Tokyo WWII firebombing, the most deadly bombing raid, remembered 70 years on
abc.net.au
abc.net.au
It's long, but quite informative.
America has 330.
Japan has seen zero economic growth for over 20 years.
America's GDP has doubled in that time.
America has the best universities, by far. Japan does not.
America has the most productive, technologically advanced, large economy on earth. Japan has been stagnant for decades.
Writing 1500 kanji with your eyes closed doesn't appear to be very useful in the real world.
Note that this does not include second/third generation immigrants.
Albert Einstein also chose to become an American.
What you're describing is the greatest honor a country can receive. There is no higher compliment, than the best and the brightest the world over seeking to immigrate to your shores. They have been seeking America out for centuries because it was and still is an immense land of opportunity.
Even the few small ones that had been placed in country side have been taken down in recent months/years thanks to Abe. And interestingly, Abe's mother's ancestors are from Korea supposedly.
I don't attribute much importance to monuments and statues. Do people actually care about them ? There were monuments to the ones who fell during 14-18 all over Europe and it did not prevent any of the European countries to enter a large scale bloody war all over again 20 years later. So what are the monuments good for?
Japan: When you actively rewrite history books to hide your past sins, you cannot be apologizing sincerely.
I agree with you on this, but if you think Japan is the only country rewriting history books my friend, you are deeply mistaken. Look at what US kids are taught about History, and cry.
Yes. Here's a cemetary of russian victims in the center of Hannover, right across the street of one of the most popular gathering places in the entire city.
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/4lzlr7p5kmao7s1/AACiUPiTvnMoYYom-...
Notice how it's well-kept and clean.
I posit that even if they installed as many plaques and statues as Germany, you would still find another reason to criticize them.
"We can no longer direct the war with any hope of success. The only course left is for Japan's one hundred million people to sacrifice their lives by charging the enemy to make them lose the will to fight."
In light of this, what do you suggest US should have done?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potsdam_Declaration
In particular it promised that Japan would be allowed to govern herself after an occupation.
The Russian role in all of this is also pretty nuanced. They didn't sign the Potsdam Deceleration because they weren't yet at war with Japan. Once Russia was in the war then the status of Potsdam became questionable for the Japanese government, it was a classic high-pressure sales tactic. "Take this offer before it expires."
The emperor mentioned the atomic bomb as a reason for the surrender in his rescript, but that was likely just a face-saving excuse. The government already demonstrated its willingness to let the entire population of Japan die fighting the allies so it doesn't seem too reasonable that they'd quibble over the means.
In addition, there is no evidence that any peace proposal would have been acceptable to the cabinet at this time.
Almost worked on the UK.
Not much better proof needed to show that Japanese leadership would've watched their population die of starvation over months and years.
Japan had no capacity to attack anywhere anymore. All of its fleet had been sunk. What was the point of leveling the country to the ground, when the opponent is already KO and on its knees ?
Given the vast genocide Japan had committed - given their fanaticism - there was also no way to know for sure that Japan would cease its war machine and territorial conquest aims, without invading and overseeing the dismantling of their system.
After what Japan had done, were the allies supposed to just take Japan's word for it, that they were going to become peaceful and withdraw from mainland Asia permanently?
Was the firebombing and the atomic bomb much better then that? Hell yes.
I don't remember any talking points being taught to me as a child, but I guess that would be the case with any good brainwashing. I am familiar with the justifications for targeting Japanese civilians for conventional and nuclear bombing though, something along the lines of Japan being prepared for total war - down to child combatants with sharpened sticks. In war you have two options for ending hostilities, complete annihilation or political resolution (surrender, cease fire, etc). If Japan went into total war mode, and they made it clear that they would if necessary, then they remove the political resolution option. So with that in mind, it is not a stretch to say that firebombing and nuking hundreds of thousands saved millions of Japanese lives.
Consider the fact that this firebombing occurred 1945-03-09, and the Japanese were still wanting to fight for another five months, until the second atomic bomb drop on 1945-08-09. The only thing that brought them to the table was the idea that their enemy possessed a weapon where a single bomb could level a city, they had no idea how many atomic bombs existed.
