this post was submitted on 05 Aug 2023
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The atomic bombings were war crimes, but so were the many previous fire-bombings of Japanese and German cities. The US was doing everything it could at that point to end the war.
Honestly, I'm of the opinion that the atomic bombings were legitimate, but the firebombings in Japan were mostly terror bombing and war crimes. The atomic bombs were indiscriminate in their destruction, but pointed towards legitimate military/infrastructure targets.
I'm of the opinion that fascists don't get to cry about the consequences of their actions, even if their former victims have become monsters themselves.
Arthur "Bomber" Harrington has an immortal quote to the effect:
"The Nazis entered this war under the rather childish delusion that they were going to bomb everyone else and no one was going to bomb them."
You can see echoes of this mentality in Russia today, as they cry and moan about Ukraine having the sheer GALL to drone strike military targets in Russia. If one wanted to get particularly spicy, you might even note the actions of America in the Middle East prior to 9/11 and the reactions afterwards.
Ultimately, the great evil of the atom bombs wasn't their use to ensure a total surrender, it was throwing away that total capitulation by allowing the continued existence of the Imperial family and not executing every Imperial Army officer above the rank of lieutenant for their crimes in their conquered territories and against American POWs.
That's an odd take, the atomic bombings were fire bombings intended to destroy cities, unless you think the US didn't realize that would happen? The US was quite capable of destroying individual facilities. Is it legitimate to destroy a facility and everyone who works there? And their homes? And their families, and their kid's schools and everyone who goes to those schools and their doctors, and the guy who sells them snacks on the way home and his family and all his in laws and their houses and their doctors.
Seems a bit excessive.
The atomic bombings were not fire bombings. Fire bombings, as the name suggests, use incendiaries.
You know what the accuracy was for daytime bombing in WW2, even with fancy American bomb sights?
A mile.
A. Mile.
In Europe, British and American approaches differed because British bomber command put a greater emphasis on terror bombing against the Germans, while the American bomber command in Europe put a greater emphasis on industrial targets. You know what both approaches shared? Absolutely blanketing wide swathes of an area with ordnance because there was no guarantee of hitting a target otherwise.
Given that low level of accuracy available, I don't find arguments regarding collateral damage to be particularly compelling. No, what made US firebombing in Japan horrid was that American bomber command in Asia oriented quite explicitly towards attacking civilian targets. Incendiary testing in US trials was done against mock-ups of Japanese civilian housing, not industrial targets, even.
Nagasaki and Hiroshima were chosen as targets because of their military and industrial importance. However cruel and indiscriminate an atomic bombing may be, it was not simply pointed at civilians in the hopes of murdering as many as possible, unlike the fire bombings.
This is historically ignorant. The cities were chosen for their psychological effect.
Atomic bombs are incendiaries. Starting fire miles away is one of the key effects of the bomb. They can create firestorms.