriors” by Sterling & Peggy Seagrave. It documents how the US traded justice for hundred of thousands of metric tons of gold stolen by the Japanese throughout Asia prior to 1945.
That gold financed America’s descent into fascism.
Ferdinand Marcos recovered around $1.6 trillion (valued @ $35/troy oz.)before the US got rid of him. That was only a very small portion of what was taken from the people of Korea, China and the SE Asian countries and hidden in huge underground vaults when Japanese shipping was cut off in 1943.
Where does all that WWII gold now reside? In the vaults of the International Bankers.
#51
War is by definition not civilized. They are dirty, nasty, heart wrenching marathons of death and destruction which is why they are something to be avoided. Wars are won by one side breaking their opponents will to fight. Even with the bulk of their navy and air force eliminated they continued to resist. The proved that they would fight to the last person in order to defend their island. Even as late as August of 1945, the Japanese made it clear that they would not surrender. It was only after the both atomic bombs were dropped and the Emperor successfully overcame a military coup that they finally capitulated.
For those questioning the A-Bomb, I recommend the movie “The Fog of War”, by William Strange McNamara.
[ ]’s
#27 – Bombs don’t suck – bombs blow….
You’re not a-holes for using the bomb. You’re just a-holes.
#55 Sagrilarus Good points. The facts remain and no matter how the nuclear bombing issue is twisted by modern thinking there was no ‘nuclear’ stigma in 1945.
For all those you felt that by dropping the A bomb on a remote uninhabited area to warn the Japanese of what was in store if they had not surrendered is mote by the fact the it did not influence the Russians during post WW2 eastern Europe – before they had the bomb.
People who are debating the bombing as as ‘war crimes’, and unwarranted have been influenced by modern political nuclear thinking.
I see no debates regarding the complete devastation of Dresden, a city famous as a cultural centre by the British. It was felt by many during the war to be unwarranted as Dresden possessed no military value. I suppose if the British used an Atomic Bomb on Dresden would the attitude be different?
Cheers
I watched the documentary when it was shown on PBS and found it to be excellent and fascinating. It certainly was not propaganda in my opinion. It’s important for the world to know how devastating nuclear weapons can be.
51–Nightstar–how many more dead Americans would it have been worth to remain “civilized?”
55–Yes, the Russian lesson. Stalin knew however that we were too civilized to use the A-Bomb. Funny no?
Dresden, the sometimes location of Kurt Vonneguts “Slaughter House Five” was rebuilt after the war. I don’t know “exactly” what it looked like before it was destroyed, but the exact rebuilding certainly created some wonderful very old looking buildings that paradoxically look like they needed rehabing??? Wonderful 1-2 day visit if anyone gets the chance.
All Japanese must be dead,they are savages.
It’s not anti-American nor propaganda…facts and accounts of what happened that day.
It is ironic that the USA, who feels the need to impose its will to keep every other country from possessing nukes, is the only one who’s ever used them in battle.
Check out Russia’s new monster bomb:
http://tinyurl.com/2ja5dd