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You start out with a fair critique of the US, but the later stretched points undermine your argument:

> Country A has weapons of mass destruction, and is the only country known to have used two of those in a war, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians, just as the war was ending and the enemy was surrendering.

I was not aware that the mainstream view was that Japan was surrendering before the atomic bombings.

> Everywhere country A invaded in the last 10 years, they brought mass instability, civil tension or war and chaos, in the name of "bringing democracy". Coincidentally it's mostly in strategic places with lots of natural resources.

Easier said for Iraq than Afghanistan. It already had chaos, civil war, etc. at the onset of the invasion. Expected returns from mineral wealth hardly justify the cost.

> They have also assassinated their two most prominent anti-segregation activists

I'm guessing you mean King for one. Not sure who'd other would be? (Malcom X? He advocated racial seperation). Either way, it's a tall argument that the country (government?) assassinated them.

> Finally, country A practices the death penalty as much as country B,

Iran executes people at not only a far higher rate but even in absolute numbers. It also applies death penalty to a far wider range of crimes.

> and has a lot of religious fanatics among its population, too

Sure, but they aren't running the government

> It's a known fact that an openly atheist would never, as it is, get elected to the top office in country A.

As opposed to being charged with blasphemy in country B.

the later stretched points undermine your argument

A little maybe. But also consider that I wanted to show how people from other countries think of the situation too. I mean, people tend to think of country B in country's A terms and framing of the discussion, so I tried to do something like the opposite.

I was not aware that the mainstream view was that Japan was surrendering before the atomic bombings.

That view is widely held all around the world. Try to find some Europeans thinking the bombs were "needed". There is also evidence that us leaders knew about it, it was just a showcase, mainly to scare off USSR. Besides, it's of little consequence if Japan was surrendering or not: the war was going on with conventional weapons even in more dire times, including the Normandy invasion, so nothing called at that time to drop atomic bombs on civilians (if anything ever does). Especially considering that Japan was at the time under attack by conventional bombs, tons of them, that had burned most of its cities and killed hundreds of thousands.

Easier said for Iraq than Afghanistan. It already had chaos, civil war, etc. at the onset of the invasion. Expected returns from mineral wealth hardly justify the cost.

It had the Taliban rule, but not much civil war anymore. And certainly no mass chaos and deaths, like it does post invasion. And it's not just "mineral wealth", it's also setting foot in a strategic area.

I'm guessing you mean King for one. Not sure who'd other would be? (Malcom X? He advocated racial seperation).

Was thinking of X, yeah. Well, even if he advocated racial separation, just means he was killed just as a pro-black activist, instead of a anti-segregation activist. Both reasons seem bad to me.

Either way, it's a tall argument that the country (government?) assassinated them.

Who said the government? I said "the country". To show it in the same vain as people that blame other countries for things done not only by the government but also by local religious nuts, teams etc.

Iran executes people at not only a far higher rate but even in absolute numbers. It also applies death penalty to a far wider range of crimes.

Not much consolation. One's too many for my tastes. YMMV.

Sure, but they aren't running the government

No, they only run the previous government. And no one can talk openly against them, or they will lose office pronto.

As opposed to being charged with blasphemy in country B.

You mean like in the Salem trials? What, that was long ago?

Then tell me, why Country A, that stopped practicing slavery later than other countries, introduced women's voting later than other countries, stopped racial segregation later than other countries, has not yet stopped practicing the death penalty unlike other countries, etc etc, thinks other countries should all be on the same timeline as it does, as to what laws they have?

As opposed to being charged with blasphemy in country B. You mean like in the Salem trials? What, that was long ago?

Europe was still trying people for heresy in the 17th century around the time of the witch trials. The inquisition was still very much alive throughout Europe (and enforcing the death penalty if needed). Galileo came very close to being a heretic.

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

Then tell me, why Country A...introduced women's voting later than other countries...

The US: 1920 --Women can vote (with many states doing so before then)

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

The UK: 1928 – Women received the vote on equal terms as men (over the age of 21) as a result of the Representation of the People Act 1928.

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

Germany:

In Germany, women's suffrage was granted in the new constitution of the Weimar republic in 1919.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Womens_suffrage#Germany

France:

Suffrage was extended to women in France by the 21 April 1944 ordinance of the French provisional government.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Womens_suffrage#France

30-33 countries had the women's vote before the US, from 1 year before to several decades.

Not to mention how many countries had abolished slavery before the Civil War time.

"Country A has weapons of mass destruction, and is the only country known to have used two of those in a war, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians, just as the war was ending and the enemy was surrendering."

Actually the statement that they were surrendering is erroneous. Peace overtures were being felt out before Hrioshima, with the last being the Potsdam Declaration. This was rejected by Prime Minister Suzuki with the following statement...

"The only thing to do is just kill it with silence. We will do nothing but press on to the bitter end to bring about a successful completion of the war."

Now consider the time that this is occurring. The armed forces of the Empire of Japan have, for four years (and for other nations like Britain, Holland, France and China, even sooner), showed that they will fight for every last scrap of land, and die trying. To be taken captive was a grave dishonour, while death in service to the Emporer, a shoulders highest achievement. Predictions for a conventional land invasion like Normandy were predicted to cost millions of allied troop lives, based on the experiences that they had witnessed first hand over the war.

