But I mean, hey, if you know more about the military conditions in WWII than Generals Macarthur and Eisenhower, more power to you.

The point was to make specific conditions, yes. He said that specific conditions, no matter how harsh, would compel the Axis to surrender. "No matter how harsh" does not mean as harsh as possible. That's your logical leap. Stalin didn't believe, like Roosevelt did, that through occupation Germany could be "reformed".

The US military and McArthur in particular were strong critics of the unconditional surrender policy.

My second post there wasn't to you, Putin. I agree with you.

I know, SacredDigits, I was simply adding the point about their criticism of unconditional surrender.

Putin: About the diplomatic moves by the japanese, why then do you think Truman (It was Truman's decision) decided to drop the bomb considering:

1. The effects of the bomb were already known after the Trinity Test
2. Stalin was already aware of the bomb after Potsdam
3. The U.S. allowed the Japanese to keep the Emperor in the the end anyway

Why was there such a rigid adherence to unconditional surrender.

I think something that hasnt been discussed much is the notion that the atomic bomb was not seen as being that special. True, it was known to be the most destructive single weapon ever produced, but the effects of fallout were not well understood, and in many ways several government officials felt the bomb was equivallent to firebombing that had already occured throughout Japan and Germany. I did some reading earlier and there was little discssion on how to avert a bombing, Groupthink and callous politicians, perhaps, or maybe our view of the importance of the bombing is more colored by the planet killing weapons that were subsequently been created

just a thought

I think the adherence to unconditional surrender was because of how the war was sold to the American public. We've all seen the ads designed to whip the populace into a frenzy of how evil the Japanese and Germans were, Truman didn't think that political climate would allow for anything short of a spectacular end for Japan. In my opinion.

So Truman was trapped by political bravado? Problem with that is there were several newspapers and groups calling for conditional surrender. The desire for unconditional Surrender was not by any means unanimous

Source them, as I sourced the opposition to your most recent statement (which didn't stop you from making it again).

ie, both Macarthur and Eisenhower disagreeing with this: "I think something that hasnt been discussed much is the notion that the atomic bomb was not seen as being that special. "

The Truman policy was aimed at keeping the Soviets out of East Asia. This motivated both the use of the bomb and the ultimate amending of the unconditional surrender policy. Truman did whatever it took to get Japan out of the war before the Soviets made East Asia look like eastern Europe.

Why rigid adherence to unconditional surrender - to avoid the problems of WWI and the Versailles Treaty. Roosevelt did not want to make promises to Germany or Japan to get them to surrender and be bound to them when the peace terms were drawn up. Germany's angst had stemmed from the idea that they had surrendered to the principles of the Fourteen Points, but the Versailles Treaty imposed on them afterwards was far different.

Plus, as I mentioned before, Roosevelt believed that Germany and Japan's aggression stemmed from evil ideas and so therefore the Allies needed a free hand to root out these evil ideas by imposing on them liberal forms of government.

Sacred

http://books.google.com/books?id=N8S6Mb26s-QC&pg=PT320&lpg=PT320&dq=halifax+unconditional+surrender&source=bl&ots=myncxAItau&sig=okO_fJ4nU5uLbcej-w_nENLQQ5o&hl=en&ei=-2GwTbK2CoXv0gHkuOFV&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCYQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=halifax%20unconditional%20surrender&f=false

what statement are we talking about?

I might take out that book to see what it says about the situation

The rigid adherence was a facade...they just needed an excuse to actually use the bomb and show the world their might.

If you just spent a boat load of money on a shiny new toy that no one has and everyone wants, then surely a few whimpers of mercy isn't going to stop you from playing with it?

"The rigid adherence was a facade...they just needed an excuse to actually use the bomb and show the world their might.

If you just spent a boat load of money on a shiny new toy that no one has and everyone wants, then surely a few whimpers of mercy isn't going to stop you from playing with it?"

they couldnt have made a demonstration of it if they just wanted to show off? They couldnt have made the trinity test results public? They couldn't have kept the whole thing a secret in hopes the Soviets wouldn't develop their own?

I'm just challenging everything here, I jst find almost every explanation inadequate. Where is VeryMetal to connect the dots.

A test is different than the practical application of the weapon. By all accounts Stalin was not impressed with Truman's boasting of his new weapon. An atomically armed US which was willing to use these new weapons was a different animal at the negotiating table in the post-war order of the world.

"I was against (use of the atomic bomb) on two counts. First, the Japanese were ready to surrender and it wasn't necessary to hit them with that awful thing. Second, I hated to see our country be the first to use such a weapon."

