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Anon

Your post to Arif is amazing especially when one considers your other posts. I can't make sense of you man.

I was born into a strict Muslim family but love was everywhere even when my older brother brought in some US seamen for lunch, my mum would cook them food. That was mid-sixties. My brother worked on US oil tankers taking oil to Vietnam. I just say this so that many here know that even though I was born into a strict Shiite Muslim family we were not crazy as some would like to paint all of us. Indeed almost everyone I know to this day is far from being crazy! May be it is the fact that I do not sit with the ignorant, no matter from what camp.

Yet today, at the age of 57, I have come to a firm belief that we are indeed ONE soul and God is pure and unconditional love. How do I reconcile my heart with those Quranic verses that Concerned and others keep posting here? Well, I do and with logic. This is part of my belief and no matter how hard I try to reason with folk, it seems a loosing battle, for I know that faith and belief is a personal issue. Thus, I try to resist replying to stuff which comes from a mind that is set in concrete.

Ali, Prophet Mohammad's cousin said: A tree that does not bend is the first to fall in a storm.

No one can reach the absolute truth whilst they are stuck in a worldly belief system. Boxed in firmly whilst we witness this whole expanding universe. Truth and religion is set apart. But it does not mean we disrespect others because of their beliefs. Indeed if we are to gain their hearts we must treat them with kindness. If certain Muslims transgress human laws and commit murder, we should treat them as criminals. We should not go waging wars on whole countries and drop bombs on towns and villages just because we suspect there are criminals there.

We do not bomb the whole school yard in order to deal with a bully. Are such basic lessons taught to us in kinder gardens lost to us?

Anon: I offer you peace from my heart as I had done here before. The same offer is for all humanity from me till Eternity.

My heart tells me: My body is that of a Jew, my heart is that of a Christian, my soul is that of a Muslim (truly submitted to God) and my life is that of a Buddhist and my way is Pure Love and it is expanding and changing with every moment yet it remains perfect and at peace with every change.

Arif,
U never were a Muslim-clearly u are a racist fascist zionist jew-and a coward who hides behind a Muslim name.

Your views on Mecca are stupid and ingnorant:as a jew and porbably an israeli,you are promoting another war on another muslim state as the case was/is with Iraq-and where American blood and treasure is wasted while AIPAC/israel/jews sit on the side and enjoy the show.

Go ahead and destroy Mecca-it is no more tha a piece of real estate that can be rebuilt;Islam however is INDUSTRUCTABLE,it firmly in the hearts of 1.6 billion human beings.

Your desperate attacks on the Prophet ring a bell:the same ones that the jews of banu quraizah threw at him in vain 1400 years ago when he was alive-and his message of ultimate truth stood the test of times and Islam today is the fastest growing faith on earth-u can go ahead and eat your heart!!
I would not normally respond to some one like u-but meant to show your unique package of racism and ignorance.

Ms. Gallagher,

“Today we commemorate the day the atom bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.”

You will have to speak for yourself here. I don’t commemorate this day; indeed, I personally don’t know a single individual, beyond you, who does.

“And yet, it is a beautiful scandal, isn’t it? That God would care about one singular, particular life. Where would we be, how would we understand our human story, without it?”

What it also speaks to is our utter devotion to self-absorption. Of what possible use can a God be who is NOT particularly concerned with my invaluable life?

The story that moves me is the one told by Shin Bok-Su. There is no right or wrong here, just one terribly awful; among many others, I’m sure.

I had an occasion to meet and speak with Mr. Oppenheimer back in 1958-9. He came to speak at our high school and our smallish advanced physics class was treated to a couple of hours of conversation with him following dinner. We were particularly interested in his insights into quantum physics and expectations of thermonuclear devices. He was uncomfortable discussing nuclear weapons, immediately shrouded with a sad and tortured look, focusing his observations on the difficulties of their use (as opposed to the morality of their use). He was, at the time, under a cloud of suspicion with respect to security. He spoke very thoughtfully, gently, slowly and clearly. I’ve not the slightest doubt that Shin’s story would have been sheer torture for him to hear or read.

But Oppenheimer tortured himself. The decision to use the bomb actually belonged to Harry Truman and as far as I know, he lost no sleep over it. We have heard both negative and affirmative cases here in prior messages. Unfortunately, both depend on virtual facts which didn’t happen so a definitive answer is indeterminate.

“What has happened to the soul of the destroying nation?”

I suppose the use of the word “soul” in this construction is intended to extend the hand of God into nations, to establish a particular relationship between God and the nation (He created). Sheer nonsense. All it does is muddy the waters.

What we are asking is, “What has happened to the beliefs and principles of this destroying nation?” That is a fair question.

I don’t believe our use of nuclear devices at Hiroshima and Nagasaki has caused any erosion of our principles or beliefs. On the contrary, the first experience of them made their further use unfathomable, until more recently. Haven’t you noticed? We have a lady no less, running for President, who insists on keeping the option of a first nuclear strike on the table, and berating anyone who says otherwise. Yup, it is in our national interest to have every other nation in the world consider the possibility that we might just do them in. Really smart, aren’t we?

Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo, Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. are OUR generation’s problem. They have nothing to do with World War II. The erosion of our morality is found in US, now, not in the fellows who developed and used the bomb in 1945. All you have to do is look at the evening news and see the list of our best and brightest who backdated their options to collect more millions on top of millions. Right? And we just had to invade Iraq to clean out that nest of Al Qaida terrorists, right?

Some people with their altruism worry about the destruction of nations far away from home while they neglect the destruction of the nation that they call home. Very typical....and it bugs my mind..(sic)

Nations do not have souls, just as corporations do not have souls. Only individuals have souls. However, a group of people gathered together to form a nation, or a corporation,agree to subjugate their souls to the greater good of the institution. These institutions provide them with safety, earnings, power, influence. A soul seems like a fair price for all that. The nation or corporation must survive in order to provide this to it's members, so it does whatever is expedient in order for it to prevail. How did the bombings of Japan, the near extermination of Native Americans, the unjust war in Iraq effect the American soul? Not at all. It doesn't have one. The machine grinds on as it always has. But it has effected many thoughtful individual souls, who work tirelessly to end the insanity of war.

Wake up folk. War is an outmoded form of settling disputes. It robs you from being creative. Violence begets violence. Have you not seen the results throughout our history? How much more mayhem you must support before you wake up to this very fact that violence begets violence and that the energy of Love neutralises all other energies.

How many times must the cannon balls fly
Before they are forever banned?

How many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?

How many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?

Well, the answer my friend is in your heart and you keep on using your worldly logic to deny this simple truth.

Just face up to it. Do not deny yourself. Be brave. We are ALL ONE. So, wish for others what you wish for yourself. Do unto others, etc. You know the drill but you keep denying The Christ that is within you. Before the cock crows you will deny the little Jiminy Cricket a thousand times.

You my friends have all the knowledge/logic but no humanity. It resides in your heart. Look for it. It was always there. Seek and you shall find.

BGone states:
"Odd how we can't seem to get away from assumptions. Does God really care? How do you know God really cares? I hope you aren't relying on sacred scriptures. The Bible and all sacred scriptures in turn are proved hoaxes."

Your comment is like asking someone to go for a drink of water while keeping them locked in a waterless room.

This is so typical of a post-enlightenment worlview...making the "assumption" that the universe is a closed system.

If you would be so kind as to unlock my room, I just might visit the church down the street and find out the answer to your question...you know, that "non-profit" organization which delivers meals to the hungry and backpacks for needy children at the local school.

BGone

I generally agree with all you've said. Those who would "fight to the last man" will not give up unless a dramatic intervention occurs, and that appeared in the form of Fat Boy and Little Man in WWII. The Japanese would have fought to the last.

I am just countering the OP regarding the premise that a "line in the sand" was crossed by our nation by dropping the bomb. I do not consider that Hiroshima "eroded our sense of morality" any more than fire bombing Tokyo did. Not at all different.

You forget that we had already destroyed two cities: Tyoto and Dresden; Neither of these were military targets. Clearly, if we had ever had one, we had already lost our soul.

Perhaps as important as what Hiroshima did to our national soul is the effect on the national souls of all the other countries in the world who still fear what we might do with our extensive quiver of nuclear weaponry.

Check out this link to see what a nuclear weapon can do to your town.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/bomb/sfeature/blastmap.html
The Cold War is over, but the threat of annihilation certainly persists.

Islamist,
I think the "Naval Officer" knows more than you give him credit for.
Islam is a very different religion; I however refer to it as a cult. A good friend a recent convert to Islam, now supports Palestine, Chechnya, Kashmir and other "suppressed" nations, the worst part is his new found hatred for the Jews (you and I know perfectly well why). Before his conversion he never knew where these countries were or even existed, today he is almost willing to do Jihad to liberate these "oppressed" peoples. Islam is dogmatic, if one insults, dishonors or defames Islam he does so at his own life’s risk. People loose their lives for criticizing or simply questioning the Koran. Your dead prophet gets insulted too easily.
Destroying the Kaaba is a what if question, one that people dare ask, and why not? Vaporize the Kaaba and what then? What do the militants have to fight for? They will be demoralized and finished with the head of the dragon eliminated. Muslims will not be able to point in that direction and pray anymore. Is Mecca still only for Muslims, will it always be that way, why?

Christians on the other hand will mourn the loss of the Vatican if destroyed, but I'm quite sure there will not be any exploding Christians in crowded Muslim gatherings. Thanks for the questions, I read your comments often.

Asim:
I am no longer a Muslim but unfortunately that is still my name, I used to believe in gods who write books and send "messengers", I don't subscribe to that anymore. You on the other hand need to evaluate why your god sent a very dishonest looting, vandalizing, raping, pedophile, misogynist as his "last messenger".

Nora: Your writing style is beautiful and your question is provocative. I am writing a novel series about a physicist who becomes a pacifist as a result of his involvement in WW1. Then he gets drafted into helping out at Los Alamos. I'm doing research on the place and plan a trip soon, so, naturally, I will be very interested in your book. I too am exploring the same question, but really do not have a clear answer.

Anonymous,
Do u work for AIPAC? The debate is about the morality/immorality of the American nukes on Japan-and not about your fabrications on any thing Muslim;u seem to think that a very lengthy cut/paste job will give your lies and warmongring credibility-it just does not and like many otehrs I would not waste my time reading such BS.

I challenge the idea that Hiroshima eroded our sense of morality as to me it was never honestly developed, or at least it was never developed to the stature that we like to believe. We are a nation founded on slavery and genocide. Hiroshima is in many ways a consequence of that formative truth.

July 5 news roundup of UK terror plot investigation activities and related news:

-- 45 Muslim doctors planned US terror raids. Daily Telegraph reports that "45 Muslim doctors threatened to use car bombs and rocket grenades in terrorist attacks in the United States during discussions on an extremist internet chat site". Police found details of discussion on the British Jihadist web site run by Younis Tsouli ("Terrorist 007"). Jihadists stated "We are 45 doctors and we are determined to undertake jihad and take the battle inside America.The first target which will be penetrated by nine brothers is the naval base which gives shelter to the ship Kennedy." Telegraph believes that is refers to the USS John F Kennedy, which is often at Mayport Naval Base in Jacksonville, Florida. Daily Telegraph states that the Jihadists also referred to using six Chevrolet GT vehicles and three fishing boats and blowing up petrol tanks with rocket propelled grenades. This would support Sky News report on July 4 of British Anglican cleric Canon Andrew White who has said of an April discussion with Al-Qaeda representative where "[h]e told me that they were going to start killing in the UK then the USA".

16 July 2007: The Northeast Intelligence Network was first to confirm during the June 30, 2007 edition of the Homeland Security Report that last month’s failed London car bomb plot had its tentacles reaching far into the United States. Now, NBC24, a television station in Toledo, Ohio is reporting that the FBI has questioned a Muslim doctor who recently moved to Toledo from the UK. Toledo also happens to be the corporate home of KindHearts for Charitable Humanitarian Development, an Islamic charity chaired by Hatem El-HADY, a Toledo physician, and a charity that has been the subject of an investigation for its reported ties to terror organizations.

The Toledo doctor was questioned by the FBI on July 4, 2007, less than a week after the failed bomb plot in London. According to information obtained through additional investigation conducted by the Northeast Intelligence Network, authorities are focused on a number of subjects in the U.S., including Muslim doctors, and others in the Toledo area who are also associated with a specific Toledo, Ohio mosque. When contacted by this agency, a spokesperson for the mosque declined to speak with this Northeast Intelligence Network investigator.

The July 4th visit to the unnamed Toledo doctor has prompted Toledo area Muslims to circulate an e-mail warning to Muslim doctors “to be ready for a knock at the door by the FBI,” and urged them to “have an attorney present” when answering questions asked by law enforcement officials. Following up on the investigation in Toledo, this Northeast Intelligence Network investigator spoke to a federal law enforcement official from Cleveland, Ohio who is familiar with the various overlapping investigations in Toledo. [MORE: Click on "read more" above or on article title to continue reading].

Responding to the e-mail being circulated, this law enforcement official stated that this type of “feigned cooperation” by the majority of Muslims, whether they are imams, Muslim community leaders or simply members of the Muslim community “is the norm.” “It has been my experience that it’s not unusual for Muslims to publicly portray a sense of cooperation, yet privately stonewall our investigations by refusing to answer questions, or limit their dialogue with law enforcement to communicating only though an attorney, even for the most basic of questions.”

This federal official, speaking to this investigator on the strict condition of anonymity, expressed his frustration at the misconception of a working dialogue between federal agents and “certain Muslim leaders and their representatives.” If you listen to them, they are actively trying to help us [law enforcement] weed out the bad guys,” stated this source. “That’s not quite the reality of it. There is a lot of stonewalling, unwillingness to share information about possible actions of other Muslims that could have criminal implications, or even ties to terrorism,” he added. “We’re talking about everything from possible terrorist funding to direct or peripheral ties to terrorism. When it comes down to them helping us by providing even some answers to the most basic of questions, there is a tremendous amount of resistance and unnecessary roadblocks. I can say from experience that instead of answering questions openly when asked, we have been put off, told to direct our inquiries to their legal representatives, or simply turned away. To make matters worse, we have been frequently told to ‘lay off’ by higher ups, to avoid causing a PR problem, I guess,” stated this source. “It’s definitely frustrating and the supposed cooperation, at least from my experience, is not being honestly portrayed.”

When asked about the media reports that Muslims are urged by Islamic advocacy groups to fully and truthfully cooperate with law enforcement whenever questioned, this source stated “I wish it was that easy, but it’s not like that at all. There is a tremendous unwillingness for Muslims to talk other Muslims, and it’s getting worse.”

