Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Solon who wrote (41493)	12/23/2001 9:11:57 PM
From: Lazarus_Long	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

The Japanese government was preparing the civilian population to be part of a last-ditch fight-to-the-last-bullet resistance against an attempted US invasion. This is hardly consistent with a government preparing to surrender. Are you aware of the mass suicides of civilians when the US invaded Okinawa? That was one of the reactions of the Japanese people to its governments propaganda. I don't want you to miss this: Message 16825968 And just in case you're Canadian: Message 16827047

To: Solon who wrote (41493)	1/3/2002 11:21:13 AM
From: TimF	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 82486

The suvey was complete and inpartial and the conclusions were clear. Even if it was complete and impartial that doesn't mean it has to be correct in its conclusions. Intelligent, determined, and impartial experts can still be incorrect, and that is assuming they where all three. In this case you are dealing with what ifs, so its almost impossible to know for sure. You can examine the facts, read reports and analysis and opinion pieces and maybe have a reasonable chance to form a conclusion that has more then a 50% chance of being correct but its not testable. Also even if they would have surrendered, how much longer would it have taken? Your survey says by December. I don't view that as so certain but even if they did a blockade and bombing with high explosives and incendiaries, would have caused death and suffering that may have been more then what the atom bombs caused. If on the other hand we where to stop bombing, and not invade, and allow some shipping to reach Japan unmolested then they might not have surrendered. There is also the consideration that even if we did not invade or drop the bomb, the Soviets might have invaded. They did invade a few islands. An all out invasion might have been unlikely but was possible. If it did happen the invading army would probably have been very brutal, and Japan could have suffered under decades of communism. One thing that is interesting is that the site that you get the report from says the following about it - "The United States Strategic Bombing Survey reports do not state or even suggest that the use of the atomic bomb against Japan was unwise. On the contrary, a careful analysis of the USSBS findings supports the wisdom of using the bombs. " It also has this link anesi.com For those who don't want to follow the link its main points are "The Survey assumed that continued conventional attacks on Japan -- with additional direct and indirect casualties -- would be needed to force surrender by the November or December dates mentioned; The Survey's estimate of Japan's likelihood of surrender without the atomic bombings, subject only to continued conventional attack, was based largely on information collected after the end of the war, and not known to decision makers in August, 1945; The Survey acknowledged that use of the atomic bombs hastened the end of the war; and The Survey did not, in any way, criticize the use of the atomic bombs or suggest that they were not the most humane and least costly means for ending the war. (They merely opined that Japan's surrender could have been achieved through conventional air power only; they did not say that the use of conventional air power would have been more merciful or less costly.) "