grateful? thats a stretch but folk who understand the reason behind the first bomb and are accepting of it plenty. all my family on thjt side except one cousin
I defer to your claim, since I wasn't there: bunches of Japanese people appreciate having been a-bombed
so len did you accidentally forget to quantify your experience? you wouldn't be dodging are ya?
You didn't "quantify" yours, for that matter. The question is impossible to answer accurately; I've known lots of Japanese people in college and grad school, but as I've admitted, never been to Japan. But none of that's relevant, since I'm not claiming personal knowledge of what Japanese people think. If you're correct, and I can't prove you wrong, the Japanese themselves have bought the propaganda which we know full well to be a lie:
almost all of Truman's commanders
opposed the bombing, including: General Douglas McArthur; chief of staff, Admiral William Leahy; chief of Naval Operations Admiral Ernest J. King; Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz; Admiral William "Bull" Halsey; Rear Admiral Lewis L. Strauss; commanding general of the U.S. Army Air Forces Henry H. "Hap" Arnold; General Claire Chennault of the Flying Tigers; Army Strategic Air Forces Commander Carl Spatz; and Army Air Force General Curtis "Bombs Away" Lemay.
Then of course there was the
United States Strategic Bombing Survey of 1946, which said in part,
Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts, and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated.
The claim that half a million American lives were saved is a myth that began some time after the fact; the actual projection for an invasion of Kyushu was under 50,000 casualties[1]. Truman himself
never claimed that he dropped the bombs to save
Japanese lives. Rather, he said things like, "When you deal with a beast you have to treat him as a beast. It is most regrettable but nevertheless true[2]."
Truman also lied outright to the American people. On August 9, 1945, he stated: "The world will note that the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, a military base. That was because we wished in this first attack to avoid, insofar as possible, the killing of civilians." The next day he commented to his cabinet concerning his reluctance to drop a third bomb because, "The thought of wiping out another 100,000 people was too horrible." He added that he didn't like the idea of killing "all those kids[3]."
The bottom line is that the Japanese were ready to surrender. All they asked was that Hirohito be spared (which, in the end,
he was). Instead, they were nuked. Twice.
--Len.
[1] Barton J. Bernstein, "A post-War Myth: 500,000 U.S. Lives Saved," Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, 42, 6 (June/July 1986), 38-40.
[2] Alperovitz, Decision, p. 563.
[3] Barton J. Bernstein, "Understanding the Atomic Bomb and the Japanese Surrender: Missed Opportunities, Little-Known Near Disasters, and Modern Memory," Diplomatic History 19, no. 2 (Spring 1995): 257.