This is not the first time a doctor in Toledo has been questioned or at the center of investigation. In an unrelated case, Dr. Mohammad ANVARI-HAMEDANI, 72, a licensed physician, pleaded guilty last April to 36 counts of money laundering, making illegal money transfers to Iran and tax evasion for sending at least $4 million to his native Iran over a four year period. ANVARI-HAMEDANI was sentenced to 60 days in a community jail and ordered to pay $1.15 million in fines and forfeitures. U.S. District Judge James Carr permitted ANVARI-HAMEDANI to serve his jail time on weekends so that he can continue practicing medicine.

Here is another site that keeps up-to-date on the Brotherhood's activities and mentions the suspect organizations involved in illegal activity.

http://www.douglasfarah.com/article/233/more-gleaned-from-the-holy-land-foundation-exhibits.com

This is the document, I think related to the CURRENT TRIAL.

http://www.nefafoundation.org/miscellaneous/HLF/US_v_HLF_Unindicted_Coconspirators.pdf

It lists some organizations and people as unindicted coconspirators such as:

VII. The following are individuals/entities who are and/or were members of the US
Muslim Brotherhood:

1. Abdel Rahman Alamoudi
2. Gaddor Ibrahim Saidi
3. Islamic Society of North America, aka ISNA
4. Muslim Arab Youth Association, aka MAYA
5. Nizar Minshar
6. North American Islamic Trust, aka NAIT
7. Raed Awad
8. Tareq Suwaidan

The Muslim Brotherhood's WAR ON THE WEST: 3 of 4

In Britain in 1997, the Muslim Brotherhood founded the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB). This group claims to be moderate, and promotes missionary (dawah) work among the young.
Friday, June 15, 2007By Adrian Morgan

In Britain in 1997, the Muslim Brotherhood founded the Muslim Association of Britain (MAB). This group claims to be moderate, and promotes missionary (dawah) work among the young. Its founder, Kamal Tawfik Helbawy, was at that time the Brotherhood's European spokesman. Born in Egypt in 1939, he had been a member of the Brotherhood since the age of 12. He co-founded the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY) in Saudi Arabia in 1972 with Abdullah bin Laden, Osama's nephew. WAMY is an organization which has been accused of funding terrorist organizations, including Hamas. Kamal Helbawy was WAMY's first president.
In November 1997, in the same year that he had founded MAB, Helbawy helped to found the Muslim Council for Britain (MCB), which was officially inaugurated on March 1, 1998. As Helbawy stated in a 2005 interview: "I played a role in the establishment of the MCB. Our objective was that the MCB should remain independent and its primary function should be to represent and protect the interests of Muslims."

The MCB, whose senior members have supported extremism, enjoyed an unprecedented position with Blair's government, acting as advisers on all things Islamic. In June 2005 its then-secretary general Iqbal Sacranie was given a knighthood by Blair, even though he is an anti-Semite who wishes to see Holocaust Memorial day scrapped. In 1996, Sacranie supported plans to invite Osama bin Laden to the UK to lecture to Muslims, claiming the terrorist was an "Islamic Scholar". Despite boycotting memorials for the Shoah, Sacranie nonetheless attended a memorial service for Sheikh Yassin, the founder of terror group Hamas. This service was held at London's Central Mosque in 2004.

In 2005, the MCB persuaded Blair to introduce a bill which would have outlawed any criticism of Islam, which was neutered by the Lords, parliament's Upper House. In June 2006, the unelected MCB succeeded in persuading the elected Blair government to abandon its 18-month campaign to outlaw forced marriage, which annually affects at least 250 young Muslim girls.

The government has been so manipulated by the claims of the "moderate" Muslims in Britain, that MI6 and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office have actively courted the Muslim Brotherhood. The overtures to the Brotherhood have been made through a unit called the Engaging With the Islamic World Group" (EWIG) which was founded in 2003. EWIG is led by a 27-year old former Muslim radical called Mockbul Ali. In July 2006, this group used taxpayers' money to pay Yusuf al-Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Brotherhood, to attend a conference in Turkey. On July 14, 2005, one week after the London bombings, Mockbul Ali argued that a visa should again be given to Qaradawi. That document and others can be found here.

After the London suicide bombings of July 7, 2005, the Blair government invited Tariq Ramadan, son of Said Ramadan and grandson of Hassan al-Banna, to sit on a working committee. This committee was set up to find ways of preventing radicalism amongst Britain's youth. Ramadan is not even a UK citizen, and according to Jean Charles Brissard, he has had meetings with known terrorists in his native Switzerland. The UK government sponsors a website promoting "the radical middle way" of Islam, where Ramadan has his own page. Tariq Ramadan is still barred from entering to the US, though he insists he is not a Muslim Brotherhood member.

US Politicians Duped By The Brotherhood

In the United States, one individual maintained a pretense of "moderation" which would later embarrass the left and the right. According to the testimony of Dr Michael Waller to the US Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Abdurahman Alamoudi was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. A man born in Eritrea in 1951, he arrived in the US in 1979 and became a naturalized US citizen on May 23, 1996. From 1985 onwards he became involved in many Muslim groups. In 1990 he founded the Washington DC-based American Muslim Council (AMC), which Waller states "has been described as a de facto front of the Muslim Brotherhood." The AMC was an affiliate of the American Muslim Foundation, which was also headed by Alamoudi. Despite this, in June 2002 the FBI called the AMC "the most mainstream Muslim group in the United States."

What is of concern is the manner in which Alamoudi persuaded US authorities under two administrations of his reliability. Around 1993, he was an adviser for the Pentagon on which Muslim chaplains should serve in the US military. He continued this role until 1998. From 1997 he acted for the State Department as a "goodwill ambassador" to Muslim countries. He was regularly at the Clinton White House and had advised Hillary Rodham Clinton on managing iftar dinners since 1996. Alamoudi had made donations to the Democrat party but was open to wooing the opposition.

In 1998, as Frank Gafney recounted, right-wing Republican Grover Norquist formed the Islamic Institute, which aimed to recruit Muslim and Arab Americans to support the GOP. Alamoudi made contributions both to the Islamic Institute and later, in 2000 and 2001, he made payments to a lobbying firm connected with Norquist.

Alamoudi's Brotherhood connections were not touted openly, but in August 1997 he was publicly proclaiming on Fox TV that Hamas was a "freedom fighting organization". Hamas had started its first bombings of Israeli civilians in February 1996, a year earlier. On October 28, 2000, Alamoudi attended an anti-Israel protest at Lafayette part outside the White House, where he was caught on video proclaiming "I have been labeled … as being a supporter of Hamas. Anybody supporters of Hamas here? Hear that, Bill Clinton. We are all supporters of Hamas. I wish they added that I am also a supporter of Hezbollah. Anybody who supports Hezbollah here?"

Shortly afterward the White House outburst, Hillary Clinton returned a donation of $1,000 to her election war chest, which Alamoudi had presented on May 25 of that year. Alamoudi embarked upon at least 10 clandestine trips to Libya. On September 28, 2003 after returning from a multi-stage excursion he was arrested at Dulles International Airport. He was handed an 19-count indictment on October 23, on charges including money laundering, dealing with a prohibited nation.

Alamoudi had been stopped at Heathrow on August 16, 2003 before boarding a flight to Syria, and had $340,000 of Libyan money seized. On July 30, 2004 he pleaded guilty to three charges - violating conditions barring transport to and commerce with prohibited nations (Libya), failure to disclose to IRS his income, and lying to ICE federal investigators. On October 15, 2004, Alamoudi was given a jail sentence of 23 years. He had told officials that he provided Libyan money to London-based Saudi dissidents to finance a plot to assassinate Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah.

Politicians may have been fooled by Alamoudi, who headed sixteen US-based Islamist organizations, but despite what is known of the Muslim Brotherhood's support of terrorism and extremism, US politicians are now openly courting the Brotherhood. On April 5 this year in Egypt. House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer met with Mohammed Saad el-Katatni, the leader of the Brotherhood's 55 members within the Egyptian parliament. Hamdi Hassan, the Brotherhood's spokesman, said Hoyer met with el-Katani once at the parliament building and later at the home of the US ambassador to Egypt.

On May 27, a delegation by four members of the House of Congress again met with Mohammed Saad el-Katatni in Egypt. The delegation was led by David Price, a Democrat who represents North Carolina.

The Enemy Within

While Said Ramadan was establishing European bases for the Muslim Brotherhood in Geneva and Munich, similar actions were being taken in the United States. In 1962, an organization called the "Cultural Society" was set up, the first Muslim Brotherhood body to be formed on American soil. Muslim Brotherhood members are sworn to secrecy when they join up ("kitman" or concealment) so exact details of this group are murky. The Cultural Society mainly drew its recruits from foreign Muslim students at midwestern universities, such as Illinois, Indiana and Michigan. The name "Cultural Society" was employed to draw attention away from its Brotherhood identity. The following year, the Muslim Students Association (MSA) was formed by the US Brotherhood, and up until the 1970s, new bodies proliferated.

The website of a newer Brotherhood-founded group, the Muslim American Society (MAS) describes its founders as "pioneers" - "The call and the spirit of the movement reached the shores of North America with arrival of Muslim students and immigrants in the late 1950s and early 1960s. These early pioneers and Islamic movement followers established in 1963 the Muslim Student Association (MSA) of the U.S and Canada as a rallying point in their endeavor to serve Islam and Muslims in North America. Other services and outreach organizations soon followed, such as the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), the Islamic Medical Association (IMA), the Muslim Arab Youth Association (MAYA) and the Muslim Youth of North America (MYNA), to name a few."

All of the groups listed above were formed by the Muslim Brotherhood. MYNA was founded by Ahmed Elkadi, who was the US Brotherhood's treasurer from the 1970s until 1984, when he became its president. He held this position until 1995, but has since left the Brotherhood. He did not resign from his position as president of the US Ikhwan - he was pushed.

Other groups were founded by the US Brotherhood later - the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) was formed in the 1980s as an outgrowth of the Muslim Students Association (MSA).

The Muslim American Society, under Brotherhood leadership, was incorporated in 1993 in Illinois. The decision to incorporate the MAS was made at a meeting of 40 Ikhwan (MB) members at a hotel near the Alabama-Tennessee state line. Shaker Elsayed, an leader within MAS, has admitted the Brotherhood had founded the Muslim American Society, saying: "Ikhwan members founded MAS, but MAS went way beyond that point of conception."

MAS is based in Falls Church, Virginia, the same town where Abdurahman Alamoudi lived. Five miles away in Alexandria lay the US headquarters of the World Assembly of Muslim Youth or WAMY, which was co-founded by a Brotherhood member, Kamal Helbawy. On Friday May 28, 2004 the WAMY offices were raided by agents of the FBI, ICE and the Joint Terrorism Task Force. An affidavit from a customs agent claimed that one WAMY publication included a section entitled "Animosity Toward the Jews", and stated: "The Jews are humanity's enemies: they foment immorality in this world." The affidavit mentioned links with WAMY and the terrorist group Hamas.

The director of MAS' "Freedom Foundation", Mahdi Bray, pushed for the release of a Falls Church Citizen, Ahmed Omar Abu Ali, who had been accused of plotting to assassinate George W. Bush in al al-Qaeda plot. Ali, who had been educated at the Saudi-funded Islamic Saudi Academy in Alexandria, was convicted on November 22, 2005 and sentenced to 30 years' jail on March 29, 2005.

MAS, which has 10,000 members in 53 chapters across the US, is also involved in the disputes at Minneapolis-St Pauls airport, where Somali taxi drivers have refused to carry passengers with alcohol. Three quarters of the 900 drivers are Muslim, mostly from Somalia. Last year, 5,400 potential rides were turned down because passengers had alcohol. The Metropolitan Airport Commission sought guidance from Muslims, and a fatwa was made by the MAS. Khalid Elmasary declared: "It is expressly stated. Transportation of alcohol for Muslims is against the Islamic faith, and therefore forbidden." The issue still has not been resolved.

It is sometimes hard to work out if such Muslim "representatives" are really following the ways of the prophet, or are following the plans laid out in Muslim Brotherhood's "Project" manifesto for gaining national and global power.

Mahdi Bray, who is based in Washington DC where he has a radio talk-show, is accused of taking part in protests were calls for the death of Jews. Steve Emerson in his book American Jihad stated that at the October 28 2000 rally for Hezbollah and Hamas at Lafayette Park, "Mahdi Bray, stood directly behind Alamoudi and was seen jubilantly exclaiming his support for these two deadly terrorist organizations." Three weeks earlier, Bray had "coordinated and led a rally where approximately 2,000 people congregated in front of the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C.... at one point during the rally, Mahdi Bray played the tambourine as one of the speakers sang, while the crowd repeated: 'Al-Aqsa is calling us, let's all go into jihad, and throw stones at the face of the Jews."

Bray, who was awarded a Congressional Black Caucus award in September last year, has issued a press release claiming "victory" in the settlement of vindictive lawsuit launched by the Islamic Society of Boston, which attacked 16 organizations and individuals, including Steve Emerson.

There was no settlement agreed between the parties - the Islamic Society of Boston mysteriously dropped its lawsuit, which claimed "defamation", on May 29, 2007. With MAS coming to its defense, and with Muslim Brotherhood member Abdurahman Alamoudi listed as one its founders and trustees, with the Muslim Brotherhood's spiritual leader Yusuf al-Qaradawi as another early trustee, it is not unreasonable to assume that the Islamic Society of Boston began its life in 1982 as another outreach of the Muslim Brotherhood. In 2002, Qaradawi appeared by videolink at an ISB fund-raising event.

The ISB, which is building the largest mosque in Eastern United States at Roxborough, Boston, was in January 2006 defended by Arsalan Iftikhar, the legal director of the Council of American Relations (CAIR), who said: "Unfortunately, I see the Boston case as indicative of a growing trend in anti-Muslim rhetoric that has grown after 9/11." It should be noted that the two co-founders of CAIR, Omar Ahmad and Nihad Awad, were officials of the Islamic Association for Palestine, which was established by Hamas member Mousa Abu Marzook, and has been called a "Hamas Front". Nihad Awad and Ahmed Bedier, head of CAIR's Florida chapter, have both openly pledged their support for Hamas, which itself is derived from the Muslim Brotherhood.

With its previous links to Muslim Brotherhood members, ISB may be thankful that it was not listed as an "unindicted co-conspirator" in a plot to fund Hamas. This has been the recent fate of CAIR. In a trial in Dallas, Texas, Ghassan Elashi, the head of CAIR's Texas chapter, is accused with a staggering list of co-conspirators. Elashi was also head of Texas branch of the outlawed Holy Land Foundation. The indictment maintains that other officials from the Texas branch of the Holy Land Foundation, had conspired with numerous others to supply funds to Hamas. Ghassan Elashi and his brothers Bayan and Basman were convicted of "conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists" on April 13, 2005. Elashi was given a seven year sentence on October 13, 2006.

