They Hate Us for Our Freedom...

Amen.

Heh.. the reason you submerged it in water, was because it catches fire when it hits the air.

That's basically why it's used as a weapon.. it's an incindiary weapon. It burns stuff.

Remember chemical reactions occur faster in ground substances since more surface area is exposed (to the Oxygen).


Ever smoke a mole out of a tunnel under a garden?


Do you know who else did or did not sign this section of the treaty? I don't ... and it would provide a better snapshot of how "international" the characterisation is.


I'll second that notion. =(

Yep, fraid so. And penetrates skin, continuing to chemically burn (oxidise) inside the flesh of the victim. No ordinary flames in there. Sounds like a chemical weapon to me. Though I spose we have, and use, many other such chemical weapons.

To me the only possible justification for a democracy allowing its representatives to do this sort of stuff to live human beings is genuinely to protect themselves from real imminent warlike attack on their own soil.

This war was based on lies. It is illegal. It is immoral. It should stop now. If they all start killing each other when we're gone it is tough, it is our fault. But its better than go on illegally slaughtering them ourselves.

In an Iraqi civil war they would have few hi-tech weapons, and boundaries would soon get drawn, and stalemate reached, after the initial bloodbath. Sanctions on all the different parties could at least prevent them from slaughtering each others civilians by dealing hi-tech death from the air.

No, it's actually not a chemical weapon based on any of the weapons conventions ratified by the US.

Burning is not an indication of toxicity.

Exactly. "ratified by the US". Saddam probably hadn't ratified the ban of the poisons he used on his civilians. So ?

Ah well - keep on slaughtering. It's all so reasonable, isn't it? We've just been reluctantly forced into all this killing by circumstances, and by our own freedom-loving natural generosity, yes ?

We'll never agree. Some people see even a deceitfully exaggerated, largely disproven, infinitesimally small (way below road accident rate at worst) just-possible threat to Americans as justifying the slaughter of tens of thousands of non-americans in their own homeland, even those palpably innocent.

Some don't see it as adequate justification at all.

Two irreconcilable viewpoints.

Uh.. yes he did.

Iraq ratified the geneva protocols banning the use of things like mustard gas and nerve gas in 1956.

He then used those weapons on his own people, and Iran.

Saddam undertook to honour treaties signed in 1956 ? Got any links on any of this, Roland? Gratefully received.....

Iraq is listed as a signatory of the geneva conventions.. Just go look at the list of countries on it.

Or are you saying that he PERSONALLY needed to sign it for it to count?

Hell, if that's the case, we don't need to obey anything! Woo hoo!

That's nothing. I hear the U.S. used nuclear weapons on a country (twice) and exposed soldiers to dangerous levels of radiation in unethical military experiments. Just sayin'.

~Ulrika~

Are you talking of the early blast testing of nuclear weapons in the desert?

It's difficult to put those tests into the realm of "unethical". At that point, scientists really did not know much about the effects of a nuclear weapon... Indeed, it wasn't until after both bombs had been dropped, that we started to learn about the effects of such a weapon.

I understand that many people believe that dropping the nuclear weapons themselves was "wrong", because obviously it would be better to just not kill all those people, right?

Certainly, if that was the actual alternative, dropping the bombs would obviously be an immoral choice.

The Nimitz estimates for losses over the entire Operation Downfall were at over 1.2 million casualties, and around 300 thousand dead. And that's just OUR guys... Back in WWII, no one bothered calculating civilian casualties... People counted how many of their soldiers they were gonna lose. Other estimates at the time, but were all much higher than the battle of okinawa

Okinawa was the bloodiest battle of the pacific theater. 50 thousand total casualties there, 20 thousand dead. The Japanese civilians suffered over 150,000 dead. Not their military.. that's JUST their civilian dead from that battle.

Now, the two atomic bombs dropped killed an estimated 120,000 people, 95% of which were civilians.

So, assuming that actually taking the country of Japan would be at LEAST as deadly as the battle of okinawa, there's really no way to suggest that dropping the nuclear bombs at that point wasn't the right thing to do. It ended the war, and prevented the need for a much larger military conflict where not only would we lose a ton of men, but even more Japanese would have died as well. I honestly think that the rationale for the decison was based almost solely on the American losses, but I think that it's hard to look at the numbers and actually come up with a different answer, even if you're counting the lives on both sides of the battle equally... Hell, even if you value the Japanese lives more than the americans.

None of this even takes into account that if the war had gone on much longer, the Soviets would have continued to engage the Japanese in the Pacific theater... And having Japan end up like Germany would not have been a good deal for the Japanese.

