No More Hiroshimas Anywhere, Ever

Good article Beena!

The points you raised are interestings and the efforts undertaken worth while, but still at let us not lose sight of reality! 45 years of peace marches did not end the nuclear race in the west; a collasping economy did!

FYI, the correct terms were, I think, Fat Man and Little Boy! They were named such by Leslie Groves, as joke. Little Boy was Oppenheimer and I am not sure who the Fat Man was...

Ciao!

The ``Thin Man`` was a character (the murder victim actually) in inter-war detective fiction. I think the author was Dashiell Hammet but I`m not sure. In the movies with William Powell and Myrna Loy, the ``Thin Man`` becomes the detective.

On a more discordant and dissenting note, let me say that the nuclear bombing of Japan was a justified act of war. The Japanese had no intention of surrendering and Operation Olympic, the invasion of Japan, would have been the bloodiest operation of the war for the US, with casualties approaching WWI levels.

If an American President had the means to spare the US from such losses and did not choose to use them, than he would be guilty of treason. Yes, certainly the civilian inhabitants of Hiroshima and Nagasaki suffered horribly, but then so did the inhabitants of the Tokyo, Dresden, Berlin, Leningrad, and to a lesser extent London, and so on.

Lets not get too caught up in the ``guilt trip`` nonsense spouted by stupid people. The only thing unique about what happened to the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is that they had a new weapon used on them. There is nothing unique about pain and suffering. Since the Japanese population, civilian and military, would have fought the invaders and followed the orders of the Emperor and the ruling military clique, they were a legitimate target of war.

I am opposed to the Pakistani and Indian nuclear weapons program not on moral grounds but because these are inherently unstable governments, the Pakistani government much, much more so than the Indian one.

I do not know if sub-cotinent can be denuclearised. But you can certainly influence public opinion on issues such as reduction in arms race, religious tolerance and peaceful co-existance with India.

Also, you must keep in mind the real motives of some of the western powers behind their relentless opposition of Pakistan and their tireless efforts to portray Muslims as terrorists and Islamic countries as rouge nations... I would suggest a balanced, and well measured approach be considered rather than a blind following of western NGOs, human rights groups, and governmental organizaitons.

With that said, I wish you all the best!
Have a safe and peaceful protest season!

Re: Fuzair # 2

I think Dillion would agree with you! Dillion is an old farmer in southern Idaho who was a Marine in WWII. After Iwo Jima, he was slated for the first wave to hit Japan and he did not expect to come home! I meet old Dilly and got to know him during my hiking and camping trips there and once the old boy started to talk, he said that he felt sorry for the Japanese, but it was better them than him! WWI levels were an opitmistic number! People forget that at the time of Fat Man and Little Boy, the Japanese still had nearly 750,000 unblooded troops in Manchuria and the Americans were planning on landing in south and fighting their way up the peninsula. The Japanese could always have brought those 750K troops and continued to fight a war of attrition.

In many ways, one should be thankful that Cordell Hull, the secretary of state, refused the American planners idea to drop the first bomb on Kyoto; the cultural center and one of the beautiful cities of Japan and went for Hiroshima, an industrial harbor city and a main port for the Japanese navy! Still, the fire bombing of Tokyo by Curtis LeMay`s B-29s was much worse and the death toll from just one fire bombing of Tokyo was 100K!

To your list, I would also add the fire bombing of Hamburg, the razing of Warsaw, Coventry, Rotterdam, and the list can go on!

Ciao!

Many Indians and Pakistanis live in fear, not
just in South Asia but here in the United States
too.
My biggest fear is that someone will do something
extremely stupid and the road to hell will open
for not just Indians and Pakistanis but an entire
CIVILIZATION to which I belong.

I am not convinced by Fuzair`s and Ferozk`s arguments to justify nuclear bombing of Japan.
The line of argument they are treading is exactly the reason I am opposed to nuclear weapons... It is too easy for a military mind to justify a horrific action like nuclear bombing of civilian population. It all becomes a simple calculation 100K, 7500K, and so on... these are human beings we are talking about...with families and loved ones... Imagine a general using his calculator to decide whether to loose 50,000 soldiers or use the bomb...his calculation result could mean extinction of life on sub-continent.
Thanks, but no thanks!

Why did the Americans drop nuclear bombs on two cities; why didn`t they drop nuclear bombs on remote parts of Japan first to threaten the Japanese first?