The named co-conspirators include eight Muslim Brotherhood individuals and organizations: Abdurahman Alamoudi, Gaddor Ibrahim Saidi, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA), Muslim Arab Youth Association (MAYA), Nizar Minshar, North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), Raed Awad and Tareq Suwaidan. The trial will begin on July 16. The trial will hopefully clarify further the exact roles of CAIR, and also the mysterious American contingent of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Muslim Brotherhood is not a body to be trusted. It claims peace and moderation, while simultaneously planning to conquer the globe by fair means or foul. It propagates anti-Semitism, and justifies and supports the murder of Israeli civilians. Its current motto is: "Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Koran is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope." Those politicians who try to do deals with such a group are betraying not only the people who elected them and the nations they serve, but they jeopardize the security of the Western world at large.

This article was also published at FamilySecurityMatters.org

FREETHINKR:

The Civil War lingered on until civilians were targeted. There are no "innocents." WT Sherman made that determination and ended the war by attacking the civilians. Those innocents give aid to the not so innocent in uniform. When Tokyo was fire bombed every house supplied all available workers to the war effort and many houses had been turned into factories. That's not innocent.

The problem in Iraq is the failure to recognize the non uniformed fighters and attack them. Foreign terrorist fighters are not living in the open off thin air. Those who have the attitude of fight to the last man (woman and child like the Japanese) must be killed to the last man. Well, one can give up the notion of victory. Maybe not going there in the first place?

"...And yet, it is a beautiful scandal, isn’t it? That God would care about one singular, particular life."

Odd how we can't seem to get away from assumptions. Does God really care? How do you know God really cares? I hope you aren't relying on sacred scriptures. The Bible and all sacred scriptures in turn are proved hoaxes.

http://www.hoax-buster.org/sellyoursoul AKA interpretation 1,501 of sacred scriptures says that was Devil and not God that cares about "one singular, particular life." No one has been able to rebuff that finding and the evidence all seems to lean in it's direction.

Could it be that the ministry is leading the multitudes to hell. Why? But of course, Lucifer plans to attack heaven again and he needs all those, "one singular, particular lives" for His army. He almost won last time. Maybe if enough people join His cause? I wonder if Lucifer has any idea about how to obtain nuclear weapons? Probably not many "Godless scientists" in hell, just the very moral violators of the first commandment, "no strange Gods." Don't you agree?

Unfortunately, during times of war, the "personal particulars" are considered collateral damage. This is why war should be avoided unless ABSOLUTELY necessary, although I think Dick Cheney et al would disagree. I don't think the use of atomic weapons in WWII was any different than the destruction of Dresden, the fire bombing of Tokyo, or the V2 and V1 attacks on London as far as "human particulars" go. The same story you quote from the Japanese woman could just as easily have been told by any civilian victim in any war. If we had any "soul" change it was as soon as we started targeting civilians.

I've spoken with many US WWII vets who are eternally grateful that the bombs hastened the surrender of Japan. The slaughter that would have ensued, of both US and Japanese forces, as well as civilians, when the inevitable mainland invasion occurred would have dwarfed the death toll of Nagasaki and Hiroshima combined.

Your essay here seems self-serving and primarily written to promote your book. The quotes you used are moving, but your conclusion is "read my book to see what I really think".

Ms. Gallagher, your treatise is foolish.

It is patently ridiculous for fat and self satisfied Americans who in many cases literally owe their very existence to our WWII decisions to now second guess those decisions.

We can sit in comfy chairs in our air conditioned homes or offices and write or say whatever we want, with the benefit of 62 years of hindsight.

But as you freely express yourself, understand this: Winning World War II was a matter of nothing less than survival. Losing was not an option. Defeating a formidable enemy – whose barbaric treatment of those it conquered was well known – was all that mattered.

Guess what? Americans fighting WWII did not know how it would end. They had a good idea of what life would be like if they lost. You enjoy the freedom of speech and many other things because we didn’t lose.

To look back with the benefit of 62 years of hindsight, which of course those fighting the war did not have, and say what should and shouldn’t have been done is nonsense.

Quote Gandhi and ponder all you like. You wouldn’t have his quotes at all if his passive resistance campaign had been waged against Imperial Japan or Nazi Germany. Fortunately, those regimes were defeated, and that fact is a very, very good thing. In 1945 that is all that mattered, and if we were in the same situation, that is all that would matter to us.

Nora:

How would you address those who seek to overthrow our government?

Aug 1, 2007
FINALLY, THE SMOKING GUN

One of the most fascinating exhibits presented by the prosecution in the Holy Land Foundation case (provided by researchers for the NEFA Foundation) is a memorandum on the Muslim Brotherhood’s multifaceted plan to convert the United States to an Islamic nation. It is the smoking gun of the Ikhwan’s long-standing efforts to destroy the Western world as we know it.

The most interesting exhibit is a Muslim Brotherhood memorandum by Mohamed Akram, dated May 22, 1991, where he outlines the Ikhwan vision of the future. He leaves no ambiguity as to the nature of the Ikhwan calling. (The exhibits will be posted and written about more completely in the NEFA website in coming days).

Under the heading “Understanding the role of the Muslim Brother in North America,” he writes:

“The process of settlement is a ‘Civilization-Jihadist Process’ with all the word means. The Ikhwan must understand that their work in America is a kind of grand Jihad in eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within and ‘sabotaging’ its miserable house by their hands and the hands of the believers so that it is eliminated ad God’s religion is made victorious over all other religions.”

But wait, there is more:

“Without this level of understanding, we are not up to this challenge and have not prepared ourselves for Jihad yet. It is a Muslim’s destiny to perform Jihad and work wherever he is and wherever he lands until the final hour comes, and there is no escape from that destiny except for those who chose to slack.”

Akram then spells out in some detail the role of the Brotherhood in moving the project forward: “As for the role of the Ikhwan, it is the initiative, pioneering, leadership, raising the banner and pushing people in that direction (the Jihadist process). They are then able to employ, direct, and unify Muslims’ efforts and powers for this process. In order to do that, we must possess a master of the art of ‘coalitions,’ the art of ‘absorption’ and the principles of ‘cooperation.’”

The document then gives rationale for setting up Ikhwan organizations across the country: “We must say that we are in a country which understands no language other than the language of the organizations, and one which does not respect or give weight to any group without effective, functional and strong organizations.”

The document also deals with the criticism among the Brothers that the focus on the United States will drain support for the establishment of the global caliphate. The response is two-fold:
1) “The success of the Movement in America in establishing an observant Islamic base with power and effectiveness will be the the best support and aid to the global Movement project.”
2) The global (Ikhwan) movement has not “succeeded yet in distributing roles to is branches, stating that what is needed from them as one of the participants or contributors to the project to establish the global Islamic state. The day this happens, the children of the American Ikhwani branch will have a far-reaching impact and positions that make the ancestors proud.”

The document ends with a list of Ikhwan groups trying to coordinate, including all the usual (ISNA, ICNA, IIIT etc.)

What is so interesting about the document is the breadth of ambition, the conviction of ultimate success and the care with which the campaign we see today was being thought about 16 years ago. So is the the clarity of the ultimate objective of ending our years as a functioning democracy, built on the rule of secular law, minority rights and freedom of religion, press etc.

The infiltration of the government by members and sympathizers, the coordinated role of the organizations in pursuing specific objectives, the recruitment of the best and the brightest into the movement, and other objectives are far advanced, perhaps further than the author could have imagined in so short a time.

The rationale, for those like Lieken et al who want play footsie with these groups bent on our destruction, is truly mindboggling. I don’t think the Brothers who have been on the cusp of the new PR campaign, from Ramadan to Akef, have bothered to spell this out like the Brothers do for themselves.

But here we have it, in their own words, written by their own hands. There is much more to say, and I will revisit the topic as more information comes in.

Will anyone pay attention?

www.counterterrorismblog.org

EM,

Amen!

Fred,

That last post was from Arminius.

Fred, you wrote:

"War sucks. The past is best explained without superimposing values on decisions which did not exist in the framework of the time.

At the end of the day the complex reasonings behind the start of this war are quite irrelevant in light of the fact that the end was predictable and could have been more ghastly save the intervention of technology.

I love my country, it ain't always easy to do but but God help me...I do.

No excuses, no apologies. The clock keeps ticking."

And you wrote it well, beautiful and moving. I am also a vet, but without your experience. 1968-1970. Did not go to Nam, but to West Berlin. The wall and a visit to East Berlin taught me to hate any and all repressive regimes. Not communism per se; communism isn't evil, just stupid, but it lends itself all too easily to evil men running the show.

Iraq is apparently personal to both of us, albeit more to you. My great-nephew went there as a gunner on a humvee. To our great relief, he came back in one piece. I trust your sons did too.

It's a strange country we live in. I love it too, in spite of our incredible recent blunders.

I seldom return to forums but this one presents a unique snapshot of the American soul sixty-plus years after the event in question. I have copied the entirety of this string of thought for further reading. Extremes exist in it but the main line of reasoning and a search for meaning is the dominant through-line.

Morality and war are mutually exclusive. I mentioned the thought that my dear old Dad most likely would have perished in any invasion (2nd Mar Div). That is personal enough for me and is a vindication of a complex decision made by an American President.

My dear old Dad didn't end wars. I ended up in 2nd Mar Div, then 1st Mar Div in Viet Nam. My own sons served in Iraq (3 tours) with 1st Mar Div and we are not particularly war-like. Serving comes easily to some of us.

The common theme for all our collective experience is that any one who has to be told that war sucks, war is immoral, war is unfair and nasty and stinks and feeds only the flies and politicians has missed something deeply human, deeply true.

For the guys who never had to load the boats to slam onto the Japanese shoreline (I've been there, JP, loved the people, loved the food, admired the ancient culture...ignored the immediate past) there was no decision. It was life and death.

I didn't want my sons to go to Iraq but I damn sure didn't want anything kept in the cupboard that could have kept them alive. WW II had been long and the death toll for the fleet and ground forces at Okinawa made for some immutable math in terms of looking ahead.

An invasion of some extent would have to happen. Japan, god bless them now, would have had the same Soviet/Western World line of demarcation across it as all the mutually conquered lands in Europe endured for sixty years after the fact.

War sucks. The past is best explained without superimposing values on decisions which did not exist in the framework of the time.

At the end of the day the complex reasonings behind the start of this war are quite irrelevant in light of the fact that the end was predictable and could have been more ghastly save the intervention of technology.

I love my country, it ain't always easy to do but but God help me...I do.

No excuses, no apologies. The clock keeps ticking.

In 1992 I wrote a thesis entitled "United States Strategic Bombing Policy in World War II" which compared the manner in which the United States executed the air campaigns in Europe and Japan. My conclusion at the time, which was somewhat controversial, was that the approach to Japan (night time fire bombings of civillian populations ultimately culminating in the use of the atomic bombs) was primarily motivated by racism. The reason I came to this conclusion was that the United States Army Air Corps.' approached the European theater in an entirely different manner (with some notable exceptions, i.e Dresden) through use of highly risky day light bombing of fortified industrial and military targets in an effort to destroy Germany's capacity to wage war. Because of the dramatic impact of atomic bombings, the previous history of "area bombings" in Japan has been largely forgotten or ignored. In any event, the history of strategic bombing in Asia did not end with WW II. Its revival, through operation "Rolling Thunder" in Vietnam is a notable example. The move towards "precision targeting" in operations such as the "Shock and Awe" campaign in Iraq, while in theory motivated by a desire to reduce civillian casualties, has done little to provent collateral damage. While the metrics are not in yet, I imagine that the death rate of Iraqi civillians (and its ratio to "combatant deaths") as a direct or indirect result of US actions in Iraq will equal or exceed the civillian death rate in WW II.

Nora, shame on you to write without any understanding of the history. The US does need to do some soul searching but for a different reason. Gen.Douglas MacArthur spared Emperor Hirohito from indictment. He also secretly granted immunity to the physicians of a covert biological warfare research and development that undertook lethal human experimentation using live humans during the war, in exchange for providing America with their research on biological weapons. Those physicians went on to work, after the war, in medicine, corporate posts, government and politics. Because of selfish reasons on the part of the US, liberal surrender conditions were authored at the expense of all the victims that fell under the evil hands of the Japanese. Some Japanese have refused to acknowledge the surrender treaty to this day.
The U.S. stole the justice deserved by the victims and the victims families who are still waiting for an official State apology from Japan while Japan continues to insult and inflict pain to the victims families as evidenced by the recent incident of the denial of the sex slaves by Shinzo Abe. By saying that the women volunteered is an insult and indirectly claims they were prostitutes. America continues to encourage Japan to see themselves as the war victims inflicting more pain to the real victims of the war's families. Yes, America and Japan need to get off their moral high horses and do some real soul searching.

Interesting to read the posts here that refer to what God or Jesus would do...or have done under simular circumstances. These religious comments/posts presume a premise of the capacity of man to posess the mind, wisdom, knowledge and perfection of the Creator's mind. This is illogical because at best, humans are imperfect....hence human choices. We can only try to make the right choices.

Nora poised valid questions. Lets break the questions down.

1. "How did Hiroshima erode our sense of morality, what we permit ourselves as a nation to do?"

ANSWER: Must qualify the question with a question here. Who, when and how proved that Hiroshima eroded OUR sense of morality ? Mabe we did in fact do the moral thing ?

2. "How did it affect our fragile sense of what is permissible to do to another?"

ANSWER: Again, must qualify this question with a question first. Who, when and how was it proved that it did in fact AFFECT our sense and why is our sense more fragile now than it was from the beginning of time ?

Take out the presumed premise of the questions Nora asked and you have a better idea of the reality of what is being asked.

Kind of like asking a person when he/she stopped kicking his pet ? :)

Regards,
Just Another Christian

A further note about what American casualties would have been in an invasion of the Japanese home islands; estimates vary all over the map, but this is probably the best indicator:

"Nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals were manufactured in anticipation of the casualties resulting from the invasion of Japan. To the present date, all the American military casualties of the sixty years following the end of World War II — including the Korean and Vietnam Wars — have not exceeded that number. In 2003, there were still 120,000 of these Purple Heart medals in stock.[42] There are so many in surplus that combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan are able to keep Purple Hearts on-hand for immediate award to wounded soldiers on the field."
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall#Ground_threat

This of course does not include Japanese casualties, which would surely have well exceeded a million.

