"The use of the atomic bomb would have to be done with visual targeting, not by use of radar. [...] The targets should be 'large urban areas of not less than 3 miles in diameter existing in the larger populated areas… between the Japanese cities of Tokyo and Nagasaki… [and] should have high strategic value.' A list of possible targets that met this criteria was given [...] Of these, Hiroshima was noted as 'the largest untouched target not on the 21st Bomber Command priority list.' Tokyo, on the other hand, was 'now practically all bombed and burned out and is practically rubble with only the palace grounds left standing.' It was further noted that they had to take into account that the policy of the 20th Air Force was now 'systematically bombing out' cities 'with the prime purpose in mind of not leaving one stone lying on the other,' and that they would not likely reserve targets just for the Manhattan Project."

"Stimson left the meeting thinking Truman completely understood the matter, and the final target order — with Hiroshima, Kokura, Niigata, and Nagasaki (the latter added only then) — was sent out.

But what did Truman take away from this meeting? We can look at Truman’s own diary entry from July 25th:

" This weapon is to be used against Japan between now and August 10th. I have told the Sec. of War, Mr. Stimson, to use it so that military objectives and soldiers and sailors are the target and not women and children. Even if the Japs are savages, ruthless, merciless and fanatic, we as the leader of the world for the common welfare cannot drop that terrible bomb on the old capital or the new.

He and I are in accord. The target will be a purely military one and we will issue a warning statement asking the Japs to surrender and save lives. I’m sure they will not do that, but we will have given them the chance. It is certainly a good thing for the world that Hitler’s crowd or Stalin’s did not discover this atomic bomb. It seems to be the most terrible thing ever discovered, but it can be made the most useful. "

This passage reflects an incredible misconception. Truman appears, here, to believe that Hiroshima was 'a purely military' target, and that 'soldiers and sailors' would be killed, 'not women and children.' But of course every city on that list was inhabited primarily by civilians. And by the calculus of war being waged, every city on that list had a military connection — they produced weapons for the military."

http://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/2014/08/08/kyoto-misconceptio...

He was clearly writing this for posterity.

Japan was beaten. They had already offered a complete surrender, conditional only on keeping the emperor, which was rejected by the U.S. Their utter defeat and the hopeless state of their armed forces was well-known by the allies, since their communication encryption had been cracked months earlier.

The real issue was likely that the Soviet Union, positioned to become a formidable power in the post-war theater, had promised to enter the war against Japan on August 6. The Americans needed to make sure that Japan had been defeated by that point and that the U.S. would occupy Japan, not Soviet Russia. Hence the rush to drop the bombs before that.

Also, there was no uncertainty about the lack of military significance of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the contemporary reports state this clearly, they even warn about the presence of American POWs in the area (which was ignored and they were incinerated along with the hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians).

> Also, there was no uncertainty about the lack of military significance of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the contemporary reports state this clearly, they even warn about the presence of American POWs in the area (which was ignored and they were incinerated along with the hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians).

Hiroshima was the city that supported the Kure Naval Base and associated anchorage. Nagasaki was a major port that was an adjunct of the Sasebo Naval Base. Those were two of the IJN's four main bases. The impotence of the IJn at this point notwithstanding, I think it is unreasonable to claim they had little military significance.

Whether or not that justified levelling them in what you can argue were just live-fire nuclear tests is a different question.

> They had already offered a complete surrender, conditional only on keeping the emperor, which was rejected by the U.S.

Are you saying the Japanese offered to surrender, with the only condition being maintaining the emperor, prior to the bombing of Hiroshima? My understanding is that was the terms accepted after the atomic bombings and the declaration of war by the USSR.

Yes. According to documents from Roosevelt's office, the Japanese had previously offered surrender on roughly the same terms that the U.S. ultimately accepted after the bombings:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8390436

> (which was ignored and they were incinerated along with the hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians).

This is inaccurate. Much fewer than 200,000 people were killed immediately (totaled across both bombings), including both incinerated and not, civilian and not.

Wikipedia has casualties between 129,000–246,000:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_an...

Casualties and losses: 20 U.S., Dutch, British prisoners of war killed 90,000–166,000 killed in Hiroshima 39,000–80,000 killed in Nagasaki Total: 129,000–246,000+ killed

It doesn't say if these are all immediate casualties (does it even matter), but it does mention estimates for Nagasaki immediate casualties is between 22,000-75,000.

You wrote that "they were incinerated along with the hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians", which implies that at least 200,000 Japanese civilians were incinerated in the bombings. The 129,000–246,000+ killed figure you cite covers 2-4 months after the bombings. I am confident that no one was incinerated 2 or more months after the bombing.

Wikipedia gives an immediate death toll of 70,000–80,000 people, of whom 20,000 were soldiers for Hiroshima and 22,000-75,000 people for Nagasaki. This is far from hundreds of thousands of incinerated civilians.

I'm sure you're trying to make a point here. But the fact is upwards of 80 THOUSAND people died immediately. Not sure what this hair splitting accomplishes.

I'm not trying to make a point. I just got the impression that upwards of 200,000 people were incinerated in the bombings, but I was skeptical of that number. I investigated a bit and just wanted to leave a note that the number was incorrect.

I don't think 120,000 lives qualifies as splitting hairs. I thought I was delivering good news, but judging by my karma, it has not been well received.