As long as the US has nukes, nuclear weapons will not disappear from the rest of the world. This is a fact. And so far, the US has absolutely no intention of getting rid of its nuclear weapons; regardless of what any other country does. The US has committed every major nuclear crime in the world. It has developed and tested nuclear weapons thousands of times more powerful than anything Pakistan and India can ever come up with. It continues this testing to this day. As soon as it was able to carry out simulated supercomputer tests, it attempted to stop any other country from testing also. It has exported its nuclear weapons to NATO countries, and provided them a nuclear umbrella. The reason Japan, Germany, Holland etc. do not have nukes is not because they are overly peaceful nations. It is because they are under the US nuclear umbrella. I believe Pakistan requested the US for a nuclear umbrella after the Indian tests, however the US refused. And most of all, the US is the only country to ever use nuclear weapons. Despite all the arguments presented on thread, I do not think it was justifiable for the US to use nukes against Japan.

Now coming to the South Asian scenario; specifically to Pakistan. Pakistan had absolutely no other option but to have a nuclear deterence, once India came out of its nuclear closet. India has turned South Asia into a nuclear zone, for absolutely no reason. The only way for Pakistan to counter and even out the balance of power was to develop its own deterence. Anyone who has studied military strategy as a profession, and not merely as a hobby, will understand this.

So regardless of how many peace movements against nuclear weapons are carried out in Pakistan, nothing is going to happen until India de-nuclearizes. And India has absolutely no intention of doing so. Infact, India has pushed the nuclear accelerator to the floor. It has come up with a tri-platform nuclear strategy, as well as its own nuclear doctrine (a phrase commonly reserved for superpowers). This means India is planning on launching nuclear weapons from land, air, and the sea. Why? And against whom? It is also testing new missiles one after the other.

This seems more to satisfy the general Indian public, than anything else. It is not achieving any other purpose. India will never be powerful enough to challenge the US in the open seas(hence the capability of obtaining nuclear tipped submarines is something I cannot figure out). It will never be powerful enough to take China on in land and air warfare, either. It can already target Pakistan from the air and land, so being able to target Pakistan from the sea is not going to change anything. So why doesn`t India just freeze its nuclear program where it is, when it has nothing to gain from accelerating it? The only reason I can think of is the Indian political parties gain a lot of internal support amongst the common Indians by pursuing nuclear options. So despite what the author is pointing out, the general Indian public seems quite happy with the nuclear policies India is adapting.

This puts Pakistan in a very odd situation. The biggest mistake Pakistan could make right now is to unilaterally deactivate its nuclear program. This would be suicide. The second biggest mistake Pakistan could make would be to accelerate its nuclear program if India decides on a nuclear freeze. Pakistan currently is following a correct policy. It is only reacting to India`s nuclear pursuits, and not accelerating the race itself. This is generally what smaller countries do, when they are in a conflict with larger countries.

As with the conventional arms race in the Sub-Continent, the controls of the South Asian nuclear arms race are in India`s hands. And so far, India is bent upon raising the stakes in both areas (the current Indian miltary budget increase is one example; the tri-platform nuclear policy is another; not to mention nuclear submarines or aircraft carriers). India could argue that due to its large geographical size, it can justify a requirement for a large defensive military. However what are its justifications for the gigantic offensive military machine it is trying to construct. Where is the invisible enemy that can only be destroyed by submarine launched nuclear weapons? And is the threat to India from Pakistan so large, that it required a nuclear capability to defend itself (even when Pakistan was non-nuclear)?

I don`t see any chance of an end to the nuclear race in South Asia until the average Indian attempts to stop its own govt. from its nuclear ambitions. And apart from the examples given by the author, the average Indian seems quite content with the nuclear and conventional arms race that India has started. All this at the expense of the massive poverty in South Asia.

And why the hell don`t the Japanese and the Dutch and the other goody-two-shoes of the world ever try to stop the US from its nuclear ambitions? The day the US de-nuclearizes, the rest of the world will be forced to automatically get rid of its nukes.

RE: Umairr #7

Umair! you worry too much. Beena has a fool-proof plan to defend the country against a missile attack. She is planning to net all the in-coming, nuclear tipped missiles in that 75 mile long banner of hers.

For rest of your post: AMEN

Re: Umair # 7

The reason being that the US wanted the Japanese to know what the weapon could do. Dropping it in some rice paddy would not have sent the message as clearly as dropping it on a city! MacArthur, in charge of American forces for the invasion of Japan, was against the use of the bomb, but the Joint Chiefs of Staff in Washington did not tell him their intentions to use the weapon and the decision was a political one and not a military one as Fairkudum seems to think!

It was just a coincidence that it was dropped on Japan, because if the war had continued in the west against the Germans, the Americans were thinking about using it on Berlin, because the British who were suffering badly from the German V-1 and V-2 raids on London were pressuring the Americans to drop it on Germany. Other reason being that the Americans wanted to end the war in the east before the Russians could get in and the bomb was dropped on the same day as Russia declared war on Japan. This was a purely political decision and had nothing to with war, which was already in process of winding up!