Odd that you question the morality of the Hiroshima event without examining all the facts and context.
Briefly:
Most estimates of the initial death toll is closer to
70,000 with 200,000 to of died in five years.
In one night of firebombing Tokyo, 70,000 died.
Yet we hear little of this event.
The next day the military leadership barely mentioned the deaths in a meeting.
Allied estimates were 700,000 causalities for a land invasion of the home islands.
There were 9 divisions waiting for the allied soldiers on the first island.
How many Japanese do you think would of died if this happened.
The total would of been well over a million for both sides.
The Japan leadership new the war was over before Okanawa.
Yet the followed a policy of "bleeding the enemy" by continuing to fight battles and allowing their and our soldiers to die.
They thought that this policy would allow them to negotiate a conditional surrender.
That the allies would "tire" of dying, while they wouldn't.

They were arming the population with sharpened bamboo sticks to use against our bullets.

Even after Hiroshima, is was only after the Russians entered the Pacific war did they finally surrender.

Odd that you question the morality of the Hiroshima event without examining all the facts and context.
Briefly:
Most estimates of the initial death toll is closer to
70,000 with 200,000 to of died in five years.
In one night of firebombing Tokyo, 70,000 died.
Yet we hear little of this event.
The next day the military leadership barely mentioned the deaths in a meeting.
Allied estimates were 700,000 causalities for a land invasion of the home islands.
There were 9 divisions waiting for the allied soldiers on the first island.
How many Japanese do you think would of died if this happened.
The total would of been well over a million for both sides.
The Japan leadership new the war was over before Okanawa.
Yet the followed a policy of "bleeding the enemy" by continuing to fight battles and allowing their and our soldiers to die.
They thought that this policy would allow them to negotiate a conditional surrender.
That the allies would "tire" of dying, while they wouldn't.

They were arming the population with sharpened bamboo sticks to use against our bullets.

Even after Hiroshima, is was only after the Russians entered the Pacific war did they finally surrender.

To Raymond Takashi:
Thank you for your post. It is the sanest, most balanced and logical (hence the best) post on the issue.
Better to have a balanced discussion than sentimental ramblings in either direction.

Eon Mullet. If your name doesn't say it all, your comments certainly fill the rest in. Every nation involved in war thinks they are the good guy. Attacking a military target does not justify annihilating a civilian one, or are you saying that 9/11 was justified?

Author writes:

"Several days after the bomb was dropped, reporters asked Gandhi what he thought. He said the atom bomb “resulted for the time being in destroying the soul of Japan. What has happened to the soul of the destroying nation is yet too early to see.” That question is what I have been turning over in my mind since completing this novel."

Gandhi understood that nations, like individuals, can not realize the consequences of their choices until fruition. However, the adage of "what goes around comes around" is not necessarily true nor applies in situations where the most difficult choices must be decided upon with prudent compassion to effect an outcome that is in the best interests of the majority...and that requires great wisdom, courage and strength from those leaders who are not predisposed to impluse nor indecision. Choosing (electing) a leader is the greatest responsibility of any citizen for it is ultimately the citizen who chooses the fate of its nation. The buck actually stops with the citizen.

Wisdom usually councils allowing the past its own integrity.

In any case, the gentleness of the current generation rests upon the exertions of the previous. If times were hard, we would revert to their decisions surprisingly quickly. Even if times are not hard: Bush II has reinstated torture and concentration camps. Dershowitz and the neos progress from advocating life sentences in lieu of execution to advocating torture in lieu of interogation.

1. Japan attacked us first. They picked the fight.
2. The Japanese military trained themselves not to ever surrender; surrender was weak and cowardly, an insult to the emporer.
3. The Japanese military was training the Japanese civilians (i.e. making them combatants) to defend against an invasion of the homeland.
4. The Japanese were not going to surrender while they still had a means to resist, making an invasion or other attack necessary to end their attempt to subjugate the world to their rule.
5. The soldiers, sailor, airmen, and Marines who had survived nearly 4 years of fighting the forces of evil around the world were moving to invade Japan. Chances of their survival were extremely low.

If you want to talk about senseless destruction of life, start with the Japanese treatment of:
a. The Chinese
b. Allied POWs
The Japanese practice of genocide against the Chinese ranks among the most horrific actions in human history.

To hold America as the bad guy in the tragedy that was World War II is a pathetic joke and an insult to all who gave their lives to end the threat of fascism. Dropping the atomic bomb on Japan was not a good or happy decision, but it was undeniably the only one the Japanese permitted. What were we going to do? Lose a million Americans and every single Japanese in their nation during an invasion? We were (and still are) the good guys. We ended the fighting and dying that otherwise would have continued and claimed more lives.

1. Japan attacked us first. They picked the fight.
2. The Japanese military trained themselves not to ever surrender; surrender was weak and cowardly, an insult to the emporer.
3. The Japanese military was training the Japanese civilians (i.e. making them combatants) to defend against an invasion of the homeland.
4. The Japanese were not going to surrender while they still had a means to resist, making an invasion or other attack necessary to end their attempt to subjugate the world to their rule.
5. The soldiers, sailor, airmen, and Marines who had survived nearly 4 years of fighting the forces of evil around the world were moving to invade Japan. Chances of their survival were extremely low.

If you want to talk about senseless destruction of life, start with the Japanese treatment of:
a. The Chinese
b. Allied POWs
The Japanese practice of genocide against the Chinese ranks among the most horrific actions in human history.

To hold America as the bad guy in the tragedy that was World War II is a pathetic joke and an insult to all who gave their lives to end the threat of fascism. Dropping the atomic bomb on Japan was not a good or happy decision, but it was undeniably the only one the Japanese permitted. What were we going to do? Lose a million Americans and every single Japanese in their nation during an invasion? We were (and still are) the good guys. We ended the fighting and dying that otherwise would have continued and claimed more lives.

1. Japan attacked us first. They picked the fight.
2. The Japanese military trained themselves not to ever surrender; surrender was weak and cowardly, an insult to the emporer.
3. The Japanese military was training the Japanese civilians (i.e. making them combatants) to defend against an invasion of the homeland.
4. The Japanese were not going to surrender while they still had a means to resist, making an invasion or other attack necessary to end their attempt to subjugate the world to their rule.
5. The soldiers, sailor, airmen, and Marines who had survived nearly 4 years of fighting the forces of evil around the world were moving to invade Japan. Chances of their survival were extremely low.

If you want to talk about senseless destruction of life, start with the Japanese treatment of:
a. The Chinese
b. Allied POWs
The Japanese practice of genocide against the Chinese ranks among the most horrific actions in human history.

To hold America as the bad guy in the tragedy that was World War II is a pathetic joke and an insult to all who gave their lives to end the threat of fascism. Droping the atomic bomb on Japan was not a good or happy decision, but it was undeniably the only one the Japanese permitted. What were we going to do? Lose a million Americans and every single Japanese in their nation during an invastion? We were (and still are) the good guys. We ended the fighting and dying that otherwise would have continued and claimed more lives.

Dear Ms. Gallagher

In order to "erode" our morlity, one must assume Americans had a moral compass in the 1st place. Any objective reading of American History would show that the bombing of Hiroshima etc. was in a long line of American traditions.

My father was a sailor aboard the U.S.S. West Virginia on December 7, 1941, when the United States was attacked by Japan. He was reported Killed In Action, and a memorial services was held for him. It was only later that he was found alive. My father fought in the Pacific throughour much of WW II, a war that was begun by the nation of Japan. I was alive at that time, a small daughter waiting for her father to return from war. I am so very sorry that Japanese civilians were maimed and killed by the use of the atomic bomb, but I was very glad to have the war over and my father home safely with us. By the way, my father attended the Pearl Harbor Survivors Association reunion in Honolulu last December. While there, he shook the hand of a crew man on the Japanese plane that bombed his ship. He said it was not easy, but he recognized that each of them had served his country. The Japanese people allowed their leaders and their military to engage in atrocities throughout the Pacific and in Asia. Americans whho were not alive at that time should take care about judging the actions of those who were responsible for the lives of our military men and women who were fighting a "just" war, having been attacked without provocation.

I do not know what it did to our soul.

I do know I was taught as a child that dropping those bombs actually saved lives.

While walking down my hometown street one day, I stopped dead in my tracks when I realized that the final death toll from these bombs we dropped on Japan is not knowable. It is in the future.

The Japanese are now claiming that the Rape of Nanking never happened;
perhaps, then, they should stop making a fuss about Hiroshima and Nagasaki,
since by the exact same level of historical standards, no atomic bombing of
these ever took place?

I suggest talking to a few people who can remember the end of WWII. To quote
one of them, "NO ONE would have argued against using the atom bomb on
them". There were multiple, and still are multiple, reasons for this:
A. The expected innocent (including not only Allied troops, but
Japanese civilian) casualties were, in fact, greater for an
invasion of Japan. Evidence for this came from, for instance, my
grandfather's examination of German documents, which he briefed
Truman on, as well as such obvious examples as the kamikazes and
other instances of Japanese fanaticism (sometimes forced
fanaticism of civilians by the Japanese military/government).
B. The Japanese were allied with the Nazis, with all their horrors;
C. The Japanese - as was already becoming known at the time of the
decision to bomb them - were carrying out policies of so-called
"racial" hatred against non-Japanese (such as the "comfort women",
mistreatment of POWs, the Rape of Nanking, etcetera), rather
similarly to those in Nazi Germany (which they now
attempt to deny, of course, at least in public - one guesses that
they (e.g., those Japanese who try to claim that Hiroshima and
Nagasaki were not fully justified) may well, like neo-Nazis in
Germany, actually think that such genocidal actions were fully
justified, but wish to conceal this in public due to the proper
outrage such beliefs would generate in less racist countries). (I
state "so-called 'racial'" because those who are currently called
Japanese are the same race as Koreans and Chinese - the Ainu are
the only group who can be said to be "racially" Japanese.)
D. The Japanese war industry extensively used civilian areas for
manufacturing, in a "cottage industry" system, thus making
civilian areas perfectly legitimate targets for not only atomic
bombing but the earlier (and rather more deadly, given the
Japanese cities fire-prone construction) firebombing.
I suggest that we should recognize the level of alliance and similarity
between Hiroshima/Nagasaki revisionists and Holocaust revisionism - a level
of alliance/similarity that is unsurprising given the common underlying
motivations for these among those in, respectively, Japan and Germany. Those
in other countries should not be fooled by all the "peace" sentiments that
the Japanese wish to cover the essential evil of this viewpoint with.

Anon,

The weapons' impact on civilians wasn't a great consideration at the time for the effects of radiation on genetic mutation were not understood and the Japanese were considered less than human and radiation causulties were still just causulties. But after the experience bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki the effects were quickly understood, which is why I say our morality certainly has not lessened, if anything we understand the effects and shoulder the burden that much more.

So are you implying that one form of destruction is less moral than the other? That dying from massive organ failure after having your skin burned off is somehow more moral than dying from acute radiation poisoning?

Lest you forget, all war is immoral.

Thomas

From a religious and spiritual standpoint, the notion that God's creatures must settle their differences and treat each other in a manner consistent with the Barbarism of World War 2 is abhorent. God made us better than the behavior men displayed toward each other in the war, which means everything from Kamakazies to Sneak Attacks to Atomic Bombs is inherently un-Godlike.

To argue the nuclear bombs dropped on Japan in World War 2 is morally more illegitimate than conventional types of warfare completely misses the point. When we resort to was as a first choice in settling human differences, we reject our Christianity. For this reason alone, I can' think God is going to look at us and suggest we were more or less evil because we used nuclear rather than conventional weapons.

For each of the combatants, I rather believe God will look at us and ask whether we tried to uphold the dignity of His creation. Whether when we made decisions, whether we considered the inherent humanity of our friends and our enemies and considered actions that would achieve our's and His objectives with minimal loss of life and human dignity.

Whether God is judging Harry Truman or General MacArthur or even Tojo and the Emperor, I suspect God will be looking from a perspective none of us have -- inside their hearts and souls. The soulful consideration of His (or Her) will should be paramount.

Thomas

Better to nuke them than they nuke us? They may be thinking the same thing. Go and visit the Hiroshima War Memorial to see the differences between firebombings' and atomic bomb's impact on civilians. No one suffered radiation sickness, got cancer or gave birth to deformed children from fire bombs.

What is the connection between Hiroshima and Guantanamo, Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib?

The same as the connection with slavery; with the extermination of American Indians; with the invasion of Mexico; with the invasion of the Philippines and the slaughter of hundreds of thousands or Filipinos there; with the invasion of Vietnam and many other countries; with the violent bringing down of fifty other governments in the last 60 years; with US crime and incarceration rates higher than any other developed industrial democracy.

The connection is: not enough limits in the US on barbaric violence. And not nearly enough guilt about it.

Miss Gallagher - if you had been, as I was, a man aged 18 years, faced with the prospect that he and his friends would have to fight the Japanese in their own islands in 1945, you might have said "Hallelujah" when the bomb was dropped.

what a good question. It should have led us to humility, but that's not the American way.

What a slease way to sell a book. Sometimes I think it would have been better to let people like you be the welcoming committee for the Japanese soliders coming peacefully ashore in California. Maybe you would have been luckly enough or have felt morally obligated to meet a friendly solider who would have made you a nice sex object and fed you with a bowl of rice.

As has been pointed out, the attack on Hiroshima was not the single worst attack Japan suffered at the hands of American airpower.

More Japanese civilians were killed during the single nighttime jelled gasoline incendiary attack of March 10, 1945, ordered by General Curtis LeMay, and its resultant firestorms which leveled 16.7 square miles of Tokyo. 100,00 were killed outright and several hundred thousands injured, many more than as a result of the Hiroshima bomb. Why not talk about that episode? Conventional incendiary attacks caused far more causulties and devastation than either nuclear attack. Why is it that you focus on the nuclear attack on Hiroshima rather than the firebombing attack on Tokyo which killed more in a single night? Which is more morally questionable?

63 Japanese cities were burned to the ground by incendiary devices. These sum total of these attacks make the causulties suffered in Hiroshima and Nagasaki pale in comparison, even after five years, or ten.

The "soul of the nation" had to come to terms with a new and awesome responsibility - as keeper of the nuclear flame. However, as a result of accepting that responsibility, America was able to bring the war in the Pacific to a successful conclusion and put an end to numerous Japanese attrocities, all without more American servicemen being killed. The acceptance of responsibility for and use of nuclear weapons was and remains today, in my opinion, an acceptable price to have paid. And it is because we understand the power of those weapons that their future use will not be decided upon lightly.

Remember what LeMay said, "All war is immoral, and if you let that bother you, then you're not a good soldier." One has to understand a fact which is hard to grasp today: America was involved in total war with a fierce and fanatical enemy, one which was commonly accepted as less than human - watch the old newsreels to see. I do not grieve for those Japanese killed, and I do not believe it is proper for Americans to do so today. The deaths of residents of Hiroshima had been decided upon by the Japanese Emperor and the Japanese military long before Little Boy or Fat Man were invented. Their blood is on the hands of their leaders who lead them into war, not on ours who were called upon to end it.