Utterly wrong. This has been shown many times that the A-bomb was not the decisive part. It was the upcoming involvement of Russians on the Japanese front. Please stop spreading explanations for 5-years olds.
To add on that, at the time of the surrender, the long term effect of the bomb was not known to the japanese and as such the nuclear bombing wasn't the worst city bombing they suffered, neither in terms of infrastructure damage or loss of life.
Some more information for those interested
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/u6qqo/there_h...
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/2y98yc/did_th...
The "5 year old" comment probably has something to do with it. HN doesn't tend to downvote people into the gray just because they are saying something that other people disagree with, unless the comment is also not particularly civil.
This one is not civil, as it personally attacks another commenter: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9169613 "That says a lot about you."
This one is in defense of the less-than-civil comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9169781
I say things that many people disagree with all the time on HN, but pretty much the only times that I am downvoted into the gray are when I am not civil. For instance, the only comment of mine that has been grayed in this discussion is this one: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9169426 That comment is little more than a personal attack, and was therefore downvoted.
I seem to recall that from the archived discussions between the officials at power at the time, the Russian invasion wa the key topic at hand to capitulate before any soviet forces landed.
Does anybody know what narrative is taught in Russian schools to Russian children?
The German Wehrmacht had just been defeated by the Soviet Army three months earlier.
Also, the Japanese army had already tried and failed to defeat the Soviet army in 1939. In fact, that's how Zhukov got his first Hero of the Soviet Union award. That was in 1939, before the massive Soviet arms buildup, before the dissipation of Japanese strength in the Pacific.
A Japanese general would have to be delusional to think that he could hold out against the Soviets in 1945.
Japan had been already utterly destroyed by that time, the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were far from the most deadly bombings at that time. Let me remind that most large cities had been already razed to the ground. You are completely missing out the context of the time and giving way too much importance to the nukes.
That is my point exactly. Those cities were selected for the purpose of a technological demonstration, not body count. I thought I made it clear in mentioning the time span between firebombing and surrender that Japan was not super concerned about body count, it was more about maintaining sovereignty following eventual defeat. The US demonstrated a technology that would allow it to annihilate Japan without having to shoot every child holding a stick. That would make total war, and the hope of war weariness in your enemy, completely pointless.
Rather, they demonstrated not only this new capability of the United States, but perhaps more importantly they demonstrated the country's willingness to inflict massive civilian casualties in an ostentatious display of the capability.
Ultimately, the bombings were intended to frighten the entire world in submission, providing leverage that was used to construct the United States empire following the war.
There is no way to know that without knowing the conditions of surrender that Japan had in mind. I have a feeling that the conditions would have been as well reasoned as an island nation attacking an industrial powerhouse with the natural resources of an entire continent :)
And what is that smile for, anyway? Do you think this is funny?
"the authority of the Emperor and the Japanese Government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied powers"
> And what is that smile for, anyway? Do you think this is funny?
Yup, because you just demonstrated the irrationality that I was hinting at: what is an emperor who is subservient to a foreign power? Not an emperor.
That is debatable, but not by you, as you seem to be missing the point. Negotiating with irrational actors is risky - burning them to death, or until they say uncle, is pretty safe.
> ... and you think that that's funny. That says a lot about you.
I have to admit, watching a frustrated care troll twist does put a smile on my face - but it gets old fast. The topic at hand is logical justification, so appeals to emotion are comically out of place here.
What are you talking about?
> Negotiating with irrational actors is risky
They never even tried it.
I'll make this simple. The only justification for the fire bombings and nuclear bombings that has any possible merit is that they were necessary to end the war. However, the US never even tried to negotiate, nor did they try to communicate to the Japanese that they would be willing to allow the Emperor to remain nominally in power. They could have used that to end the war far sooner.
So how could the bombings possibly be necessary to end the war when the war might have been ended by other means? I'm sure you'll say that that wouldn't have worked, but how would you know? The lack of any attempt shows that the US wasn't interested in ending the war: they wanted revenge, and therefore the bombings were not justified.