No one knows it, but after the war in the west, most American combat units were being transfered to the east agaisnt the Japanese and there were instances of men refusing to move east and fight on; mutiny! Hence, the need for a rapid end and the military pressure on the political leadership to end the war. Within 24hrs after Hiroshima, the Japanese Imperial Cabinet was in a meeting chaired for the first time by the Emperor and a decision was taken to end all hostilities, but before that could be conveyed to the Americans, a second weapon was dropped.

Now there is a host of arguments and counter-arguments, but the utilization of the second weapon was difinitely ``over kill``. Another factor to considered is that when Truman became the president, he was not aware of the Manhattan Project and he did not have the same kind of rapport was FDR did with the military. There is enough evidence to suggest that had FDR lived, he might have made a different decision and there is some evidence to back this theory. FDR was a former secretary of the navy during the WWI and for the invasion of Japan, the US navy was hoping to get the lion`s share and we know, historically, that the navy resented the Army Air Corps getting the glory for ending the war and had FDR lived, he might have been persuaded by the navy to go for the invasion instead of ``trying out an untested weapon``.

Umair, look at this way; this was a bargaining chip for the American services to secure their post-war future and who ever ended up with winning the war was going to get the biggest slice of the post-war defence budget! Who gets the biggest slice today? Air Force!!!! in 1947, the USAAC- United States Army Air Crops became the US Air Force and took on the job of the strategic defence of the US. This was about 10 years before the navy would have the ability to do and about the same time before the navy`s first nuclear submarine. Remember what Eisenhower said about the military defence industrial complex, this was just the begining of it! Who brought the German rocket scientist out of Germany before the advancing Russian armies? United States` Army Air Corps intelligence!

As to the question why the Germans and Europeans did not go nuclear, the answer is simply that the French and the British saw themselves as the post-war powers in Europe and wanted to dominate Europe between themselves. This changed, when the Soviets refused to vacate their zones in eastern Europe and the Americans started to commit to western Europe. Once this happened, the Americans did not want to ``compromise`` on their strategic interests and wanted to deal directly with the Soviets and hence, offered the nuclear umbrella to the Europeans. Just look at the chronology and you will see some interesting discprencies. NATO was formed to defend Western Europe against the Soviets and their military alliances, but the Warsaw Pact was formed in 1949 as reaction agaisnt NATO!

I am sorry folks, but the decision to drop the bomb was more complex than a few generals getting together! There is more to this than meets the eye!

Umair, I agee with your post on Pakistani nuclear options, but I still think that people need to take a critical look at the events of August 6, 1945 and not try to paint the reality in good verus bad terms! These guys were playing for the brass ring and the prize of a post-war world and in this game, there were no prizes being offered for finishing second! In this case, it was not how you played the game, but whether you or lost!

Hope this helps...

Ciao!

article: good

nuclear weapons: bad

end to arms race: good

killing of innocent: bad

beena: good

rsaxena: bad (just kidding) ;)

FerozK!

Your point of Justifying the American dropping of bomb on Japan does not make sense.

As a people, what is in the best interest of people is Nuclear free world. No question about that.

The interest of Capital determine that war should be imposed and won to perpetuate their profits. It is as simple as that.

I as a person can tell you that there is no animosity between people, unless it is created at superhuman level, like religion, nationalism etc etc.

Pakistan is destined to pursue a nuclear deterrence course as long as India does pursue. It is not right. But it is compulsion.

Simply put there should be a movement for Nuclear free world. Multilateral disarmament, not unilateral disarmament.

Re:Krashid # 11

I think that whole situation was different...

Still the dropping of the bomb was decided on two levels; political and military and both did not complement each other!

Am justifying the use of nuclear weapons on Japan as you seem to suggest? The answer is yes and no! Yes, in the political sense and no in the military sense. You have understand the geo-politics of the time and that is the key, you have to understand the issues as they were debated in 1945 without any hindsight or morality of 2000.

Nuclear weapons are just another weapon and the fact that they are efficient in killing more people does not lessen the fact they are just another weapon! Wars kill people! There is no morality in wars or in killing people and it is wrong to impose a false set of morality on something, which is nothing more than murder writ large!

Ciao!

The thrust of the essay is something few rational people would object to loudly. I would recommend caution is wholesale condemnation of the August 1945 attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Let`s not forget that those bombs, as grisly as they were, ended a world war far more quickly and with less human deaths than would have been the case otherwise. I wasn`t there in the jungles of Malaya and the mountains of Burma fighting an enemy who was brutal and uncompromising. My ancestors were. Like most WWII vets they were glad that the war was over thanks to the A-bomb.