Los Alamos and the Atomic Bomb have already been covered throughly in at least two very detailed books by Richard Rhodes, and many of original declassified LANL documents are available on the web at www.fas.org.

I would argue that our use of nuclear weapons has heightened our sense of morality, certainly not eroded it in any way. We have fifty years of relative world peace as evidence of that. Yes, we did let the nuclear genie out of the bottle. But it was inevitible that someone would. Just be glad it was America and not the Germans or the Japanese first. I'm glad to accept the burden of nuclear weapons possession and their first use because I trust this nation to act as a rational and sane trusted guardian of those weapons; we are a nation which understands the burden first hand. Would you have rather it have been the Japanese emperor nuking San Francisco or Hitler nuking London or New York? I think not.

The President has the authority in the Constitution and has the option to choose to use nukes it he deems it necessary to successfully defend America!!!! Unquestionalbly.

listen - we capitalized on using the European scientists to develop the bomb in a race (and Stalin had spies in the program, and when Truman told him about the magic weapon - Stalin already new everything about it!!!) before the enemy did us in - and now the damn terrorist threante us and they can walk across an open border and nuke us!!! Where's Chertoff? Hiding in a bunker?

Harvesting new stem cell research is morally wrong - we've lost 40 americans due to abortion - these people could have filled in the jobs the damn mexicans are taking away for us. AND ADDED TO THE GDP.

I believe the primary reason most individuals do not seriously ponder the effects of using nuclear weapons is that we are so far removed from that time, that younger generations only know, as you say, the statistics. These are indeed horrific in themselves however, I believe the impact of such a horrible event is lost because our history books are censored in such a way that high school history courses only show images of the obligatory mushroom cloud and the desolate aftermath of the cities. Unfortunately to have more of an impact students would have to be exposed to more graphic and horrifying pictures of the real effects on the people that were irreparably injured and maimed by the use of nuclear weapons. The old adage a picture says a thousand words is ever more true in this case. An example of this is when I visited the Holocaust museum in Washington DC for the first time. The images I saw and displays I was witness to were to say the least eye opening. It wasn't until I was exposed to the uncensored facts and images of these atrocities, was I truly affected by these events that happened some 60 years earlier. Seeing and reading about these events with not only images, but personal effects of the murdered made me ill, as it should. If we can some how deliver home this sort of message, not only to students, but everyone, I believe that we will finally begin to have an understanding, or at least empathy for the events that transpired in Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Harry Truman said he decided to use the bomb because otherwise he could not have faced the mothers of Americans killed in an invasion of Japan.

Perhaps it should be considered that those who do not want their cities bombed and people killed should not start wars.

All wars are generally bad, and that one was over sooner because of the power of the bomb and it is likely to have discouraged Stalin from further expansion in Europe.

Do you suppose that President Bush would agree with Truman's decision to drop the bomb? Would he agree with the justification that it is morally permissible to take an action whereby we would probably kill fewer people by dropping the bomb than going through with a full scale invasion of Japan?

Is it fair to apply this same reasoning to the issue of stem cell research? That the use of harvested cells from already aborted fetuses to find cures for a myriad of diseases is morally permissible because many lives might be saved and the greater good would be served?

Doesn't anyone remember Clausewitz theories of war - or as a famous Civil War, southern general state most succinctly - "Get thar fustest with the mostest"? Listen the Japs brought the bomb on themselves - they stared the war - Harry Truman ended it - we've benefitted from relative peace ever since - and the LIBS HAVE THE FREEDOM TO REMAIN IGNORANT of history, and politics, and war is a "Kill or be killed" situation - remember Jack London's book?

...And what do you suppose the Japanese would have done had they had the bomb?

...And what do you suppose the Japanese would have done had they had the bomb?

It didn't affect our soul as a nation, it was an expression of our soul as a nation: use greater technology to brutalize and subjugate those who resist our hegemony. Note that we used WMD during the genocide of the Native Americans in the form of small pox. As more people speak out against these abhorrent activities, we develop still greater technology that both masks the reality from ourselves and increases the efficiency with which we can kill our enemies.

It's not just America. Humans have always used the advantages at their disposal to monopolize the resources of their environment. Modern technologies enable greater reach than a club or spear, but we use them in the same way with the same objectives: what's mine is mine and what's yours is mine. America is just the latest, greatest example of empire in action.

...And what do you suppose the Japanese would have done had they had the bomb?

I found this article maudlin and meaningless. Does Ms. Gallagher think that all war is wrong? The Japanese killed literally millions of Chinese civilians in their occupation of that country. And, with regard to her "theology," if God cares about each particular life, why is human history so bloody. Where is Ms. Gallagher's God? Far removed from us, I would say.

What in the world are you thinking? The Battle of Okinawa, which ended only 2 months earlier, claimed the lives of over 12,000 American Servicemen, not to mention the civilians on Okinawa. A land invasion of the Japanese mainland would have had similar results on a much larger scale. The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were in my opinion ultimately humane in that up until then the Japanese military showed no signs of surrendering. I believe that although costly in human terms on the Japanese side, ultimately, the 2 atomic bombs probably saved at least 10 times as many Japanese lives as were lost in the A-bomb attacks, as the Japanese military sacrificed 66,000 soldiers in Okinawa, and showed a ruthless willingness to allow soldiers to fight to the death.

Mr. Duncan Stewart

The Japanese war and warrior culture is different from Americans'. Don't forget the families of soldiers from the other side too. Do you really think they want their menfolks to go to war, and be atomic-bombed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki?

Yes, wars must be ended fast and cheaply to save more lives from being lost. With all the lessons on the cost of war and the price all have to pay as winners and losers in resources and on our souls throughout history, we would think we learn something on how to prevent wars, but no and never will. Whoever said war is heaven? It is hell on earth. Just ask the American soldiers who survived Omaha Beach on D-Day, the Battle of the Bulge, the Vietnam War, the Iraq War.

Cheers mate and exiting from this thread now.

The brutish, primitive nature of the "nuke 'em" crowd clogging this blog remind us that the infamous General Curtis LeMay, the author of the holocausts of the Dresden and Tokyo firebombing and the world's first mass nuclear incinceration of civilian cities, was no isolated knuckle-dragger. He had lots of help. Many of those posting on this web page are living proof that LeMay's insane "strategic bombing" ethos and vengeful "nuke 'em because we're in the Right" creed was not some horrific human aberration but a mainstream pathology infecting the American psyche. Note well the testosteronic epithets these manly goobers deploy against their critics whom they would feminize: "teary-eyed, weak-kneed, complaining, whining, slanted, hypersensitive, losers, uninformed, impressionable, weirdo, ignorant". The Japanese children, women and elders at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the goobers say, "got what was coming to them" (even if Hirohito and Japan's senior military and warlords didn't). No better evidence than these remarks exists to confirm the unhappy fact that to leave 13,000 nuclear warheads in the hands of a nation so infected with vulgar jingoism, cold callousness and historical illiteracy is gravely dangerous for the future of the world.

War is the tragedy. When ONE human being is killed
by another in war this is a tragedy.

Hiroshima was a great tragedy for the Japanese
people and for the US and our people.

However, war means that one group of people decides that their main object is to kill as many of another group of people, their enemies, as possible. The
killing goes on until one side gives up.

Hiroshima was a HUGE SUCCESS. Just look how many people were killed! Japan gave up as well, didn't
they?

You speak about losing our sense of morality after fat boy fell.

How naive!

We lost our morality when we killed the Red Indians and usurped their land!

What has happened to the soul of the destroying nation is still too early to see...

It amazes me when I read articles like this one of how little some people actually know or understand about our nation's military history, or history in general. Or maybe its not a matter of ignorance at all. Maybe people just conventionally forget certain information in order to pursue their agendas. I guess you would have to ask a Marine, sailor, or soldier who fought in the Pacific theater why it was necessary to drop two atomic bombs on Japan. Their personal experience would be much better at explaining the terror surviving Banzai charges. American sailors on ships watching helplessly as the Japanese version of a “Divine Wind” sweeps down in the form of a Japanese Zero Fighters whose pilots crash them—quite willingly—into American ships. I'm sure many of those American servicemen were thinking, “Jeeez, if its like this on these little islands, what's it going to be like when we land in Japan?” I guess there are thousands of American soldiers, sailors, and Marines...along with their families...who are quite happy that they never had to find out thanks to the atom bomb. If the soul of your so called “destroying” nation is damaged—and I have no doubt that it is—there are plenty of other more pertinent reasons why it is, and I don't have time or word space to list them all. I can find plenty of sad chapters in this nation's history without having to pick the one desperate attempt by an American President to bring a very bloody and costly war to an abrupt end.

One of the worst horrors of Hiroshima is that free people have not changed the course of world affairs. Vietnam and Iraq are stark reminders that unholy alliances between politicians, bureaucrats, military personnel, and big business, can continue their destructive ways, while citizens look on helplessly or indifferently.

Neal Atkins

Asking your fellow Americans to move to Darfur for having a more questioning view on use of atom bombs in wars and to end wars? Patriotism is the last resort of the scoundrel some would say. "America - love it or leave it!" Please don't insult your fellow Americans. I have more respect for them than you. Yes, winners write history. Losers have nothing. Beyond that, what?

B Kane

Ms. Gallagher is a novelist, not a historian. Novelists writes about the human soul and experience. Read more novels and we learn more about humans, not just from history books with statistics on numbers of casualties, military strategies, how many planes and tanks arrayed against humans. Start with Tolstoi's "War and Peace" on strategy, morality, ethics and impact of war on humans, not Sun Tzu's "Art of War" or Clausewitz's "On War".

Cheers and good day mates

"How did Hiroshima erode our sense of morality, what we permit ourselves as a nation to do?"

Does this really refer to the nation that came close to wiping out the continent's original population and utilized slaves for generations? I'm not convinced that the country was any more 'moral' before Hiroshima, or has been any worse since then.

I've enjoyed reading the opinions expressed in On Faith, regardless of how close or how far they've been from my own. But this post is the biggest piece of narrow-minded, slanted, hypersensitive whining that I've seen. Why is this even in the On Faith section? Because it renews my faith in the ability of people to lose their perspective and revise history, no matter what?

And why do I have to hear about this woman's novel?

The idea of a link between Abu Gharib and Hiroshima is completely ridiculous, unless you plan on linking every bad thing that happened to everyone, everywhere, ever. There is a compelling argument to be made that Truman dropped the bomb to stop Stalin as much as Hirohito, but she certainly doesn't bother making that here. That would require facts and discussion instead of teary-eyed complaining and weak-kneed apologizing. If you want to know more about the dropping of the bomb, read American Prometheus, not this.

Arminus makes the statement: "We never used the Bomb again, and we probably, God willing, never will." On the contrary, humans probably will use the Bomb again, given our history. Our species is hurtling into the future at an accelerating pace, with no guidelines, little memory, and a primitive capacity to learn -- or to imagine the chiling horrors we are ready and willing to fill our planet with. It's a good idea to periodically re-read Kurt Vonnegut's 'Cat's Cradle', or Camus' 'The Plague', or any of a score of other microscopes turned on the hardness of the human heart. With tens of thousands of nukes silently waiting, our clock is ticking, but we are all deaf. I just hope I die before our race destroys the 15,000-year-old civilization that so many men and women toiled to create. God (should he exist) did nothing to save the Jews from the Holocaust, nor the troops in the trenches during the Battle of the Somme, nor the millions who quietly died in the Great Congo War just a few years ago while the rest of the world quite successfully averted its gaze. The future of man is in the hands of man -- and that is a nightmare scenario!

george w bush sez that killing civilians is what bad people do. why does george w bush hate america?

harry s truman ordered the attacks on innocent japanese civilians as a tactic to achieve his military aims and further his political cause.

osama bin ladin ordered the attacks on innocent american civilians as a tactic to achieve his military aims and further his political cause.

terrorist see, terroist do.

note to self: save quotations from well-known conservative posters to re-use in the next abortion debate. can't wait til someone mentions the 'sanctity of life.'

Ms. Gallagher is lost in self-absorption. She needs to understand that Hiroshima was in a sense an ethical postscript. We abandoned our sense of morality in Feb., 1945 when we and the British reduced Dresden and its largely civilian population to ashes; then embarked alone upon the firebombing of several Japanese cities. One can argue convincingly either that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were barbarian acts or saved millions of lives; the point to remember is that by then morality was not a consideration in the action we took.

Ms. Gallagher is lost in self-absorption. She needs to understand that Hiroshima was in a sense an ethical postscript. We abandoned our sense of morality in Feb., 1945 when we and the British reduced Dresden and its largely civilian population to ashes; then embarked alone upon the firebombing of several Japanese cities. One can argue convincingly either that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were barbarian acts or saved millions of lives; the point to remember is that by then morality was not a consideration in the action we took.

The comparison of Hiroshima to "abu ghraib" is the same as fish to bicycles. Apples to zepplins. Morality in war? Marquis de Queensbury rules in a nuklear age? Are you insane?

The purpose of war is to WIN! Winners write history. Losers die. Ask saddam.

Idiocy. If you don't like it, renounce your citizenship and move to Darfur and become a "citizen of the world".

Quite honestly, I think this is crazy.

The Japanese got what they deserved, as did the Germans. When faced with the cruelty of the Rape of Nanking, or the insanity of the Concentration Camps, my question would be how would not acting have altered our soul?

We had a tool to end the war, and to end it a way that would be unequivocal and devastating to all those who believed that the behavior of the Axis was acceptable.

Judgements are a part the circumstances of their time. While we can learn from history, we must refrain from extrapolating a judgement from our circumstances to those of another era, even if they should not stop us from learning from the past.

Jihadist!

Did I not tell you to stay off the Net and focus fully on the spiritual in Mecca and Medina? This thread is interesting to know on American mindsets on war, peace, atomic bombs and souls of a people and nation. Theirs vs others.

Kerry

Atrocities were also committed by the Allied troops during World War II but not reported. Winners decide on history. The Japanese largely leave western civilians interned the Japanese in horrendous camps, especially western women and children, many who died of diseases. America also interned Japanese living in the US during World War II but not Germans. Do I detect racism then as racism now with regard to Japanese as opposed to the worst German behavior and killings of civilians during the last great war?

Should we nuke Cambodia and Soviet Union for the atrocities Pol Pot and Stalin commit on their own people which is worst than war with external forces? We were a bit late to stop genocides in Rwanda and Bosnia but no nukes used. The worst genocides are by the state with people like Hitler, Stalin and Pol Pot in charge, against their own people. Like Eddie Izzard, a British comedian said, but in a black humour particular to him and better put in his own words but which I recall here as best as I can - "We tolerated Hitler killing his own people and go almost 'Well done! You kill 100,000 of your own people? You must be very busy!' But to invade another country and kill their citizens, after a couple of years, we won't stand for it."

