Idle thoughts on the word "Terrorism"

[213374U]

How is that terrorism?

 

We warned the japs that if they dont surrender we will unleash a weapon that could destroy cities.

 

They didnt surrender so we had to use the bomb to end the war quickly. Since an invasion and occupation of Japan would have been costly. Since almost every damn citizen has been training and ready for a American landing on Japan.

The war was effectively over when the bombs were dropped on Japan. Perhaps there wasn't a written treaty, but it was obvious who were the victors. And there was no warning. The bombs were dropped first, and then the japs surrendered. But even if it was as you said, that doesn't justify dropping the second one.

 

However, I agree with you that it wasn't a form of terrorism. Terrorism is aimed to create and extend fear among the civilian population of whatever is the target. Terror is not a goal in itself, it's but a tool. The ultimate goal of terrorism aim is to have the fear it causes to coerce civilians. Sometimes it aims to coerce people into pressuring their government to accept the demands of the terrorist, and sometimes the terrorist is the state itself, as was the case of the USSR. In this respect, Machiavelli's views could be considered terrorist.

 

Guerrilla tactics on the other hand can't be considered terrorism. The fear it causes among the troops those tactics are being used against is just a byproduct. While terrorism seeks to achieve coercion through fear, guerrilla tactics are aimed to diminish the effectiveness of a regular fighting force by lowering their morale and most importantly, by causing large amounts of attrition without presenting a clear target for retaliation.

 

In the case of Japan, the threat was as great to the State as it was to the people themselves. Japan didn't surrender because their people wanted to surrender (even though after the bombs they probably did), but because they had no way to counter such a devastating weapon, and surrender was the only option that didn't guarantee their destruction.

[Laozi]

Please stop using that word "Japs", Japanese is not too hard to type.

 

Second Japan doesn't really have much to stand by, they surprised attack the U.S. without warning, they where considering using "disease bombs" as a weapon against the U.S. of which the Black Dragon had already tested on Chinese captives. Their human experimentation rivaled that of the Nazis and they had to be decisively beaten and the U.S. wasn't going to risk hundreds of thousands more casulties with a ground invasion of the Japanese homeland

[Volourn]

"Please stop using that word "Japs", Japenese is not too hard to type."

 

Yeha, how horrible. No one better call me Cans. It'll make me mad and call them bigot!

[B5C]

This is the warning that Truman said to Japan:

"If they do not now accept our terms they may expect a rain of ruin from the air the like of which has never been seen on Earth. Behind this air attack will follow by sea and land forces in such number and power as they have not yet seen, but with fighting skill of which they are already aware."

 

 

I think thats a good warning to Japan.

[Laozi]

"Please stop using that word "Japs", Japenese is not too hard to type."

 

Yeha, how horrible. No one better call me Cans. It'll make me mad and call them bigot!

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By nature being a canadian is offensive

[213374U]

Second Japan doesn't really have much to stand by, they surprised attack the U.S. without warning, they where considering using "disease bombs" as a weapon against the U.S. of which the Black Dragon had already tested on Chinese captives. Their human experimentation rivaled that of the Nazis and they had to be decisively beaten and the U.S. wasn't going to risk hundreds of thousands more casulties with a ground invasion of the Japanese homeland

1.- What they were considering is irrelevant. What they did, is not.

 

2.- All of that still doesn't justify their dropping of the second bomb.

[Laozi]

right but the fact that they didn't agree to a total surrender does weigh in

[Volourn]

"By nature being a canadian is offensive"

 

LOL

 

Anyways, as far as the nulcear bombs, it sucks it wa ddone. I wish it hadn't. Sadly, in the end, by alld etails by those 'in the know' it actuall saved lives. Scary thought; though.

 

It's a reminder, however, that war is ugly and should be avoided if at all possible.

[sawyl]

sorry bud, but the palestinian is walking into a cafe full of civilians with a bomb strapped to his chest. the purpose of such an act is to create an atmosphere of fear. the very essence of terrorism as defined by kumquat. how you can fathom equating these things is beyond rational thought.

 

of course, in order for such rationalizations to hold, little facts like the latter must be left out. not surprising.

methinks murder can make people fearful as well...