The argument can be made for nuclear deterrence during the Cold War. It was these nukes which kept it a ``cold`` war as opposed to a ``hot`` war in which the numercially far superior Russians would have marched and gobbled up the rest of Europe.

Criticism of nuclear weapons is okay but let us not forget that perhaps these very nuclear weapons gave us the opportunity to voice criticism so loudly. Or else some of us would be parroting the patriotic lines in Japanese while others singing the Communist Internationale.

FerozeK

post#12

That was an excellent reply.

The only good thing about nuclear weapons is that it has made humanity realise & understand WAR for what it is, what is was & what it has always been--pure evil.

In history, soldiers have romanticised war. In fact, theyve made it a quasi-religion. The movie Patton showed how he viewed war:a glorious endevor, an adventure where good conquers evil, an enterprise of honor,discipline & patriotism.

In hindu mythology, war is glorified in both the Ramayana & Mahabharat. Both epics, conclude that war ultimately causes more harm than good. War can resolve some problems, but new ones come up to take their place, that leads humanity to call for arms again--& the cycle continues.

If the atom bomb wasnt discovered, NATO & the Warsaw Pact would have probably gone to war. Since conventional weapons are able to kill more efficiently & quickly, there would have been more casualties than WW2.

It was the bomb that prevented the cold war from warming up. The prospect of nuclear war forces humanity to look at war for what it always has been--murderous, destructive, unjust; an embodiment of evil.

A nuclear war will not resolve the Indo-Pak problem. It will wipe out civilisation in the subcontinent. There is no such thing as a ``limited`` nuclear war. What good is Kashmir then to anyone?

Sometimes I feel the way we are behaving makes God feel we of the subcontinent deserve to be annihilated from the face of the earth.

Dear Beena,

India made a mistake by exploding the nuclear bombs and forcing Pakistan into the game. In this regard Pakistan`s explosion can be justified, but that certainly doesn`t mean we should be euphoric over our Pakistani or Islamic bomb and start making replicas of Chaghi hills and Ghauri missiles in our cities. There is no such thing as Islamic bomb, a nuclear bomb targets innocent civilians and is used to create terror in the population which is against the teachings of Islam.

In a newspaper someone said that he was proud of Pakistan because of two reasons, construction of motorway and exploding of nuclear bombs. It seems there are psychological reasons for bragging about our atom bomb, there is literally nothing else in Pakistan to brag about, economy of the country is in shambles, govt institutions have almost collapsed and in this scenario nuclear bombs provide a good diversion, masses are made to shake their heads emphatically over speeches by demagogues. It is time to teach sanity to the people, war is not solution to our problems, lets initiate the dialogue. The peace banner campaign is a good initiative, someone said that first India or USA be forced to withdraw their nuclear arsenals, well demonstration against Hiroshima incident is infact a protest against US nukes, so instead of fussing join hands in that campaign. Their are civilian organizations in USA and India doing that job, in Pakistan even to say anything against the bomb or friendly ties with India makes you a RAW agent or threat to national security. So keep up the good job Beena, my prays are with you.

PS Urstruly, I agree with your previous article, but your reply in ``Facts O level...`` left too much to clarify. I hope we will interact later, but please in the meantime study about sufism and its dominant role in the spread of Islam.

Dear Beena,

India made a mistake by exploding the nuclear bombs and forcing Pakistan into the game. In this regard Pakistan`s explosion can be justified, but that certainly doesn`t mean we should be euphoric over our Pakistani or Islamic bomb and start making replicas of Chaghi hills and Ghauri missiles in our cities. There is no such thing as Islamic bomb, a nuclear bomb targets innocent civilians and is used to create terror in the population which is against the teachings of Islam.

In a newspaper someone said that he was proud of Pakistan because of two reasons, construction of motorway and exploding of nuclear bombs. It seems there are psychological reasons for bragging about our atom bomb, there is literally nothing else in Pakistan to brag about, economy of the country is in shambles, govt institutions have almost collapsed and in this scenario nuclear bombs provide a good diversion, masses are made to shake their heads emphatically over speeches by demagogues. It is time to teach sanity to the people, war is not solution to our problems, lets initiate the dialogue. The peace banner campaign is a good initiative, someone said that first India or USA be forced to withdraw their nuclear arsenals, well demonstration against Hiroshima incident is infact a protest against US nukes, so instead of fussing join hands in that campaign. Their are civilian organizations in USA and India doing that job, in Pakistan even to say anything against the bomb or friendly ties with India makes you a RAW agent or threat to national security. So keep up the good job Beena, my prays are with you.

PS Urstruly, I agree mostly with your previous article, but your reply in ``Facts O level...`` left too much to clarify. I hope we will interact later, but please in the meantime study about sufism and its dominant role in the spread of Islam.