The Jasons: The Secret History Of Science's Postwar Elite (2006) | Hacker News Reader

The Jasons: The Secret History Of Science's Postwar Elite (2006)

nytimes.com

27 pointsJabavuAdams21 comments

I find this fascinating: `Yet the disturbing implication is that, under different circumstances, nuclear attacks might make sense. Finkbeiner accuses Dyson and his co-authors of "supping with the devil."'

I can't tell if that's the review author or the book author speaking. It's the point of such a group to think of such things? Isn't there indeed an unambiguous case in which "nuclear attacks made sense": Hiroshima?

I find it hard to think of cases where a nuclear attack would not be worse than not doing so, but not impossible.

Hiroshima is far from unambiguous!

No, Hiroshima was pretty unambiguous. Nagasaki is a bit of a stretch, but you have to be pretty revisionist in your view of history and the state of the world in '45 to doubt its necessity (we have one, it works, and we can deliver it) vs. the second (we have more than one, capitulate or die in flames...)

Agreed would any sane president look at the generals projected 98% wastage rate for the first 5 waves ashore for operation Olympic and think well this new weapon could force a surrender but no I will give America her own Verdun or Somme what's 1/2 a million dead GI's and Squaddie's.

Of course, this assumes the case that also other weapons hadn't been developed as well.

One of my favorite weapons, where my username is derived, was actually very effective in it's own right.

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_bomb

Of course, a bat bomb wasn't a sure thing, but Fat man was much more complex than little boy, which wasn't as efficient, and we didn't have much more nuclear material than a few bombs worth at the time.

So, in hindsight, I don't think it's easy to say whether or not the atom bomb was absolutely necessary to ultimately prevent many lives (on both sides) from being lost. I do believe it was very effective to that end, however, with the side effect of letting the nuclear genie out of the bottle.

Actually 1 the production line for nukes was gearing up at this point in time and 2 traditional firestorm raid killed more people than Hiroshima

That weapon is so weird. So incredibly weird. Just what you'd expect from a Pennsylvania dentist-cum-weapons researcher, I guess? Thanks for pointing it out!

I think you rather exaggerate the case for both Hiroshima & Nagasaki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Debate_over_the_atomic_bombing...

Hiroshima was only necessary if it was the only way to get Japan to capitulate. This ignores rumours of back-channel diplomatic dealing that could have seen through a less humiliating exit for Japan.

The entire point of unconditional surrender was to humiliate Germany and Japan for starting the largest war yet known to man, leading to the deaths of tens of millions of human beings.

Humiliating leaders and nations is not a valid reason to kill under most ethical systems.

It certainly does not fall under the precepts for a "just war".

Neither Hiroshima nor Nagasaki had any effect on the Japanese leadership of the time, as minutes of government meetings show. The nuclear attacks paled in comparison to the firebombings or larger cities such as Tokyo.

What ended the war was Soviet invasion. Apparently Japan would rather surrender to the USA than face a post-war country divided on two fronts as Germany was.

That's something I haven't heard before. I was taught in school the bombings were pretty much what ended it.

Would you recommend any books? I've found a very interesting article in the Boston here: http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2011/08/07/...

This has been discussed here before, for example https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5813776

I had a similar question. While we're playing with hypotheticals, say the Allies had gained atomic weapons in 1941. It's pretty easy to imagine that using them then would have been preferable to what followed. That the author apparently didn't consider such a thing makes me think this piece is excessively colored by his idealistic mindset. Too bad, sounded interesting until I saw how judgmental he is.

Atomic weapons were not feasible for use until we destroyed the Imperial Navy and the expert aircraft pilots that made up their offensive and defensive air-service, from what I know, which admittedly is not expert-level.

You're right, the parallel for Europe occurred in early to mid 1944. Might have shortened the war six months? It's not clear though. It could be argued the turning point was really boots supplementing the ongoing strategic bombing. Or maybe the key event was Hitler exiting and handing things to Dönitz, who immediately suspended operations and began winding down all the madness.*

Interesting tour of how air control fluctuated in WWII here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_supremacy#World_War_II

*Maybe because the writing was on the wall, but I think a case could be made that Hitler was a little crazy and other leaders might have been more pragmatic, seeking earlier options for peace. Who knows though.

Yes, delivery systems must be considered. Wonder what the Allies would have built to deliver a 10,000 lb bomb in contested airspace if one had been ready well before the B-29.

He didn't consider your particular (bad, IMO) analogy, therefore his story is "excessively colored by his idealistic mindset"? What is it about your analogy that makes you think it's such a good litmus test for serious thought on the subject?

Wasn't an analogy, but I'll let that slide. The parent comment to mine answers your question. And remember, downvotes aren't for disagreement.

Surprised not to read anything about Roy Schwitters in this, although he had just taken over as chief of JASON shortly before this article.

One amusing note, many of the JASONs (I believe it supposed to be capitalized) often have thinly veiled experiments/projects, I.e. UT Maya muon tomography research, which was to discover techniques to calculate tomography of a Mayan pyramid, was obviously taken up with actual hopes of muon tomography for vehicle inspection (in fact, most of the experiment's research was exactly concurrent with Roy Schwitters reign of JASON.)

More notably, you also have the NIF.

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