why 6 aug 8.15am deserves silence

[Whaleboy]

Originally posted by MichaeltheGreat
So?

Instead of 300 bombers dropping incendiaries for 4 hours and creating a firestorm that sucked the oxygen out of people's lungs 20 miles away, we had one bomb from one bomber. That's efficiency. Human beings have been searching for efficiency in warfare since the first Neanderthal. Better spears, bows, longbows, yadda yadda.

Why does getting killed by one method mean so much more than getting killed by another? For that matter, why is getting killed by a bomb worse than starving, or dying of pneumonia, TB, typhus, or any of a number of other diseases that were starting into outbreaks in Japan, due to poor health and housing conditions and shortages of basic medical care and treatment?

All war is immoral, and the a-bombs were instrumental in ending that war much faster than it would have otherwise.

Sorry to spoil most everybody's happy, first-world liberal angst, but if you have the choice between two nasty, evil decisions, opt for the one that gets the job finished first.

Wow! I completely agree with MtG!!!! I think the thing with WWII nukes is very much a retrospective thing, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were seen as the progenitor of the nukes of the cold war and today, and the terrible prospect of mutually assured destruction. At the time, it was no different to an incendiary raid. People don't concentrate on the after effects the bomb, only the blast itself so that cannot be used. When you have total war, you're going to have this, so a politically correct notion of "war with limits" is ridiculous. If you're going to be silent, be silent for the war itself, not some part of it you find unpallatable relative to the rest.

[Stefu]

Why does getting killed by one method mean so much more than getting killed by another?

Could it be the 40 years of baby boomers and Xers getting inundated with the message "The atom bomb is going to kill us all, the atom bomb is going to kill us all?"

It might be the mystique of the nuclear that was created during the Cold War and then applied to a pre-Cold War situation that makes it OMG SO MUCH MORE HORRIBLE than firebombings of Tokyo and Dresden or such.

[Atahualpa]

*reading the first page*
jesus people make a fuss about it.

This sounds like delibaretly thinking: hey **** those who died, if they didn't it could have come worse.

And that makes it of course a "no reason" to hold a minute of silence.

See it that way that they had to die so that others (probably many more) could have been saved. That alone justifies, that we uphold a bit of a sentiment for them and not ***** around like stupid 6 year old children.

[MrFun]

Are my posts invisible in this thread?

[Jaguar]

Originally posted by General Ludd



You where talking about things like "illegal occupation"


But anyways, "the end justifies the means" is the same thinking the otherside uses when commiting their atrocities - it's a rationalization that can justify pretty much anything.

Hell, the Nazis turned a defeated and impoverished germany into a prosperous, united, and stable superpower. Surely the actions of the Nazis where justified for the positive results they brought to Germany?

Of course they aren't - their actions involve the wanton slaughter of innocents. Oh wait, but so did ours. But that doesn't matter, because we where trying to stop the other side from their slaughter, right?

Again, the "innocents" that we killed were manufacturing guns, bayonets, and gas chambers.

[alva]

Originally posted by MrFun

[General Ludd]

Some of them where. Some of the ones which the Japanese and Germans massacred where, too.

[General Ludd]

It's just a matter of cutting resources, right? Human resources that are used to fuel the war machine. Civilians. Massacres all of a sudden make alot of sense when you put people into terms of industrial resources.

[Jaguar]

Like the Jews? You're on fairly thin ice here.

[Jaguar]

Also, while you're at it, explain to me which non-Axis country had civilians creating gas chambers...

[MrFun]

Originally posted by alva

[Jaguar]

You do realize that there's a thread for the moment of silence, and that this is a thread for political discussion, don't you?

[MrFun]

yes -- which is why I contributed my opinion here

[General Ludd]

Originally posted by Jaguar
Like the Jews? You're on fairly thin ice here.

They wheren't producing weapons to use against germany, but like I said in my previous post they where percieved as a threat to germany and the Nazis made germany a stronger and more stable country through their actions.

And what about the massacres that where commited against others than their own citizens? Actually, wheren't most of the jews killed from poland and other occupied countries? Obviously they where all making bombs for the resistance or something.

[Jaguar]

@MrFun: Never mind, I thought that when Alva quoted an empty post, that you had posted your moment of silence here.