That doesn't work in real life. In order to know what level of force is necessary, one has to have a perfect knowledge of the opposition. That isn't possible, so you always respond with more force than you think in necessary - overengineering the carnage.
> So how could the bombings possibly be necessary to end the war when the war might have been ended by other means?
If we are going to play the what if game, why stop at the firebombs? What if Japan didn't attack? What if the US didn't apply economic pressure? What if Japan didn't stomp all over Asia? The what if game is pretty boring.
That's exactly the kind of thinking that leads to global nuclear annihilation, and when that consequence became clear, intelligent people finally realized how wrong it is.
But your argument is wrong anyhow. Either you're trying to end the war, or you're not. If you are, you try all avenues, including negotiation. If you don't try negotiation, you aren't trying to end the war, you're trying to prolong it. The US leadership knew they couldn't lose at that point, so they weren't trying to end it.
> The what if game is pretty boring.
It sure is when you lose right away, due to the US never trying to negotiate. Earlier you said that it was "risky" to do so. How?
And It doesn't matter that we don't know what would have happened if the US had attempted negotiations with Japan. It only matters that they never did.
That is the kind of thinking that ends wars. Compare the results of this method in WWII to the results of modern warfare, where force is much more restrained.
> Either you're trying to end the war, or you're not.
It isn't as simple as that, you aren't just trying to end the war - you are trying to end the war while maximizing your return on blood and treasure. If your goal is to completely dismantle the enemy's war machine, and head off another war with them in a few years, then you are most likely going to want an unconditional surrender. So if your enemy announces that isn't in the cards, then why bother with negotiation?
> Earlier you said that it was "risky" to do so. How?
Because irrational actors can't be understood, you can't negotiate without understanding.
> It only matters that they never did.
I don't try to negotiate with salesmen when they announce a hard price, the resulting lack of negotiation is on them - not me.
I agree with most of your post, but not this one.
The other major factor was that the Soviet Union declared war on Japan. Until that point, the Soviets had led Japan to believe it would be possible to negotiate a peace through them.
The only way I can logically fit the Soviet angle in is if Japan thought that they might be able to divide the Allies with a Soviet peace treaty. It would have been a real long shot, but not uncharacteristic of them at that time.
[1]: http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1945/08/19/page/1/article...
Satō advised Tōgō that in reality, "unconditional surrender or terms closely equivalent thereto" was all that Japan could expect. Moreover, in response to Molotov's requests for specific proposals, Satō suggested that Tōgō's messages were not "clear about the views of the Government and the Military with regard to the termination of the war," thus questioning whether Tōgō's initiative was supported by the key elements of Japan's power structure.[47]
On July 17, Tōgō responded:
Although the directing powers, and the government as well, are convinced that our war strength still can deliver considerable blows to the enemy, we are unable to feel absolutely secure peace of mind ... Please bear particularly in mind, however, that we are not seeking the Russians' mediation for anything like an unconditional surrender.[48]
In reply, Satō clarified:
It goes without saying that in my earlier message calling for unconditional surrender or closely equivalent terms, I made an exception of the question of preserving [the imperial family].[49]
On July 21, speaking in the name of the cabinet, Tōgō repeated:
With regard to unconditional surrender we are unable to consent to it under any circumstances whatever. The Allies read this in realtime. Japan was not ready to accept any sort of unconditional surrender. More the point, America and Europe had just finished a brutal war in Europe. The point of view then was that the war occurred because Germany had no truly been defeated in World War I. All where concerned with not seeing another world war.
Maybe your confusion stems from something you said:
> Japan was not ready to accept any sort of unconditional surrender.
There is only one sort of unconditional surrender, that is why it's called unconditional. The Allies, the US in particular, were not interested in negotiating peace with Japan. They were not willing to settle for anything less than Japan's total submission to them, which is why they ignored Japan's overtures to negotiating peace in January 1945. Not, as you naively seem to be believe, because they were "concerned with not seeing another world war", but because the US realised it had the might to do so, and wanted to assert itself as a global military power. Negotiating with Japan would have implied that the US had doubts about their own capacity to wage war. You seem to be aware of this, as you point out in your other comment that was linked to earlier:
> Japan counted on the vast distance between San Fransisco and Tokyo to protect them from the horrors that they had unleashed on China, the Philippians and countless other peoples in the Southeastern Pacific. They were wrong.