Remember, this wasn't a war like Vietnam.. We couldn't simply walk away from WWII.

Additionally, it seems odd that you would pick out the nuclear bombings as an atrocity of interest.. I mean, the conventional bombing campaigns killed WAY more people. Take, for example, the firebombing campaign against Tokyo (or one of numerous examples from the European theater).

Is killing a lot of people with an atomic bomb somehow worse than killing a lot MORE people through conventional means? Because it's got.. uh.. I dunno.. atoms and stuff?

I read no post longer than my hand.

~Ulrika~

Also known as...

tl;dr

You need to set your resolution to 2048 X 1536, and set your fonts to 8pts! You will never have this problem again (well, maybe, but not often).

Oh, wait, how long / wide is your hand (it is your personal hand attached to your arm you are talking about, right?), and how do you measure, length or width wise? This may take some caculations and possibly some plastic surgery, but we can fix this Ulrika!

The cops have a similar policy about the legality of knives. Just sayin'.

In case you're wonder what tl;dr means

The accompanying picture for this article is woefully appropriate for this thread.

You sound like Robert McNamara prior to his Vietnam epiphany, Roland. And I hardly know where to start. Point by point, I guess.



Not true. Initial modeling of blast, heat, and radiation effects by hand-calculation and mechanical binary engines were fairly accurate. The uncertainty factor has been greatly exaggerated by postwar journalists and writers, mostly for dramatic effect.

In addition, there were several extremely well-documented cases of critical-burn and radiation exposure from testing and assembly accidents - all of which supported the existing modeling. The records of the Manhattan District in the U.S. National Archives - readily available in complete form on CD and DVD to anyone - are very detailed in this regard.



Again, not so. The Nimitz estimates were artificially inflated. The numbers were not based on anything remotely approximating objective analysis, and Nimitz and the Navy knew it.

Why? Because the U.S. Navy had implemented a successful blockade of the Japanese home islands in the spring 1945, and were trying to convince the Truman administration that the blockade would successfully bring Japan to its knees. The Pacific Theater had been a Navy operation all along, and interservice rivalry dictated that the Navy oppose the U.S. Army's end-game strategy of invasion. Nimitz's staff inflated the casualty numbers to convince Truman that the blockade strategy was best.

In 1947, when the Truman administration was facing heavy international and domestic criticism for its decision to use nuclear weapons against Japan, former Secretary of War Henry Stimson wrote a famous defense of the decision in Look magazine. He cited the Nimitz calculations at that time, because the inflated numbers were a useful justification. It was the Look article that gave the Nimitz estimate the credibility it still has. But no one in 1945, including Stimson himself, took Nimitz's numbers seriously.

A better estimate was sponsored by CJCS General George C. Marshall, who used analysts from the General Accounting Office and British statisticians at Harwell. Marshall's worst-case numbers were less than a quarter of Nimitz's numbers, and were regarded as the best estimate - at the time the decision to use nuclear weapons was made.

Again, the evidence is well-documented in the records of the Manhattan District, and much additional material has been found, catalogued, and published over the last thirty years from the personal papers of those who participated, and from allied governments who were informed of the process.



This argument was invented by Stimson in the 1947 Look article. It did not represent the thinking of those who made the strategic decision to use nuclear weapons against Japan in 1945. Army commanders and JCS were of the opinion that the Okinawa and Iwo Jima experiences were not especially relevant to a home island invasion - when the two battles were brought up in discussion in June 1945. There are specific reasons why theater commanders and the JCS believed this - and they are too detailed to go into here. Suffice it to say that the Army and Navy agreed on one thing: that the defensive infrastructure and morale of the Japanese home islands was nowhere near as developed as in the off-island approaches.



I'm afraid that the 1945 versions of the JCS, the Army, the Navy, the Secretary of War, the CO of the Manhattan District, and most of the Truman administration disagree with you here - and again, the records are very plain. There were a multiplicity of reasons that went into the decision making process, and potential American casualities, although very important, was certainly not the overriding factor. Once again, Stimson and the Truman administration would claim that it was the overriding factor in 1947 - for political reasons.

Among the other reasons for the decision was interservice rivalry, the cost of the bomb project itself and the need to justify that cost to Congress, the political implications of not using the weapon should the American public learn of its existence in the postwar period, the diplomatic utility of nuclear weapons in the postwar environment viz. the Soviet Union, the confused nature of decision-making in the early Truman administration itself, and the ongoing Allied record of battlefield testing of new military technologies.