Cheers mate and good day.

The decision to drop the atomic bombs was correct and even through the revisionism of our history it is still is the right the decision. By dropping the bombs we saved US soldiers, sailors and Marines. Outstanding.

All:
Well for those who are still blaming America, without knowing their own history, I guess the rest of us will have to just put up with it. It is the American way to let the uninformed, impressionable, and the easily convinced to have their opinions. Reminds me of the World War II poster for war bonds painted by Norman Rockwell, where a man stands to speak, and the caption is "Protect Freedom of Speech." Many soldiers died to protect that freedom and so we should all just let it go. It is what makes our country great, the diversity of ideas. Unfortunately, the ones being protected have no concept of where the freedom comes from, it is just taken for granted.

Nora:

I understand and admire your premise. What is relevant to your question, however, is the relevance of war, any war, to the question. As a retired military aviator and combat veteran, I find the naiveté' of some in the population exasperating. War, in my view, is man's ultimate act of inhumanity towards other human beings: it is itself an immoral act. Whether based on greed, power, failure to address grievances through negotiations, it is the final breakdown in civility and morality of our species.

War, once engaged, is the act of executing to achieve one's objective as expeditously as practicable and with the least loss of life to one's fighting forces. The Western nations carry this loss of life further by fighting wars within a defined set of rules, ostensibly, to limit collateral loss of life. Most Middle Eastern and Eastern cultures do not subscribe to such rules. (Some now do, including Japan) During WW II they did not. You will note that it took another hit on Nagasaki to force the Japanese to cease hostilities. Even then, the military did not want to end the war. The reason being that the word surrender is not in the Japanese language and the Bushido sect that was running the country could not abide such a thought. It took the emperor, a deity in Japan, to make an extraordinary speech on radio - never before done - to demand adherence to his wishes. In fact, he stated: "It is over". The word surrender or "give up" was never mentioned, because the culture and mentality did not allow for that concept. What the atomic bomb allowed us to do was avoid another 2-3 years of fighting the Japanese across their island nation. It is estimated that another 150,000-200,000 US lives were saved, not to mention avoiding a similar loss of life by the Japanese people. It has always stuck me as odd that people could live with an airplane dropping 500 pound Mark 82 bombs singly or in a salvo of 4-8 over a period of many sorties in which the chances for more lives lost went up exponentially for the pilot and the belligerents against whom they were engaged. I believe what finally sinks into the human consciousness is the enormity of the devastation and chaos being wreaked upon human beings when the same destruction to the target(s) can be accomplished with a single weapon. In Japan, I believe the cause was just and appropriate given the circumstances at that time. Given events today, I do not believe we have learned many lessons.

Thanks for listening,

Curt

Read me!

Well, Abu Ghraib was a fairly minor event-at least when one looks at the convicted, England and Graner, who basically used prisoners are actors to be photographed. The man who turned in Graner, Darby, described a helicopter that landed at night, and brought a prisoner, who was tortured and killed by the arrivals, who then left back into the night, with their chopper. Graner and England were left to photo the iced body, their smiles in the pictures leaving them with the blame of an act they did not create. Child's play, certainly compared to Hiroshima.

One must not forget, that Nations behave like a living organism, on a grand scale, even for all of the author's cry for us to view the particular and not the grand picture0the human to the sky, the burning Japanese corpse to the American War machine.

I will turn that around on the author. The Japanese government in 1945 was truly soulless and would have used an atomic bomb on the USA, had the Japanese been in possession of one. The Japanese organism, the government, used people like machines, to kill and torture on a grand scale. I think it is wishful thinking, to believe that the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was not useful in destroying this organism.

The soulless America we see today is one born of greed power and corruption on a grand Federal level one that thinks it is okay to wiretap without warrants, and to waterboard terrorists, but these characteristics of absolute power that the federal government exercises on a daily basis are not born from a long ago use of nuclear weapons in Japan. And yes, I don't think that the US "won" WW2, but it was a complicated situation that needed some response-perhaps not one that left the Soviet Union in a position to do what Germany and Japan failed to do, that is, destroy the US, but the US had to do something.

The US does not have to be, and should not be, in Iraq, and there is the difference.

All:
Well for those who are still blaming America, without knowing their own history, I guess the rest of us will have to just put up with it. It is the American way to let the uninformed, impressionable, and the easily convinced to have their opinions. Reminds me of the World War II poster for war bonds painted by Norman Rockwell, where a man stands to speak, and the caption is "Protect Freedom of Speech." Many soldiers died to protect that freedom and so we should all just let it go. It is what makes our country great, the diversity of ideas. Unfortunately, the ones being protected have no concept of where the freedom comes from, it is just taken for granted.

There is one museum you did not mention having visited - the National D-Day and WWII museum in New Orleans. There on a wall you can read the scale of the U.S. invasion that was planned for the Japanese mainland - many times the size of D-Day, with many times the number of casualties on both sides. There is no doubt in my mind that Truman did the right thing even for Japan (even if he did it for many of the wrong reasons).

And one more thing that no one discusses -- without the full demonstration of the horrible consequences of nuclear weapons, are we really so sure the Cold War would have ended without either side initiating a nuclear exchange, just because one side wondered if nuclear weapons were really all that bad, compared to, say, backing down over Berlin or Cuba?

Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have more to do with the corruption of leaders (not soldiers) who think they can do anything and answer to no one while on their "mission from God," than with the corruption of America's soul brought on by Hiroshima.

There is one museum you did not mention having visited - the National D-Day and WWII museum in New Orleans. There on a wall you can read the scale of the U.S. invasion that was planned for the Japanese mainland - many times the size of D-Day, with many times the number of casualties on both sides. There is no doubt in my mind that Truman did the right thing even for Japan (even if he did it for many of the wrong reasons).

And one more thing that no one discusses -- without the full demonstration of the horrible consequences of nuclear weapons, are we really so sure the Cold War would have ended without either side initiating a nuclear exchange, just because one side wondered if nuclear weapons were really all that bad, compared to, say, backing down over Berlin or Cuba?

Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have more to do with the corruption of leaders (not soldiers) who think they can do anything while on their "mission from God," than with the corruption of America's soul brought on by Hiroshima.

Read me!

There is one museum you did not mention having visited - the National D-Day and WWII museum in New Orleans. There on a wall you can read the scale of the U.S. invasion that was planned for the Japanese mainland - many times the size of D-Day, with many times the number of casualties on both sides. There is no doubt in my mind that Truman did the right thing even for Japan (even if he did it for many of the wrong reasons).

And one more thing that no one discusses -- without the full demonstration of the horrible consequences of nuclear weapons, are we really so sure the Cold War would have ended without either side initiating a nuclear exchange, just because one side wondered if nuclear weapons were really all that bad, compared to, say, backing down over Berlin or Cuba?

Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib have more to do with the corruption of leaders (not soldiers) who think they can do anything while on their "mission from God," than with the corruption of America's soul brought on by Hiroshima.

Concentrating on the individual is fine however it is very subjective. You have concentrated on the girl with the painted nails and the man who longs for big cities. How cute. And Oppenheimer made booze. How clever.

God has no time to deal with the individual. If he did then thousands of children would not have perished in the Holocaust, nor in any other holocaust. What was the purpose for that, God? Man has adopted God for his own selfish use but God has been cleverer than to fall for it - He keeps with His cosmic work and man goes crazy when things don't fall into the "right" place. Like when innocents perish.

I was in the museum in Hiroshima. It does present the destruction and the suffering of the Japanese people but it does that without connection to anything else. It is as if one day, a bomb came from nowhere and wiped out the city and its people. There is no background, no mention of how the war started, of the millions of people who suffered in the hands of the Japanese, of all the cities that were destroyed by them. I left the museum disappointed but proud, proud of all of those people who have worked so hard to make the bomb a success, and it was a success. It brought a miserable war and suffering for millions to an end.

If one wants to concentrate on the individual then I would suggest discussing an individual U.S. infantryman in Germany at the time of the bomb. He has just finished a grueling war and is about to be shipped to the Pacific to participate in the upcoming invasion of Japan. The odds of his survival are not great. It is estimated that there will be a million military casualties and that millions of Japanese civilians will die as well. And then suddenly, one bomb and millions are saved - American and Japanese. Not bad for one bomb.

What happened to us as a nation on August 6, 1945? Not much but a few days later the war, in which the USA and its her allies really saved the world, ended. Would make anyone feel good, don't you think?

The only difference between the horror of atomic bombs and conventional bombs is that vast amount of instataneous damage they cause.

Why not focus on the horror of the numerous Australian and U.S. troop beheadings in the South Pacific. How about the Japanese crucifixions of Aussi nurses and troops. Hum, the Bataan Death March.

Additionally, what about the medical experiments on human subjects by both the Japanese and Germans.

War and what humans do to each other is often hideous, but has been with us throughout human history, along with the numerous acts of human charity and kindness.

What bothers me most regarding liberal and the very faithful, is that they often "turn their cheeks" to the genocides inflicted upon humans and excuse it. Many even excused Stalin as he was doing what he thought best for most of the masses. What he did was inexcusable, as was Hitler's Holocaust.

How about you slam, we all slam the bad guys in print and quit cowering.

Islamist:)

Give it up my friend. Some Americans don't know the histories of other countries too well. Some do. China and Korea do take exception on Japanese atrociitses committed during World War II. But these neighbours of Japan have a very long history of disputes and wars.

Yes, Chinese atrocities against their own people throughout history is worst, but that is the point. It would seem to be all right for people to kill their own, but not foreigners. God help us all.

My Umra's going on well but too hot here. No, Mecca and Medina was not nuked as yet. If it is being nuked, I won't be able to tell the difference with the body melting and physically debilitating heat I'm experiencing right now in Mecca:)

Time for the Umra rites again.

Be well and salam.

J

I know someone who was in the Pacific, preparing for the immanent invasion of Japan before the Bomb was dropped. He's forever grateful that the invasion was stopped.

I think that our national soul was damaged not when we dropped those two bombs, but when we continued to make them afterwards. Truman should have seen the results of this destruction and said, "no more." Dismantled the whole thing, and charged the newly-formed UN to outlaw nuclear weapons. Allow only nuclear power for peaceful purposes - if that. But, hindsight is 20/20.

Eugene

Consider what? That all Muslims be punished for the acts of Muslims terrorists that also kill them? Nothing to consider except for some absurd Americans here connecting speciously which cities should be nuked in retaliations.

Some posters here insisted that bombing Japanese civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasake is moral and right in response to what the Japanese army did in Asia. This as absurb as excusing Muslim suicide bombers killing civilians in response to what Israel did. To bomb Afghanistan and its civilians back to the stone age for what Osama did. To invade and occupy Iraq for what Osama did.

I paged through some of these comments but didn't get through all of them. At some point different people have said the same thing again and again.

Nora, I do hope you read this far. I want to commend you for a thought-provoking article. I am not that inclined to read the book, sorry to say. But your article was thought-provoking.

I guess I have to agree with a poster named Nick Lappos above. In asking whether we lost our soul as a nation by dropping the bombs, you have, I think, ignored the context and the reality of that time. If you haven't read it, I recommend you read "Flags of Our Fathers." Forget the movie -- read the book.

It is hard for a modern-day audience to understand what was happening in the United States, and in the war, by the summer of 1945. We get upset now when a helicopter crashes and eight troops die in a day. Well, try several thousand deaths in a single day, and not of volunteer professional soldiers, but of conscripts. Those are the reports that were coming back from Iwo Jima in February 1945. And why? Because the leadership of Japan chose a path. They would fight to the death to defend their homeland. Their strategy was to inflict the maximum number of casualties on the Allied forces. They would not surrender unconditionally. To get the best settlement possible, they increased the stakes. Iwo Jima was a frightful message to our country about the consequences Japan was planning if we were to push our objective of disarming and defeating Japan, fully. I recently visited the museum at Japan's national shrine for its war dead in Tokyo. The museum certainly expresses an alternative perspective, and one that hasn't changed. According to the display on Iwo Jima, the Japanese defense of Iwo Jima was a victory for Japan because the mass casualties on the U.S. side hastened the willingness of the U.S. to end the war. Really, that is what it says at that museum. Honest.

So we gave them a response that by today's morals is very, very questionable. I'm just not sure it was as questionable under the circumstances of the time. I think your suggestion that we lost our soul as a nation is an exaggeration. Nora, I also think that by raising that question, and by glossing over the very real events of the time, you have minimized Japan's culpability in the deaths of the innocents at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I'm not sure we, or Japan, or any of the Allies, or any of the Axis nations had a "soul" during this conflict, the likes of which are unimaginable to this generation. I think each of us warring nations had a survival instinct. I don't know that we ought to expect any of them to have had more than that until this nightmare finally ended.

Thank you for your essay.

President Truman had to decide between losing thousands of American lives in a protracted and costly invasion of Japan whose leadership had exhorted its populace to defend the homeland at all costs and dropping the bomb to quickly bring the war to an end. He made the right choice. It always strikes me as odd when voices denounce the use of the atomic bomb yet remain muffled regarding the Allies' firebombing of Dresden and Tokyo, which resulted in more civilian casualties.

The only difference between the horror of atomic bombs and conventional bombs is that vast amount of instataneous damage they cause.

Why not focus on the horror of the numerous Australian and U.S. troop beheadings in the South Pacific. How about the Japanese crucifixions of Aussi nurses and troops. Hum, the Bataan Death March.

Additionally, what about the medical experiments on human subjects by both the Japanese and Germans.

War and what humans do to each other is often hideous, but has been with us throughout human history, along with the numerous acts of human charity and kindness.

What bothers me most regarding liberal and the very faithful, is that they often "turn their cheeks" to the genocides inflicted upon humans and excuse it. Many even excused Stalin as he was doing what he thought best for most of the masses. What he did was inexcusable, as was Hitler's Holocaust.

How about you slam, we all slam the bad guys in print and quit cowering.

to further muddy the waters:

The Scandal of the Particular
preached at Trinity Church
by Nora Gallagher

http://www.journeywithjesus.net/Essays/20070723JJ.shtml

John Horrigan

As for numbers, more people died in Asia due to their nationalist independence movements and internal insurgencies for it than the Japanese occupation of the Asian lands. Maoist China killed more of its people in the Long March and the Cultural Revolution than by Japanese occupation. More Vietnamese are killed by the Vietnam War for reunification than by Japanese occupation. More Burmese died under the reign of the Burmese junta than by Japanese occupation.