They were indeed wrong, but the US had to prove it to them and to the rest of the world, which is what they did by firebombing Tokyo and nuking H. and N.
In addition, as noted above, this only was the proposal from the peace party.
My belief in the United States "being concerned about another war in 20 years" is well founded and documented. Please see the personal memoirs of Marshall for example.
Sadly yes, the United States did need to prove to them, something that very basic laws of economics should have revealed - they had no shot whatsoever, at any point, in winning a war against the United States if total mobilization came into play.
That is not true according to the article by Walter Trohan I quoted above[1]. From that article:
> 4. [Japanese] relinquishment of Manchuria, Korea and Formosa, as well as all territory seized during the war.
This peace proposal was virtually identical to the one Japan ended up accepting. The only difference was that it did not offer the surrender of the person of the emperor.
The veracity of this proposal has never been questioned or denied:
> The authenticity of the Trohan article was never challenged by the White House or the State Department, and for very good reason. After General MacArthur returned from Korea in 1951, his neighbor in the Waldorf Towers, former President Herbert Hoover, took the Trohan article to General MacArthur and the latter confirmed its accuracy in every detail and without qualification.
(Harry Elmer Barnes, "Hiroshima: Assault on a Beaten Foe", National Review, 10 May 1958)
So there is no reason to doubt it.
As for your belief that the US was concerned about another war in 20 years, I am aware that this commonplace ideological piece of rhetoric is very well documented. But let's take it a face value. Let's say we believe that the real reason the US chose to firebomb Tokyo and burn to death around 100,000 people, mostly children, elderly and caretakers was to save lives by preventing another war in the next 20 years. The very least you could say is that it didn't work very well: the US was fighting another war in Korea 5 years later, Cuba 16 years later and Vietnam 20 years later. And yet the rhetoric keeps coming back, as justification for every single one of these events. So if fighting wars doesn't actually seem to prevent any killings, but always warrants more wars, why not change tactics? Why not try a different approach, for example a game of rock-paper-scissors between world leaders? The answer is that wars do indeed work for the purpose they are fought for. But this purpose is not preventing other wars, as ideology would have you believe, but instead to establish the might of the state in the general competition of states for power and domination. And populations are simply the means by which states achieve this purpose: their own population as productive force for the war machine and canon fodder; and the enemy's population as evidence of the state's power, in the form of number of casualties. The more you kill, the better.
[1]: http://archives.chicagotribune.com/1945/08/19/page/1/article...
For the allies to take over Okinawa island, it took 80+ days of near constant combat, resulting in U.S. manpower losses of over 82,000 casualties, including non-battle casualties (psychiatric, injuries, illnesses) of whom over 12,500 were killed or missing. All this for an island of 463 square miles.
And the size of entire Japan is 145,925 square miles.
And Japan was actually saving up their best troops/planes/ships for the defense of the main Japanese islands.
And let's not forget how many Japanese soldiers and civilians were killed in Okinawa battle. Many, many more Japanese civilians would've been killed if an invasion took place. School girls were being instructed on how to use grenades/homemade weapons to try to kill invading US troops.
Nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals (awarded for combat casualties) were made to prepare for the invasion of Japanese main islands. After Korea, Vietnam, Middle East, they still haven't exhausted the stock.
I would prefer that it not commit any awful acts.
WWII was won, with an unconditional surrender, followed by rebuilding and indoctrination. Not merely a cease fire which just flames hostilities in preparation for another round (e.g. Middle Eastern conflicts).
The specter of nuclear war makes us wish we had never opened that Pandora box, but anyone making the decision in the past could not have made it any other way.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_biWi-lXTM
The scale of that is mind-boggling. I had no idea, the first time I saw it, the amount of destruction involved. It rivals Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but we (in the US) almost never hear about it.
To put a more human face on it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Tokyo#mediaviewer/Fi...
Unfortunately. =/
God, help me never.