More likely he was using cya language. Either that or he was unbelievably ignorant.

Personally I think that dropping the bomb was much less about winning the war and far more about winning the post-war.

They already knew that they could take Japan, it would be nasty, but they could do it. So from that point of view, the bomb was unnecessary. But from a post-war perspective, the West was facing the prospect of a strong aggressive Soviet front. The A-bomb put an instant chill on all post-war aggression and helped encourage the worlds armies to stand down just a little bit.

I think in hindsight it's also worth pointing out that people in general are pretty terrible at judging the consequences of things of that scale. ie. You can describe just how big an explosion a nuclear bomb is going to make, but until one is actually dropped and the casualties start coming in, you don't really comprehend it fully. If those bombs hadn't been dropped, the aversion to destruction might not have been fully ingrained in the minds of every commander and it could well have meant that the Cold War would have turned "Hot".

Yeah, from what I've read on the subject, it seems that it's pretty well understood now that the Soviet Union was as much (or more) the intended "audience" for the A-bombs as Japan....

Pretty scary stuff considering that the main brunt was born by civilians.... oO;

Trying to win by bombing civilians was a common theme in world war two. From British Air Staff papers (1941)[1]...

  The ultimate aim of an attack on a town area is to break the 
  morale of the population which occupies it. To ensure this, 
  we must achieve two things: first, we must make the town
  physically uninhabitable and, secondly, we must make the people 
  conscious of constant personal danger. The immediate aim, is
  therefore, twofold, namely, to produce (i) destruction and
  (ii) fear of death.

Whilst that strategy may have worked in Japan with the atomic bombs it was hardly successful in Europe. And surely the impact was on the high command and political leadership rather than normal people.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_bombing_during_World_...

Arguably the only civilian bombing success in Europe was the August 1940s RAF air raid on Berlin... inasmuch as it angered Hitler into diverting the Luftwaffe's resources away from a relatively effective campaign of targeting airfields and ports towards a useless campaign of indiscrimate city bombing.

I advise those that get misty eyed over Hiroshima and Nagasaki to look into Unit 731: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unit_731

remind us again of the fundamentals of moral calculus: how many rongs make a right?

You are confusing two moral issues. You're talking about revenge, and the Christian moral position is of course, that nothing justifies revenge.

(But keep in mind, Judaism, Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism and others all regulate revenge instead. Revenge is certainly justified under those moral systems, and the revenge is usually bigger than the event that "justified" the revenge. Judaism, but especially Islam is especially famous for having revenge punishments so extreme (I should say so extremely stupid) that they have triggered civil wars on occasion (of course these come from the Roman Empire's late-empire laws, which had a justice system that can reasonably be called "based on terror"). Which moral system is right ?)

The moral issue here is the duty to stop or at least contain moral wrongs in progress, e.g. this Unit 731, the Soviet Union, ... The key difference being that revenge is after the fact and is unnecessary. The key thing about revenge is that it makes society worse off in the short term, both the person taking revenge and the person being punished (e.g. kids destroying a toy rather than giving it back).

To fight moral wrongs in progress the moral position is that it is justified to use any amount of force, but comparable force should be tried first. Collateral damage should be avoided, but if you can't stop a criminal without causing collateral damage, then it is acceptable to, for example, destroy property (if the police destroys your front door chasing a robber, you will not receive compensation, nor if they burn down your house, though insurance usually covers this). If someone fights, beat him a bit and lock him up. If someone has a knife or a gun and is (trying to) kill people, shoot him. If a country is raping and killing half a continent, ...

This differentiation can be found in the bible, and in any sane moral text. Hell, it can be found in the UNCHR (united nations convention on human rights).

Point out a horror resulting from Hiroshima or Nagasaki that tops human infant vivisection.

Point out how e.g. the My Lai massacre does not justify me murdering your entire family and everyone you know in a slightly less horrible way.

You're welcome to try. Please leave a printout of your preferred funeral procedures where it will be found on your body.

US POWs ended up picking up the tab for My Lai.

Way to dodge the question...

Considering that the "peace" faction's strategy was to force an invasion and massive casualty's (98% wastage for the first 5 waves) to help a negotiated settlement I think Pres Eisenhower is as naive as Chamberlin was prior to ww2

> Considering that the "peace" faction's strategy was to force an invasion and massive casualty...

The notion that the alternative to the bombings was an invasion is an utterly pernicious falsehood. It is a matter of record that Japan had offered to surrender prior to the bombings, conditional only upon retaining the emperor. Those terms were subsequently accepted, after the bombings. The "peace" faction's strategy was to accept the surrender before conducting the bombings.

You may be right, I don't know enough to say. Perhaps it was wishful thinking in retrospect. (He said it in the 1960s when the nuclear genie was definitely out of the bottle and causing major headaches for everyone.)

There is a 1950s fictional film by Akira Kurosawa called "I Live in Fear" which tells the story of a man driven mad by fear of radiation from a nuclear war. For better or worse it is easy to forget now what a catastrophic thing the introduction of the bomb was for everyone.

d don't for get that American politicians saw what the butchers bill for Verdun and Somme did t France and England.

What if 4 or 5 years after the war it turns out that the president had a wonder weapon that could have ended the war in a week and saved 1/2 a million GI's - it would have been the end for the democratic party when that came out.