-Dwight D. Eisenhower

Norman Cousins was a consultant to General MacArthur during the American occupation of Japan. Cousins writes of his conversations with MacArthur, "MacArthur's views about the decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were starkly different from what the general public supposed." He continues, "When I asked General MacArthur about the decision to drop the bomb, I was surprised to learn he had not even been consulted. What, I asked, would his advice have been? He replied that he saw no military justification for the dropping of the bomb. The war might have ended weeks earlier, he said, if the United States had agreed, as it later did anyway, to the retention of the institution of the emperor."

Norman Cousins, The Pathology of Power, pg. 65, 70-71.

I don't disagree, although MacArthur and Eisenhower were not without political (foreign and domestic) reasons to oppose the action decided by Truman (as is cousins), but the decision, ultimately was Truman's, and there was very little debate regarding it. If there had been a painstaking debate, perhaps the disregarding of McCarthur and Eisenhowers view would carry weight, but it seemed the use of the bomb was not very carefully debated, if debated at all. This of course doesn't go either way as to saying whether tits use was justifiable or not, perhaps it only questions whether the point of this post is an irrelevant exercise in hindsight that was not much considered by those that authorized the bombs usage.

Secretary of War Stimson traveled to Europe to consult with Eisenhower about the dropping of the bomb, which Eisenhower urged him to counsel Truman against. By Eisenhower's estimate, Stimson was astonished by Eisenhower's reaction and was expecting enthusiastic agreement.

Santa I am confused. Do you think that the use of the atomic bomb(s) was right or wrong?
From my perspective you seem to be tending towards the latter viewpoint, but for some reason you cannot quite bring yourself to unequivocally say it. Just maybe that is in part due to who did the dropping?

I don't see how Santa can even be close to accepting any justification for dropping the bomb and killing so many innocents, given his heritage and family history.

Ful- You are confused because I am confused, which is in turn why I made this post. I am willing to state that I believe using the bomb on civilians was wrong. But I am confused whether or not in the context of 1945 my moral judgment would be the same in a war in which all sides bombed civilian centers at one point or another if not out rightly targeted civilians. My question is less of who dropped the bomb, but when the bomb was dropped. Bombing civilians is always morally reprehensible, but in a situation where the morality of the use of the atomic bomb wasn't even an item on the agenda, do my moral objections matter?

I need to read a scholarly work about Truman's decision it just seems like a bad military, political, and diplomatic decision if what has been written in this thread is correct. I think the question I am more interested in now whether it was a good or bad decision, which I find yself leaning toward the latter.

"I don't see how Santa can even be close to accepting any justification for dropping the bomb and killing so many innocents, given his heritage and family history."

Well if you want to go there my great uncle was placed in a unit of frogmen tasked with blowing up coastal fortifications to pave the way for operation downfall, so actually my family benefited as my Uncle would probably have been among the hundreds of thousands of dead in the event of an invasion.

But in equating the holocaust with the atom bomb, in order to see them as moral equivalents, I would have to agree that the bombing served no purpose other than to kill Japanese or intimidate the russians. At the moment i am not convinced the bombing was understood of being devoid of military merit, and equate it more with the london blitz than with the Holocaust.

Truman, even later in life, was unrepentant about his decision: "I knew what I was doing when I stopped the war ... I have no regrets and, under the same circumstances, I would do it again." That quote is from 1963, after the dangers of radiation were known. I think that we impose this idea that not much was known about the longterm effects at the time, but it seems that everyone who had an opinion in 1945 had the same opinion later in life.

Again, another excellent point for Santa. It is 'easy' for us to sit back and view the event through the sands of the hourglass and debate the pros, cons, dilemmas and repercussions 66 years later. The decision was made at the time under conditions and stresses that very few of us that are alive today can fully understand. This is not meant to make light of current battles/actions/rebellions. We are talking of a time after the world at large was at war for 4 years (13 in the case of China and Japan) that was ushered in on the heels of a world wide depression. August 6 & 9 of 1945 will always be a point in history in which 10 people will look at and come up with 13 different opinions.

@ santa

''Bombing civilians is always morally reprehensible, but in a situation where the morality of the use of the atomic bomb wasn't even an item on the agenda, do my moral objections matter?''

I wonder if you had a chance to read my reference to Joseph Rotblat's testimony? It might form a good source document for your students perhaps?

In passing it seems that those in favour of the dropping of the bomb have mostly made the argument that ''the end justifies the means''. I would respond with this:

''Though to save life is laudable, it in no way justifies the employment of means which run counter to every precept of humanity and the customs of war. Should it do so, then, on the pretext of shortening a war and of saving lives, every imaginable atrocity can be justified.'' JFC Fuller. The Second World War

I did not see it and i would be interested