You're right, and it's irrelevant. Using nuclear weapons represents an arbitrary line that should not be crossed - and the world agreed upon that as early as 1926. In that year, the League of Nations defined indiscriminate area weapons as "weapons of mass destruction" and proscribed gas, biological, and city-wide incendiary weapons as examples of inhumane technologies.

You may disagree or find such blandishments silly, but scientists, military commanders, and the political leadership in the United States understood precisely that they were constructing and using a weapon that had been proscribed by international authority twenty years before. And more to the point - they worried about it greatly. Which is why the Truman administration went to such extraordinary lengths to justify the decision in 1946-1949 - to the point of fabricating distortions like the ones you've retold in this thread. (Henry Stimson was an honest and capable man. The article he published in Look devastated him in a very personal sense. Before he died he told a relative that he believed he had dishonored himself and his country by putting his name on it. Worth noting that the article itself was actually authored by McGeorge Bundy - one of the architects of the Vietnam War.)

I know of no greater example of the effects of disinformation - government and educational - on democratic culture than the distortions and outright lies associated with the use of nuclear weapons against Japan over the last sixty years. What's really stunning about this is that the evidence has been so clearly identified, made available, parsed, and published - and yet, misinformation about things like the Nimitz estimate still circulates.

It's a reason why simple explanations for decisions leading to the war in Iraq cannot be trusted. Almost always in history the real causes of such decisions are complex, interlocking, and often irrational.

Seth, regardless if Nimitz estimates were inflated - it's been discovered from captured documents and officials that the Japanese government was planning to fight to the bitter end. Their decision changed when the a-bombs were dropped, and it still took 2 of them. Pointing out the firebombing of Tokyo is quite apt - they were far, far more destructive to civilian targets, but it did not dissuade the Japanese.

But war is hell. No matter what, people die. Decisions have to be made on how to best achieve goals with the least loss of life - on both sides.

No, elements of the Japanese military - primarily the Army - were planning to resist to the end. That's very different from saying that the "Japanese Government" was planning to resist to the end - especially given the fragmented character of Japanese leadership and policy-making in the last months of the war. Again, simple characterizations often times mislead.

The same set of documents indicate that even the more rabid elements of the Japanese military had severe doubts about their ability to hold the country together and inspire the civilian classes to commit to a suicidal defense. In fact, the fire-bombing of Tokyo had nearly broken the resolve of the civilian leadership and civil institutions in the country. This uncertainty and lack of resolve elevated the influence of the Emperor in the political end-game, and the evidence is that he questioned the sense of the war well before summer 1945.

The Emperor, the civilian leadership, and elements of the Japanese Navy seized on Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a political tool for control over the Japanese Army (Japan, too, had its interservice disagreements), and as a catalyst for surrender. But there is no evidence - from the American or Japanese archives - that the nuclear decision was the only scenario that would have worked this way. And American intelligence on this political manuevering in Japan was uncertain, and did not play a major role in the Truman administration's decision.

Whether the decision was the right one or the wrong one is still an issue - although, unlike Hiroshima, Nagasaki is difficult to justify under almost any scenario. What isn't at issue is the method by which the Truman administration made the decision - it was deplorably irrational. "War is hell" ain't gonna cut it when the strategic system falls apart like that.

Except the Emporer was a figurehead and the military *was* effectively the government.

Sorry, I could have been more clear about that.


Doubts are not plans, though. It's normal for military to question plans - they help to provide feedback to formulate the best plans. I know Bush has got this country convinced that questioning the President is wrong, but ... frankly, he's ... *resisting urge to swear amid great dissatisfaction of the plans enacted by Busy* ... very incorrect.

By contrast, a major reason Hitler lost WWII was because he didn't listen to his generals. Japan lost because they simply were outgunned and our soldiers fought hard.


I see what you're saying - and you're correct about how the power was seized, from what I've read.

However, if America had invaded, it would have been chaos ... communication would have been cut off and it would have been huge casualties. Case in point - they were finding Japanese soldiers years after the war, stranded on islands that were not taken by the US, who still thought the war was on.

Also, there is a huge difference in resolve when the battle is on your own soil. If America had invaded Japan proper, people would fight to defend their homes and families.


Point taken. Well stated.

Dude!!!!!!

I totally saw that episode!

A huge body of the information we have regarding nuclear detonation actually comes FROM the bomb sites at hiroshima and nagasaki.

I think I'd have to actually see some of this research to accept what you're saying here as true... It's easy to say, "They knew all about it... the proof is somewhere in the National Archives".