JohnG1

The power of the atomic bomb and now the nuclear bomb makes everyone wants to have one. Japan don't have it, but North Korea do have it. Japan has the capability to build one, but don't as yet. Ever heard of NPT?

What makes Americans think only they have the sole right to use atomic bombs and nukes on others? To cluster bomb, carpet bomb, smart targett bombings and not expect others not to want to have the same capabilities? Ban the bomb for all and not just for those already in the declared nuclear club, and the undeclared ones as well, the non-signitories of IAEA NPT.

Every time a bomb goes off, the souls of the bomber and the bombed are ravaged, lost or are in limbo. If American taxpayers are willing to pay for nukes to be used somewhere, and the US have the most nukes in the world, so be it. The US have more money and better brains to create the best and most immediate ways for death and destruction. Will worldwide Armageddon begins and end with the US, the god of total global destruction with the power to do so? A new idea? No. Thinking this "unthinkable" has been going on from the Cold War. A new one coming. The US agreed to sell multibillion dollars worth of military hardware, but no nukes, to several Middle East countries and to increase annual assistnce to Israel to $3 billion per year. More wars and bombs there, and maybe a nuke blast or two in the future? What are they thinking? Arming or rearming in the Middle East? Is it just business for the military industrial complex in the US supported by US government, in a drive for no more wars there?

There is no connection between Hiroshima and GTMO, and Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib. The enormity of death and destruction of Hiroshima--the death and destruction of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilian non-combatants-is on an entirely different moral plane than the amateurish stupidity of GTMO and Abu Ghraib, most of whose victims are still alive.
Instead the questions are, "What is the connection between Hiroshima and the proposed annihilation of North Korea should they acquire the bomb and launch them at S. Korea or Japan? What is the connection between Hiroshima and the preemptive annihilation of Tehran should they acquire the bomb"? That's what you need to think about, Ms.Gallagher--it is the proposed wholesale slaughter of innocent civilian populations as a viable deterent to terrorism rather than the relatively innocuous incarceration and bad treatment of fanatical terrorist Muslims. Or, worse, what is the connection between Hiroshima and the retributive annihilation of a Middle Eastern city should a terrorist-inflicted mushroom cloud occur over a great United States city? The Arab and Muslim populations should consider.

"war does not solve anything"

Really? Tell that to the Jews of Europe.

The author asks

What happened to us as a nation on August 6, 1945?

Answ: We saved the death of many millions of Japanese including the 600,000-700,000 of the allied nations soldiers that it would have taken to invade Japan with conventional means fighting house to house, booby trapped street to booby trapped street to end the war.( See Iwo Jima and Okinawa to see where that assessment comes from.)

Did the use of a weapon designed to ruthlessly annihilate whole cities contribute to where we find ourselves today?

Answ: We find ourselves not forced to speak German punctuated with frequent Heil Hitlers and wearing Swaztikas or living in a nightmare world of a Japanese fascist dictatorship where anyone who is not Japanese is treated like an animal. See the rape of Nanking for a reference point.)

How did Hiroshima erode our sense of morality, what we permit ourselves as a nation to do?

Answ: It did not erode our sense of morality at all. Unfortunately good must stand against eveil and sacrifice themselves to stop abject evil like the very many dads and moms and brothers and uncles and grandpas who died defending freedom in WWI and WWII.

How did it affect our fragile sense of what is permissible for one human being to do to another?

Answ: War is not the enemy dictators who would enslave and rape and murder like Hitler, Hirohito, Mussalini, Castro , Mao and Stalin and wannabe dictaors like osama bin Laden are the enemy who bring war upon the innocent. We can stop them when they are relatively weak hiding in the caves of Afghanistan and Iraq or cower and then fight them in a future WWIV where tens of millions of innocents will die.

Finally, what is the connection between Hiroshima and Guantanamo, Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib?

Answ: They were all results of murderers and those who bring darkness upon humankind,Hitlers and Hirohitos and Osama Bin Ladens.

We shouldn't have done it.

Let's put this politically correct piece of sophomoric sentimentality in perspective. The atomic bomb was not only more efficient than incendiaries, but it was effective, ending a war in which Japan had, as a matter of military policy, enslaved and murdered millions. It's important to remember not only Pearl Harbor, but Comfort Women, the Bataan Death March, the Nanking Massacre of 1937-38, etc. Viewed in context, the use of the Bomb was not only sensible, but moral.

I have a hard time getting worked up over this. Just study the battles of Okinawa and Iwo Jima. These were but pale precursors of what a battle for Japan would be. Millions would have died, both military and civilian. The entire country would have been devastated, not just two cities.

The atomic bomb was no secret. Hitler was well on his way to building one before he was defeated. The Soviets were trying desperately, too, and got considerable help from the Rosenbergs. If we didn't use the bomb in 1945, the world would still have gone nuclear in a very short time.

And remember, finally, who started this war.

Three points:

1. Truman saved 500,000 American lives that would have been lost by an invasion. This was the US Military's estimate that caused Truman to drop the bomb.

2. If the US had not dropped it and shown the inhumanity of the weapon, someone would have used a nuke later........ Hiroshima and Nagasaki maybe saved NYC and Moscow. We fear a terrorist nuclear weapon today because of the nukes dropped on Japan....

3. I worked with a Japanese who lived in Hiroshima and was 7 when the bomb was dropped. I met him later in life (age 55) when he worked in America for a large Japanese company. He was pro-American and his kids now live here.......A fine gentleman. I was so shocked when I realized what his home town was that I was at a loss for words. I was embarrassed. He was not bitter nor vindictive. Just a fine gentleman who had comes to grips with the horror and outgrown it and raised fine kids.

Would God approve dropping atomic bombs on Houston, Tallahassee and Washington to punish the loyal Bushies for their evil? According to God, the answer is yes.

What did Japan do between Hiroshima and Nagasaki that justified Nagasaki? With Nagasaki, America erased all the excesses of Japan by out-doing the extreme cruelty of the Imperial Army of Japan.

"Finally, what is the connection between Hiroshima and Guantanamo, Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib?"

What pretentious drivel.

So many hateful and vitriolic posts which see evil in all manner of contradictory forms -- liberal/progressives, conservative Christians, Muslims and non-believers, bleeding hearts and Catholic sado-masochists, and many more. So few posts which bother to actually address the question posted by Ms. Gallagher: what has happened to the soul of the destroying nation (and its people)?

The soul of those who lived during the aftermath, who rebuilt defeated nations through the Marshall Plan and who eschewed the use of nuclear weapons in Korea, is not in question. It is the souls of those of us who are alive today, particularly those who are far removed in age from WWII. It is the souls of those who voted for a US Congressman and presidential candidate who proposed nuking the holy sites of another religion. It is the souls of those who are governed by an administration which bought into the notion of 'sole superpower' and its imperial hubris which has brought the possibility of destruction ever closer to our doorstep. It is the souls of all of us who face the prospect of how to respond -- not as decision-makers, but in our own individual hearts -- to a faceless, nationless nuking of one of our cities.

Whether or not bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the "right" or "best" choice, does having had to make that choice somehow diminish our ability to be outraged by the horrors of Guantanamo and Abu Gharib because they pale in comparison? What does that tell us about ourselves? These are the questions Ms. Gallagher seems to be asking. They do not have to be read as rhetorical questions with right answers. Maybe your answer is that Abu Gharib shows that we've progressed a very long way, that we can be more outraged by a small set of atrocities relative to those which were far worse and more numerous in WWII. Maybe it's that we are in danger of losing what we've gained from winning WWII by our excessive projection of pseudo-imperial power. Maybe it's something else.

Beyond that is the real question: what have we have learned which will enable us to evolve beyond facing such awful choices in the future? When the articles in this series attract less outpouring of prejudice and more thoughtful and reflective responses, that will be one small sign of progress...

Until I read James Bradley's book "Flyboys", I also thought that the atom bomb was a turning point in our country's morality. However, his research is clear that before we started fire-bombing cities in Germany and Japan, we had condemned such practices by our enemies. What we find out is that our national morality is situational... what FDR once labeled as "barbarian" when done by the Japanese in China, we were happily doing by the end of the war to Japan under his leadership.

Our country's soul is fine so long as our enemies are not wining the war.

Very interesting take on the atom bombing of Japan. I suspect it did erode the soul of our nation to some extent. If such a thing as a national soul exists. I guess the alternative, invasion of Japan and the death of hundreds of thousands of young Americans (needlessly?) and the wounding of hundreds of thousands of more and perhaps a more complete destruction of Japan would have enabled us to to maintain the moral high ground? I don't know. I'm glad the war ended when it did. My grandfather may have been killed had it gone on longer and I would not be here.

You should go back and read "Typhoon of Steel" (history of the Okinawa campaign), and review Japan's preparations for invasion before condemning the A-bombs.

It's fascinating to watch people apply current morality to historical events, and wonder, "how could we/they do that?" It's clear that the Nora has no real sense of History, or what would actually have been involved had the Allies NOT used the Atomic bomb, and instead had invaded the Japanese Home Islands. Operation Downfall was expected to produce roughly 1.2million casualites, with 250,000 dead. This figure only includes Allied servicemen. Japanese civilian figures would have been well into the millions!

Nora's figures regarding the firebombing of Japanese cities suggest that firebombing was relatively benign vis a vis atomic weapons, when in fact, it was not. For example, the firebombing of Tokyo on March 9, 1945 destroyed 16 Square miles of the city, and killed as many as 100,000 people. Therefore, suggesting that fireboming was OK, and atomic bombing was somehow morally corrupting is quite a moral stretch indeed, if the results were the same in the end, particularly considering how many Japanese cities were firebombed.

Before denouncing acts of the past, as "amoral" and "corrupting", it would be far wiser to attempt to see things as the folks who made the decisions saw them, and the consequences of not only their acts, but of their inaction. In this case, Nora is so busy pitching her fear of atomic weapons and her book, that she fails to consider that things were different back then.

You should go back and read "Typhoon of Steel" (history of the Okinawa campaign), and review Japan's preparations for invasion before judging the A-bombs as excessive.

Scott, are you ignorant enough to believe bombing a MILITARY TARGET justifies laying waste to two ENTIRELY CIVILIAN ONES? Bravo Scott.

Nora:

I commented earlier... and have this to add:

Everybody who commented here were people of faith. They self-selected to this NYT web page because they are curious.

Almost without fail, each found your pitch to be disingenuous and hypocritical.

Nora, you've got some soul-searching to do. And in my opinion, the NYT did a rotten job allowing you to pitch this garbage. Nora... your article is all about you.

I look forward to reading your novel. It sounds very insightful. One of my favorite quotes from Ghandi: "an eye for an eye, and soon the whole world is blind." This was my line is a play, called, "A Symphony for Peace".

Rita A. Weinstein has taken the words of Albert Camus, Cesar Chavez, Mohandas K. Gandhi, Emma Goldman, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich and Count Leo Tolstoy and composed "A Symphony of Peace."

Come hear the voices of peace. Let this symphony touch your heart and inspire your actions. Join us in claiming Peace now!

Albert Camus (1913-1960). French novelist, essayist, and playwright, received the 1957 Nobel Prize for literature. Joined the French resistance movement during the German occupation during World War II.

Cesar Chavez (1927-1993). Founder of the United Farm Workers union. Beginning in 1965 led boycotts and fasts in order to raise American awareness and create better working conditions for farm workers.

Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948). Considered by many to be the founding father of the modern state of India. Pioneered the use of nonviolent resistance to achieve revolution. Assassinated 1948.

Emma Goldman (1869-1940). Activist, socialist, feminist. Advocated the use of violence early in her career, changed her position after witnessing the brutality of the Bolshevik revolution.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1921-1968) Founder and President of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. Central figure in the American civil rights movement. Winner 1965 Nobel Peace Prize. Assassinated 1968.

Congressman Dennis J. Kucinich. (b. 1946) Recipient of the International Gandhi Peace award in 2003, the year he led a coalition of 126 Congress members in opposition to the invasion of Iraq. Twice introduced legislation in the U.S. House of Representatives to establish a cabinet-level Department of Peace.

Count Leo Tolstoy (1828-1910). Russian novelist and philosopher considered one of the world's greatest writers. Influenced strongly by Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience". Tolstoy, in turn, wrote essays that laid the foundations of Gandhi's philosophy of nonresistance.

Jacob Jozevz :

Man, your posts read like a very sacrry version of Dr. Brower's Soap labels.

Bizarr-o-matic for sure.

And Jesus was man, no God. Ignorant those who claim otherwise.

No one would have heard of Hiroshima or Nagasaki if it hadn't been for Pearl Harbor.

The souls of hundreds of thousands of our Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, and Marines are still instact because of the fact we chose to drop the Bomb instead of sending these men to certain slaughter by storming Japan.

If anyone should feel any guilt it is the Japanese. They thought they could take over the world, but instead woke a sleeping giant who properly put them back in their place.

Spare me the crap about what is permissable for one human being to do to another. I hear about Abu Ghraib, but where is the author when the Taliban cut people's heads off? Where is the author when islamic suicide bombers blow up innocent civilians? I am secure in the fact that at least our system holds people accountable instead of believing that cutting off a person's head will guarantee me a place in heaven with 72 virgins.

The author needs to worry more about her soul and less about our nation's.

I think most commentators are missing the point. I don't think the question is the morality of the act in light of the existing circumstances, it is more how that awful event (regardless of justification, it was still an awful event) has possibly inured us to violent acts that we may have found objectionable prior to our doing this.

After all, this country has invalidated the Geneva Conventions, will not disavow torture, and reacts to Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo will some mild discomfort, but no more. We attribute it to 9/11, yet we held to those principles after Pearl Harbor, where 2400 were killed and 1400 wounded.

This is a valid question, first posed by Ghandi. Perhaps that was when we lost our moral center.

Have you ever seen a picture of the huge Gyeongbok Palace in Seoul?

The palace was originally constructed in 1394 by Jeong Do-jeon, a Korean architect. The palace was burnt down during the Japanese invasions of Korea (1592-1598). It was reconstructed during 1860s as a massive 330 building complex with 5,792 rooms. Standing on 4,414,000 square feet (410,000 square meters) of land, it was a symbol of majesty for the Korean people and the home of the royal family.

In 1911, the government of Japan demolished all but 10 buildings during the period of Korea under Japanese rule, constructing the Japanese General Government Building for the Governor-General of Korea in front of the throne hall.

Almost every Korean cultural monument was destroyed or sent to Japan during this time.
Tens of thousands of Korean men were forced into labor units and perished from inhuman treatment as virtual slaves.

The world knows, but Japan refuses to fully acknowledge, what happened to the thousands of Korean woman sent to serve the armies of Japan.

You have not seen photos of the full Gyeongbok Palace as the Japanese forbid any visual memory of the palace to be preserved as they were in the process of destroying it.