Even when the first bomb was dropped, there was resistance to accept the terms provided, due to the belief that the United States could not have more then one atomic bomb. This was believed due to the difficulty of constructing one at the time from Japan's own research team. Even when Nagasaki was bombed, and the USSR invaded Manchuria days afterwards, there was resistance to accepting the Allies terms. 50% of the cabinet wanted the terms changed to allow Japan to disarm itself, and try it's own war criminals, and there to be no occupation of Japan. All of the cabinet demanded that the emperor's position not be touched. In fact, if the emperor's position of power could not been guaranteed, there was no opposition to continuing the war to the very end.

There's a lot of things that the United States, I mean Country A's, foreign policy can be lambasted for, especially as of late. But to revise history to fit a narrative is no better then those that gloss over the failings of the past when stating it was superior to today. To do so places your argument on a foundation of fine sand, ready to crumble the moment someone blows in facts that contradict your statements, like usaar has done in the statement below mine.

  > Country A has weapons of mass destruction, and is
  > the only country known to have used two of those in
  > a war, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians,
  > just as the war was ending and the enemy was
  > surrendering.

Is there credible evidence that the US knew that the Japanese were on the verge of surrendering, but decided to drop the bombs anyways?

It was 1945, the Italians had surrendered, the Germans had surrendered, Japan had been under heavy under attack with conventional bombs (leaving tens of thousands dead and most of their cities destroyed). USSR was also there (had freed Manchuria). Besides the official US line, held for political reasons, most countries in the world believe this was the case, i.e. the US was just itching to test their new weapons in a war setting.

"In his 1965 study, Atomic Diplomacy: Hiroshima and Potsdam (pp. 107, 108), historian Gar Alperovitz writes:

(...) In mid-April [1945] the [US] Joint Intelligence Committee reported that Japanese leaders were looking for a way to modify the surrender terms to end the war. The State Department was convinced the Emperor was actively seeking a way to stop the fighting."

I've read similar arguments and evidence in my language books, but here's some more from a quick search on the web (the source seems dubious in general, but the specific parts legit):

"Months before the end of the war, Japan's leaders recognized that defeat was inevitable. In April 1945 a new government headed by Kantaro Suzuki took office with the mission of ending the war. When Germany capitulated in early May, the Japanese understood that the British and Americans would now direct the full fury of their awesome military power exclusively against them."

and:

"It was only after the war that the American public learned about Japan's efforts to bring the conflict to an end. Chicago Tribune reporter Walter Trohan, for example, was obliged by wartime censorship to withhold for seven months one of the most important stories of the war.

In an article that finally appeared August 19, 1945, on the front pages of the Chicago Tribune and the Washington Times-Herald, Trohan revealed that on January 20, 1945, two days prior to his departure for the Yalta meeting with Stalin and Churchill, President Roosevelt received a 40-page memorandum from General Douglas MacArthur outlining five separate surrender overtures from high-level Japanese officials. (The complete text of Trohan's article is in the Winter 1985-86 Journal, pp. 508-512.)

This memo showed that the Japanese were offering surrender terms virtually identical to the ones ultimately accepted by the Americans at the formal surrender ceremony on September 2 -- that is, complete surrender of everything but the person of the Emperor."

With all due respect, most of the arguments that you're proposing here are the result of historians rife with accusations of revisionist history - Alperovitz especially.

The Japanese did express a desire for peace before the bombs were dropped, yes, but a desire for peace is not nearly the same as an unconditional surrender. At this point, the context of this war should be noted - it occurred, in part, because of the manner in which World War I ended, an armistice (however imbalanced in its terms), which was certainly a factor in the outbreak of World War II. It's understandable that the United States wished to avoid a similar situation with Japan.

Is this justification for dropping two atomic bombs on a hostile nation? I don't know; I wasn't there and I definitely don't know all the details. However, it certainly isn't as one-sided as you present it.

What? The unbalanced armistice was a big cause of world war 2. If anything it serves as a lesson that accepting the conditional cessation of hostilities would be, in the long run, a decent exit option.

With all due respect, most of the arguments that you're proposing here are the result of historians rife with accusations of revisionist history - Alperovitz especially.

Sure, but you can find similar information in many historical works, and most of it refers to actual evidence and sources of the era (correspondence, intelligence reports, etc). It's also only natural to have someone saying something unfavorable for a country's foreign policy actions to be attacked, in academia and elsewhere. Chomsky also gets that a lot, but what he says reflects exactly what third party countries think of us actions.

The Japanese did express a desire for peace before the bombs were dropped, yes, but a desire for peace is not nearly the same as an unconditional surrender

And why would any nation should accept an "unconditional surrender"? A conditional surrender would do just fine, if your goal is to end the war. Especially, when the conditional parts were quite trivial (the emperor and such).

The "unconditional surrender" essentially meant the right to use Japan as an USA base for the next decades. It wasn't even about correcting the Japanese war atrocities, as Japanese were never made to apologize (and pay) for, say, their Manchurian massacres.

Plus, it was exactly the "imbalances" of the armistice that led to World War II. An unconditional surrender, as a even greater imbalance, would have made it even worse.