There are a few different sets of predictions involving the casualty count for Operation Downfall....

If you don't like the Nimitz estimates, then which set of estimates DO you want to work with?

Because they ALL indicate MASSIVE losses on both sides. So, feel free to pick someone's estimates, and we'll run those numbers.




Ah, the good ol' Marshal Numbers! I actually was originally going to pick these ones originally, but I felt that it would be more interesting to actually allow someone like yourself to choose them... Which I knew you would, because they're by all accounts the most conservative estimates for the operation's cost. Pretty much textbook attack against the atomic bombing of Japan.

Of course, there's an excellent reason why Marshal's numbers are so much lower than Nimitz.... Do you know why this is, Seth?

Marshal doesn't count any losses at sea during the invasion... which by all accounts was somewhat silly, considering the losses we had taken in previous battles like Okinawa. Off the shores of Kyushu, the fleet would be even more exposed to Kamakazi attack. And, after the war ended, we realized that we had underestimated the Japanese force on their main island by about a factor of 3.

But let's work with those numbers anyway. So, it's "only" a quarter of Nimitz numbers. *chuckles*

Ok, so Marshal "only" predicts a total casualty count of around 70,000 in the first 60 days for the Americans... not including any battles at sea, and while using intelligence that greatly underestimates the Japanese strength.

This was considered to be about 20% of Japanese Casualties (military), so you're talking about 350,000 casualties on the Japanese military side... This is not considering civilians.

Now, we can compare this to Okinawa... This would be MUCH bloodier than Okinawa.. Even Marshals estimaes, which were FAR more conservative than anyone else's, predicted this would be much bloodier than Okinawa.. and Okinawa resulted in more civilian deaths than Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined.

So, even with Marshal's estimates, which were almost certainly well under what would actually have happened, they STILL suggest that invasion of Japan would have been far bloodier than dropping the two bombs.






Prior to the bombing, the JCS predicted that we would take 1.78 fatalities/1000 man-days. In the course of the 90 day campaign, this suggested that we'd take 456,000 casualties, with around 109,000 dead.

So, while maybe they thought the the defensive infrastructure on the Japanese mainland was weaker (which we learned after the fact, was NOT the case), they were still making an estimate that involved over 450k casualties just for our side.

Think about this for a moment. We're upset that we have 2000 dead soldiers in Iraq after a few YEARS.... We're talking about over a hundred thousand dead in 3 months... And that's not including the guys on our ships who would have died.




No, I'm afraid that they don't.

You're suggesting that they produced numbers that are smaller than the nimitz predictions. While that's certainly true, the numbers that even THEY suggest were still far higher than the deaths suffered by dropping the atomic bombs.

Like I said, you're presenting a fairly textbook argument here... certainly one I've heard before. But the problem is that when you actually look at the numbers from even the sources you cite, you still end up with some pretty huge freaking numbers.




Yes, although neither Japan nor the US were signatories of those conventions.

Wow! Truly amazing! A bunch of people who mostly seem to lack, or refuse to use, a basic high school level understanding of chemistry, let alone military tactics, debating the use of white phosphorous. And then somehow devolving into an argument over using atomic bombs on japan! Ah, only on the internet.

Well, in any case, I think I'll accept the claim that WP is a "terrible chemical weapon." Fine by me! HEy, I'll even go with labeling it as a Weapon of Mass Destruction! Wonderful!

Okay, all you war protestor people. . you can all go home now! Yep, turns out the war was justified. Seems Saddam DID have huge stockpils of CHEMICAL weapons! Yep! It's all good! You can all put down your signs now and go home and once again feel proud of your nation and it's good works. ;>

Hey, who knew it was so easy to find chemical weapons in Iraq? Why didn't anyone TELL me all we had to do was change the definition? *l*

Should Godwin's law extend to cover Hiroshima and Nagasaki? It was the same war.

Agreed on the second point. I don't get what the fuss is about using incendiary weapons. Anything that blows up is going to cause some kind of chemical reaction somewhere. If anything, we should really just start using Neutron bombs since it seems more ethical (like the poster a few months ago brought up). Maybe we could even make Neutron death rays, that would be pretty sweet.

Actually, the reason the neutron bomb wasn't put into commission was because even politicians felt it was unethical - killing the people and leaving cities intact ... it's too much of a doomsday device - that it removes the negative consequence for wiping out your enemy.

Unless you're being facetious, in which case ... I would say that we should develop a weapon that cascades matter into antimatter. This way we can wipe out the Earth and end all war.