 

and the Israeli army waltzing into Palestinian border towns and killing children is not terrorism? So murdering children is "less" bad than bombing a dance club? You can rationalize anything. Both sides are guilty; the civilians are the ones who get caught in the crossfire on both sides.

 

i've never heard a bigger bunch of BS. it is being defined as stated by kumquat above. just because you seem to think differently does not make it so. those that we are calling "terrorists" are bombing civilian settlements, taking down public buildings, blowing up public airlines and committing other acts of violence in order to reach a political goal. in the end, however, their primary goal is fear.

the U.S. destroys civilian settlements and infastructure. Granted, the army doesn't set out to do that (hopefully), but in the end the same thing is accomplished. So we're not terrorists because...we didn't mean to do it?

 

About the Japanese: Let's do a little role-reversal. They drop a nuclear bomb on New York, killing countless civilians, because a ground war of the U.S. would be costly. Now would we call that terrorism?

[213374U]

So we're not terrorists because...we didn't mean to do it?

Exactly.

 

 

About the Japanese: Let's do a little role-reversal. They drop a nuclear bomb on New York, killing countless civilians, because a ground war of the U.S. would be costly. Now would we call that terrorism?

Nope. I'm not looking at it from a situation in which my feelings cloud my judgement so the situation is just the same, if the circumstances of the nuclear attack were the same as those that were in place when Hiroshima and Nagasaki were nuked.

[Rosbjerg]

2.- All of that still doesn't justify their dropping of the second bomb.

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from a military perspective it was very necessary to drop the second bomb .. if you drop one, it's quite clear you have a very serious weapon in your hands, and should be feared .. if you drop two, the same applies, but it seems like you have enough to spare to drop as many as you want! hence it would be very smart to surrender to you, since other nukes would be following ..

 

even though the US didn't have more than the two at the time .. but Japan didn't know that..

[213374U]

from a military perspective it was very necessary to drop the second bomb .. if you drop one, it's quite clear you have a very serious weapon in your hands, and should be feared .. if you drop two, the same applies, but it seems like you have enough to spare to drop as many as you want! hence it would be very smart to surrender to you, since other nukes would be following ..

I'm not so sure. For starters, the same reasoning can be applied to any number of nukes. "Hey, they have leveled each and every single one of our major cities, I think they did have as many as they said!"

And, after the first one was dropped, it's not like they asked if they wished to reconsider unconditional surrender. I mean, thousands of lives wasted just to make a point that didn't need to be made in the first place.

 

Anyway, this is a pretty good thread, let's not hijack it.

[jedipodo]

Rosbjerg is right in his point.

 

The Japenese Generals thought the Americans could bomb them back to the stone age and, obviously, surrendered for this reason. Without this nuclear "demonstration" the war definitely would have lasted much longer.

 

213374u, consider who initially declared the war and who is guilty for the attack on the Asian region and e.g. the massacres on Chinese civilians.

 

I think when you think morally you have to take into account which sort of opponent you face.

 

The same applies to the war against the so-called "terrorists" (the guys who are intentionally boming soft targets to cause death and fear).

 

But, please, don't get me wrong, my motto is *not* "The end justifies any means".

[213374U]

213374u, consider who initially declared the war and who is guilty for the attack on the Asian region and e.g. the massacres on Chinese civilians.

I am NOT saying they shouldn't have dropped the bomb. I am saying it probably wasn't necessary to drop the bombs.

[jedipodo]

213374u, consider who initially declared the war and who is guilty for the attack on the Asian region and e.g. the massacres on Chinese civilians.

I am NOT saying they shouldn't have dropped the bomb. I am saying it probably wasn't necessary to drop the bombs.

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Yes, I know this and agree with you on this.

 

What I have said is that otherwise the war would have lasted much longer in this scenario (with many casualties on BOTH sides, of course).

[Rosbjerg]

well we will never know if it was truely necessary .. but US didn't just send a signal to Japan you know .. Russia and every other power in the world thougt that America had alot of bombs ..

[jedipodo]

well we will never know if it was truely necessary .. but US didn't just send a signal to Japan you know .. Russia and every other power in the world thougt that America had alot of bombs ..

