The most tasteless and insensitive museum exhibit ever.

[Sikander]

Originally posted by cyclotron7


1) It isn't their plane. They are very capable of building a replica if they see fit.

In fact I think they sold me a replica of this very plane when I was a kid.

[Patroklos]

Weren't the Joint Chiefs of Staff created in the National Security Act of 1948? How could they be agains dropping th ebomb in 1942.

I love it when people talk about historical misrepresentation in the A-bombs, becasue the mean is that it isn't presented in the light they want to villify it. There are revisionist that have improper arguements for the ombing, but the most impartial fact for fact analysis always yields the same conclusion; let em fly.

Froma strict military/numbers standpoint of course the military would rather not invade Japan and would rather not drop atomic bombs. But politically acceping terms that you seem to think would be okay would be politically and morally shortsighted and disasterous. But I still maintain that any talk of surrender before the bombs was just that, talk. And I don't care if their one condition was to keep the rights to Digimon, it shouls still be rejected.

-Pat

[Q Classic]

Q-Cubed, placing the war criminals on trial and executing them (I am sure that you would prefer that penalty in the case of the Japanese) is quite a bit different that mass slaughter of hundreds of thousands of innocent women and children in revenge.

actually, no, i wouldn't. even though they did execute plenty of koreans, my treatment of them would be no different from my treatment of kim jong-il--or saddam. let them spend time in the 3x3x3 box. let them walk barefoot around korea begging forgiveness. korea's a lot more rocky than iraq, too.

also, i've mellowed out a bit. i don't think so much that they deserved it, but to ask me to take pity on them, to apologize for something which happened in the midst of a brutal war to a population that was complicit in the brutalization of other peoples...
to humor their seeming belief that they were the only ones who suffered an atrocity during this war?
forget it.

the japanese are not taught about their brutal war history. they are taught that they suffered under the atomic bomb.

it is true, they suffered. but they brought suffering to countless others, and for them to pretend otherwise, for them to imagine that they can get by without confronting that past, asking for apologies and political correctness from america...

it's bull****, and it's hypocritical.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Sikander
In fact I think they sold me a replica of this very plane when I was a kid.

The atomic bomb museum, or the Smithsonian? I didn't see much in the way of the Enola Gay stuff in Hiroshima, but then again I didn't hit the gift shop either.

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by Ned
The following,

"We call upon the government of Japan to proclaim now the unconditional surrender of all Japanese armed forces, and to provide proper and adequate assurances of their good faith in such action. The alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction."

from the Potsdam declaration called for the unconditional surrender of the armed forces, a change from the Cairo declaration that called for an unconditional surrender of Japan.

The Japanese acceptance of Potsdam did not require it to remove the emperor. Even the "reply" by Truman to the condition was interpreted by the Japanase an not requiring removal of the Emperor. Otherwise, the war would have continued.

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/hando/hando.htm

Ned, can't you see how this is proving OUR point, not yours? Nowhere in Potsdam did the Allies say, one way or another, what the fate of the Emperor would be. Japan wanted a guarantee that he'd be kept safe and free from any charges of war crimes. The Allies NEVER granted that request, saying only "He's going to be subject to the authority of the Supreme Commander." After the bombs, the Japanese accepted Potsdam unconditionally, and did NOT get the guarantee they wanted. In order for a surrender to be conditional, the surrendee has to get the condition it wanted in the peace terms. Japan got no such thing--as it's condition was a promise of the Emperor's continued sovereignity.

The Japanese condition was thus:

"The Japanese Government are ready to accept the terms enumerated in the joint declaration which was issued at Potsdam on July 26th, 1945, by the heads of the Governments of the United States, Great Britain, and China, and later subscribed by the Soviet Government, [3] with the understanding that the said declaration does not comprise any demand which prejudices the prerogatives of His Majesty as a Sovereign Ruler."

Now, show me where in the peace terms or in any subsequent telegrams where such an "understanding" was agreed to. In fact, by saying that the Supreme Allied commander would have authority over the Emperor, the Allies were explicitely rejecting this condition. Byrnes reply:

"From the moment of surrender the authority of the Emperor and the Japanese Government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied powers who will take such steps as he deems proper to effectuate the surrender terms...
The ultimate form of government of Japan shall, in accordance with the Potsdam Declaration, be established by the freely expressed will of the Japanese people."

That's not remotely accepting Japan's condition--it's an outright rejection of it. When it is said that 1) the Emperor will be under someone else's command, and that person can decide the fate of the Emperor as he sees fit, and 2) the Japanese people will democratically get to choose their form of government, I'm curious as to how anyone (ok, except maybe a lawyer) could construe this as somehow accepting the Japanese condition that there be a guarantee of Hirohito's retained sovereignity.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Ned


Spencer, rather than debate with me what he said, why don't you read what he said. I quoted when he said an earlier post.

I know the debate has moved on but I couldnt let this go.

Maybe you dont accept that what a politician tells about why he did something may not have anything to do with the real reason?

Truman didnt give a finkers **** about the Japanese. Why should he have?

[Ned]

Spencer, in reading the historical material yesterday in conducting this debate I have come the conclusion that Truman only reluctantly agreed to the use of the bomb because he all along was concerned about deliberately killing women and children. His notes taken during the Potsdam conference confirm this. He even told his subordinates to bomb only a military base so as to avoid killing women and children. Originally I thought that this was just a self-serving statement as a cover for history. Now I believe that he believed that they were going to bomb a military base and not a city. His subordinates apparently were not telling him the full truth about the potential targets.

Apparently Truman was at the center of a struggle between the War Department and the State Department. State, led by Secretary James F. Byrnes, wanted an unconditional surrender of Japan so as to arrest, try and execute Hirohito as a war criminal. The War Department wanted Hirohito and the government Japan intact for two reasons:

-- they did not have enough troops to govern Japan alone; and
-- they feared a guerrilla war of resistance if they were to overthrow Hirohito.

Truman took office in mid-April with the death of Roosevelt. He was completely unfamiliar with war policy and originally took advice primarily from Secretary Byrnes. As can he seen from the quote from the combined Chiefs of Staff, the military wanted to accept Japan's conditional surrender offer because that was highly consistent with their need to maintain the Emperor and rule Japan through the government of Japan. We can see from events that Truman followed the advice of Secretary Byrnes up to and through the dropping of the bombs. When, however, Japan sent its note to the United States after the second bomb offering to accept the Potsdam declaration on the condition that it maintain Emperor, Secretary Byrnes was the only one continuing to insist on an unconditional surrender. This time Truman said that he would accept the conditional surrender because he was sickened by killing so many kids -- exactly the reservation be made in his diary during the Potsdam conference in July.

The reply to the Japanese government was worded in a way to allow both parties to claim they had achieved their objective. The Japanese believe that they had maintained their Emperor and therefore their surrender condition was accepted. The American side consistently pointed to the fact that the surrender of the Japanese Armed Forces was unconditional to maintain that their demand for unconditional surrender was accepted. But in truth, the War Department's position was finally accepted by Truman. This ended the war in a way that made Douglas MacArthur a hero to the Japanese rather than a hostile occupying general that may have and probably would have led to a resistance that would make both Iraq and Vietnam look mild by comparison.

I am reminded by Secretary Byrnes zeal to arrest, try and execute Hirohito even at the risk of inciting a guerrilla of resistance with the debate between the Lincoln faction and the Radical faction at the close of the US Civil War. That debate ended with the assassination of Lincoln. The Radicals ruled the South with oppression of the white majority that set off a guerrilla resistance in the form of the Ku Klux Klan that has had a lasting effect even to this day.