The morality of the decision to target innocents as a means to an end stands independent of what people do, or do not know of future intelligence.
If we hunted together and I knew that in a couple of seconds you where going to turn around and shoot me, then I don't think it would be immoral to shoot you first. If I knew that you had no intention of shooting me or harming me in anyway then it would be very immoral to shoot you first. Beyond making the point that the morality of an action or a decision can be dependent on such knowledge I would also draw an analogy to a Japan that was going to continue to war against the US to the violent murderous Solon, and a Japan that was just about to surrender to the Solon that does not intend any violence.
The issue of targeting civilians if killing some of them might actually save the lives of civilians is not completely cut and dry. Reasonable, sane people can disagree about it. And of course there is also the question of when would Japan have surrendered which we have already discussed. Assume for a second, for the sake of argument that Japan would not have surrendered without one of three things having happened first, a massive invasion, months of continued blockade and heavy conventional and incendiary bombing, or dropping an A-bomb on a city or two. In that situation, if you have reasonable cause to believe that more Japanese civilians will die from either of the other two alternatives then from the atom bomb, would you order the bomb dropped if you where president?
Of course it would mean targeting civilians and it would be horrible. I might never completely get over the horror of being responsible for so much death and destruction if I was responsible for it, but is it immoral if it actually did save lives? I know you think it did not, but I am trying to separate the "Japan would have surrendered soon anyway" argument from the "it is always immoral to target civilians no matter what" argument.
Tim |