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And by this they gave away to the Soviets where they could get this powerful technology from...

[Laozi]

Not really Stalin already knew the U.S. had "the bomb" and were well on their way to developing their own

[Oerwinde]

213374u, consider who initially declared the war and who is guilty for the attack on the Asian region and e.g. the massacres on Chinese civilians.

I am NOT saying they shouldn't have dropped the bomb. I am saying it probably wasn't necessary to drop the bombs.

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Yes, I know this and agree with you on this.

 

What I have said is that otherwise the war would have lasted much longer in this scenario (with many casualties on BOTH sides, of course).

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They didn't even have to invade Japan, they had no fuel supply, and their industry was in ruins, within a month their war machine would have been crippled and they would not have been able to continue. And in that time the US could have switched to defensive tactics which would have inflicted some small military casualties, but 800,000 civilians wouldn't have died. Several sources have said that the japanese were ready to surrender, and the casualty predictions of a japanese invasion were inflated by politicians to get support for using the bomb. Even if it was necessary to use the bomb, its pretty agreeable that they didn't need to use two.

[jedipodo]

Not really Stalin already knew the U.S. had "the bomb" and were well on their way to developing their own

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Oh, then they stole it even earlier? I didn't know that they were that fast.

[Laozi]

I think its been said many times that when Stalin heard about the "dropping of the bomb" at the (Crimean Conference? I think maybe) he wasn't even surprised. Russian scientist are quite competent and wouldn't have to steal anything, just catch up. In a way america built its nuclear program on the back of germany's program

[jedipodo]

They didn't even have to invade Japan, they had no fuel supply, and their industry was in ruins, within a month their war machine would have been crippled and they would not have been able to continue. And in that time the US could have switched to defensive tactics which would have inflicted some small military casualties, but 800,000 civilians wouldn't have died. Several sources have said that the japanese were ready to surrender, and the casualty predictions of a japanese invasion were inflated by politicians to get support for using the bomb. Even if it was necessary to use the bomb, its pretty agreeable that they didn't need to use two.

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Propaganda. Your number is *much* to high. Even the sum of the citizens of both towns didn't exeed 500,000.

 

As far as I know, about 100,000 civilians died from the direct blast (or within months). And some others died from cancer decades later. But definitely not *everybody* died!

 

 

The Japenese were ready to surrender? The ideology of this times left no room for a give-up. My interpretation of your "defensive tactics" is that you would simply wait until the enemy has died by himself. To be honest, do you think that they had sent Kamikazes to sign their surrender? (ok, sorry for polemics here " )

[jedipodo]

I think its been said many times that when Stalin heard about the "dropping of the bomb" at the (Crimean Conference? I think maybe) he wasn't even surprised. Russian scientist are quite competent and wouldn't have to steal anything, just catch up. In a way america built its nuclear program on the back of germany's program

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

No, the U.S. nuclear program was founded as the response to a (supposed/feared) German program.

 

Yes, Americans carried off technology(e.g. the V2 rocket project) and hired German scientists to work for them (e.g. Wernher von Braun).

 

But on the other hand I know for sure that Soviets took German technology, scientists and their families with them home (and that anything but voluntarily...).

 

The Soviets were the masters of industrial espionage.

Really, it is not a secret that in the beginning the Soviets have copied U.S. air planes, computers and the first uranium bomb.

 

*surprised* You have never heard of this?

[sawyl]

As far as I know, about 100,000 civilians died from the direct blast (or within months). And some others died from cancer decades later. But definitely not *everybody* died!

Oh, only 100,000 plus the cancer/leukemia/radiated patients. That makes it all better.

 

...ahh, why are we even arguing? It's over and done with and everyone's dead. Hooray.

[jedipodo]

As far as I know, about 100,000 civilians died from the direct blast (or within months). And some others died from cancer decades later. But definitely not *everybody* died!

Oh, only 100,000 plus the cancer/leukemia/radiated patients. That makes it all better.

 

...ahh, why are we even arguing? It's over and done with and everyone's dead. Hooray.

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We are talking about an event of World War II, a war in which only 60 millions people got killed.

 

I also don't know why we are arguing about it. It is way off topic.