How would you feel about the manner of the ending of WW2 if your society were under Japanese rule?

Even the Nazis did not destroy Versailles or the Vatican.

Have you ever seen a picture of the huge Gyeongbok Palace in Seoul?

The palace was originally constructed in 1394 by Jeong Do-jeon, a Korean architect. The palace was burnt down during the Japanese invasions of Korea (1592-1598). It was reconstructed during 1860s as a massive 330 building complex with 5,792 rooms. Standing on 4,414,000 square feet (410,000 square meters) of land, it was a symbol of majesty for the Korean people and the home of the royal family.

In 1911, the government of Japan demolished all but 10 buildings during the period of Korea under Japanese rule, constructing the Japanese General Government Building for the Governor-General of Korea in front of the throne hall.

Almost every Korean cultural monument was destroyed or sent to Japan during this time.
Tens of thousands of Korean men were forced into labor units and perished from inhuman treatment as virtual slaves.

The world knows, but Japan refuses to fully acknowledge, what happened to the thousands of Korean woman sent to serve the armies of Japan.

You have not seen photos of the full Gyeongbok Palace as the Japanese forbid any visual memory of the palace to be preserved as they were in the process of destroying it.

How would you feel about the manner of the ending of WW2 if your society were under Japanese rule?

Even the Nazis did not destroy Versailles or the Vatican.

Yes, this was an awful article. Like something an eight grader would write.

Havng read most of the comments above, I have nothing further to add but my thanks to our former presidents who used the bomb wisely with respect to Japan. And God bless Curtis LeMay!

The occasional outcry on these discussion groups to nuke Mecca defies any possible rational explanation or excuse except extreme mental problems. The idea is worse than evil, it is Hitlerian madness. It is the worst possible example of proposing to take an action without thinking for a nanosecond about the consequences.

The very idea that these pathetic people think that it could actually 'improve' matters makes my blood run cold.

Possible consequences of nuking Mecca:
1. The oil from the Mideast will be instantly turned off.
2. All Americans - nay, all Westerners - in any Islamic country would be quickly hunted down and brutally killed.
3. Taliban-like governments would spring up like diseased flowers in a forsaken spring.
4. Israel would be overrun in a second holocaust.

The list could go on. I have no stomach for it.

An old debate, but it is one where some never consider the alternatives. Are you aware that the Japanese were causing the deaths of over 100,000 Asians (in China, Indochina, Philipines, etc) per MONTH in 1945. So if the US had not ended the war in August 1945, another million Asians would have died by the following summer. How moral would that have been?
T.Horrigan

President Truman did the right thing. My father was set to go to the Pacific when the bomb was dropped. If he had gone, chances are I probably would not have known him because he would have been killed. The casualties in Hiroshima and Nagasaki would have been insignificant compared to the number of U.S. military that would have died invading Japan.

It is unfortunate that civilians are involved in war. But this is, and has been, the nature of war. There are no innocents in war.

Japan decided to begin the war with us and we ended it. If we hadn't beat Germany in May, hopefully the bomb would have been dropped there too.

No apologies from this man. Morality had nothing to do with it.

I perused the post on this column and noticed that you have the usual "wingnuts" taking most of the space. Yawn!

The writer is incredibly naive about history, war, and the nature of man. She seems totally unaware of what the German historians and theologians refer to as the "Sitz im Leben", the contextual setting in life of the event in question. The bomb cut short the war drastically in time and in lives lost on both sides. My own father was slated to be in the first wave of the invasion force. I may well not have been here had that invasion gone forward. Japan started the war, not us. Had we not been attacked at Pearl Harbor, there would have been no war, no bomb. You reap what you sew. In its full historical context (which the writer conveniently ignores) conscientious and moral reservations about the bomb were virtually non-existant. The existance of the bomb and the policy of MAD kept us from an even greater slaughter during the Cold War.

Do I wish there were no such thing as war? Yes. Do I wish that humanity were more altruistic? Yes. Do I think that the bomb took away the morality of a people who beforehand were morally pure? How absurd. We are a people who had already purged a continent of its native population, brutally enslaved, used, abused, and tortured African slaves, and fought a war far more vicious than WWII to settle that issue. The bomb was horriffic, but it brought to a swift and sudden conclusion an unimmaginable carnage begun by Japan nearly two decades earlier. The Japanese had been a ruthless and bloodthirsty aggressor with all its Pacific neighbors for a long time. The bomb fundamentally changed an entire civilization from warmonger to pacifist. Those who mourn some loss of innocence in August of 1945 are about as enlightened as those who mourn the loss of another civilization "gone with the wind" in 1865.

Certainly the 'Atomic Bomb' contributed to where we find ourselves (not many American's analyze themselves or our nation) today. After 4 years of brutal killing of civilian's, our allies, and our soldiers by the Axis, the "Bomb" was a welcome event for people worldwide. It was startling and gratifying, even moreso after Nagasaki caused the Emperor to command surrender. The new weapons were only a small part of the transformation of our nation, our people's attitudes, about war. Hiroshima was dramatic enough to grab people's attention after the numbness of seeing continuous battles, death and destruction.

Wars shaped our nation, not weapons. I was fascinated by the accounts of the atomc bombs. I joined the Army Air Force when I was 17, not to drop bombs but to get the GI Bill to go to college. I was in Japan in 1950/51 and got to know the Japanese people. Civilians and soldiers suffer greatly if they are passive to a leader who starts wars. I was in Korea and Vietnam and know the futility of war. Weapons are just a parcel of that futile effort. We do not permit ourselves (the nation) to do anything but war is the catalyst that compels some people to do bad things.

Certainly the 'Atomic Bomb' contributed to where we find ourselves (not many American's analyze themselves or our nation) today. After 4 years of brutal killing of civilian's, our allies, and our soldiers by the Axis, the "Bomb" was a welcome event for people worldwide. It was startling and gratifying, even moreso after Nagasaki caused the Emperor to command surrender. The new weapons were only a small part of the transformation of our nation, our people's attitudes, about war. Hiroshima was dramatic enough to grab people's attention after the numbness of seeing continuous battles, death and destruction.

Wars shaped our nation, not weapons. I was fascinated by the accounts of the atomc bombs. I joined the Army Air Force when I was 17, not to drop bombs but to get the GI Bill to go to college. I was in Japan in 1950/51 and got to know the Japanese people. Civilians and soldiers suffer greatly if they are passive to a leader who starts wars. I was in Korea and Vietnam and know the futility of war. Weapons are just a parcel of that futile effort. We do not permit ourselves (the nation) to do anything but war is the catalyst that compels some people to do bad things.

Certainly the 'Atomic Bomb' contributed to where we find ourselves (not many American's analyze themselves or our nation) today. After 4 years of brutal killing of civilian's, our allies, and our soldiers by the Axis, the "Bomb" was a welcome event for people worldwide. It was startling and gratifying, even moreso after Nagasaki caused the Emperor to command surrender. The new weapons were only a small part of the transformation of our nation, our people's attitudes, about war. Hiroshima was dramatic enough to grab people's attention after the numbness of seeing continuous battles, death and destruction.

Wars shaped our nation, not weapons. I was fascinated by the accounts of the atomc bombs. I joined the Army Air Force when I was 17, not to drop bombs but to get the GI Bill to go to college. I was in Japan in 1950/51 and got to know the Japanese people. Civilians and soldiers suffer greatly if they are passive to a leader who starts wars. I was in Korea and Vietnam and know the futility of war. Weapons are just a parcel of that futile effort. We do not permit ourselves (the nation) to do anything but war is the catalyst that compels some people to do bad things.

Uggh, another liberal feel good weirdo rewriting history. The connection between Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib? Let us make sure Nora Gallagher remains so shelter, so naive, so ignorant, that she was lucky to not be in the World Trade Center, or in one of our African Embassy's in 1998, or in the Rome Airport or a jew at the Olympics, or at Pearl Harbor. Let us hope this woman is never around children.

Uggh, another liberal feel good weirdo rewriting history. The connection between Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib? Let us make sure Nora Gallagher remains so shelter, so naive, so ignorant, that she was lucky to not be in the World Trade Center, or in one of our African Embassy's in 1998, or in the Rome Airport or a jew at the Olympics, or at Pearl Harbor. Let us hope this woman is never around children.

The bombings ended the war quickly and efficiently, and most importantly, favorably for the United States with a limited expenditure of resources and human lives.

As a secondary justification, which I find personally irrespective of the first, Japan certainly benefited from the bombing as it left the population, leaders, and resources more intact than had the planned U.S. invasion occurred. If the U.S. launched the planned ground invasion of Japan, Japanese resources and population would have been essentially decimated to the point of complete and total economic collapse, and years of poverty and disease would have occurred. Japan would not be the nation it is today and millions, not hundreds of thousands, would have perished.

Naval Officer,
I doubt very much that u are a naval officer-the graduates of the US Naval Academy are the cream of the cream...your ignorance is such that you think Talaban/Afghan tribesmen and Islam are the same thing and/or its representitives....If you do some intelligent reading, you will discover that Islam is unequivocally anti-tribal and in fact put an end to it;ignorance and lack of education propel some nominal Muslims to revert to triblism-such as some Afghans. The Prophet Muhammad described tribalism as:"It stinks." Islam is an urban civilized faith that trancends race-abslouetly colour blind-and ethnicity;meritocracy of good deeds,charity and piety,justice,equality..etc are the basis on which Islam is based.

Arif, why are you hiding behind an Islamic name? I trust you work for AIPAC or the late Jerry Falwell,don't you. And why bomb Mecca? It is no more than a place-and will not destroy Islam-it's industructable-such a sick thought can only come from a sick mind-such an would galvanise the fragmented Muslim World against the agressors;Would not the destruction of the vitacan do the same?

Naive. Extremely naive and shallow. Okinawa was the exact signal the Japanese Military leaders wanted to send to the US and Allies. My dear old Dad was with the 2nd Marine Division, shot up across the Pacific against the very Japanese you write up as victims. He had no plans to leave his job in a cotton mill and travel around the world getting in bloodbath after bloodbath. Tarawa, too many battles to mention, the 2nd Mar Div was on the books as one of the units to spearhead the invasion of mainland Japan in 1946.

Japan had cached monstrous numbers of suicide planes, boats and armed all civilians to carry out a war of extermination in hopes of getting this country to quit.

As far as I personally am concerned, enjoy your picture of the nice Japanese culture developed after the war. It was not in place before Hiroshima. The bomb changed that. Without the bomb we would have had poison gas, radioctive seeding and final-solution grade events to finish up.

Case in point: In the long term planning for the capture of the main islands the 2nd Marine Division (and 1st, 5th, 6th) do not make the pages again as active units until 1949-1950.

My dear old Dad would be splattered somewhere on the rocky slopes of Japan and my simple-minded self wouldn't be here.

Digest the physchology of all this in the light of the fact that if there is an all-seeing and all-knowing God would that God not rather nuke a city that exterminate a people?

My country has the gift of self-loathing down to an art.

Go have some sushi and ponder the immutable path of logic with the other nay-sayers.

Like I said, I'm a simple dude and reading through the totality of the comments here I see that the self-loathing and lack of resolve have become pervasive to insure that our Country can not succeed in the world any more.

The posts above have generally convinced me that we have lost it...what ever the hell it can be defined as being.

Kids have it right..."They started it, reap the whirlwind."

Anyone whose conscience is bothered about the atomic bombs dropped on Japan is probably so bleeding heart that he/she would not want to harm a single Islamic terrorist either.

Leave bleeding hearts to Catholic sado-masochists.

What a bunch of BS. Get real.

What a bunch of BS. Get real.

Ms. Gallagher trivializes the requirement to end the war with Japan by equating it with Abu Grahib and Guantanamo. Guantanamo is a clear example of our groveling at the alter of evil lest we not be equated with evil. The prisoners at Guantanamo are treated so much better than any other prisoners of war, ever, that any suggestion that there is some analogy to Hiroshima is petty and foolish. And as for Abu Gharib, well we had a few aberant soldiers with poor judgment, but there was no torture as the word certainly is defined by people that are not phychotic haters of the United States.

Hiroshima was a tragedy that was caused by Japan, not the US. And I state plainly that it was better for 400,000 Japanese to die by the bomb than it would have been for a million or more Japanese to have died conventionally and it is unquestionably better than having a million US soldiers die invading Japan. Ms.Gallaher suffers from a complete lack of understanding of both human nature and the history of the world. And her entire discussion trivializes our humanity's unending quest for Liberty and Peace, not just surrender.

Priver

Thank you for your post asking me not to have knee-jerk. As you can see from subsequent posts, there are others who do want to nuke Mecca and Medina.

Arif

Agreeing with a naval officer about nuking Mecca and Medina? He is a "naval officer", one who, in war, wear nice whites and shot missiles and nukes from a ship miles from land as support fire to ground troops. South East Asian Muslims are not tribal in socological structure like Middle East Muslims.

As Priver said, Muslims who have no quarrel with the west will not certainly stand by after Mecca and Medina is nuked. China is still standing and have nukes. India too and further strentened with the new nuclear deal the US governent it that runs contrary to every reason and will heighten the rush for nukes by other countries.

Nuking Mecca and Medina to teach Muslim terrorists has the same logic as nuking the Vatican teach Basque seperatist and terrorists.

Were the Japanese not pushed by western policy of not letting them access to markets that lead to their idea for an Asian Greater Co-prosperity sphere covering most of East Asia?

Did the Japanese occupation of other Asian countries colonised by the English, French and Dutch not weakened those colonialists' hold and hastened the nationalistic independence movements in the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia during and after World War II?

Did the Japanese expulsion of colonial powers not gave the nationalist movements of the countries that the western colonialists can be defeated and strenghtened the resolve of Asians fighting against their colonial masters?

Well done Japan. You taught East Asians that the west can be beaten out of dominating their countries. Even after World War II, when they tried to stop your cars and electrical products from geting into their countries by various non-tariff barriers, your still made it. The East Asian countries are led by your example of successful economic development.

Hiroshima has no meaning. Too far gone. US morality and fakeness as a country with its American flag and "Sea to shining Sea" songs is really Vietnam and Iraq and Bush. The US is not to save the world but rather to be in control. And the world hates us, asslickers included.

I think the author needs to research the history of World War II a bit better. The horrors of Hiroshima are obvious but she does not note the horrors that utterly horrible regime, Imperial Japan, visited upon the rest of Asia. Who would the author have paid the price for Imperial Japan's crime? Hundreds of thousands of American, Britiish and Australian soldiers? Imperial Japan was truly the destroying nation and that weapon helped to end that horrible regime. The only shame is that it was not ready 2 years earlier to save the lives of hundreds of thousands of Russian, British, and American soldiers in the fight against Nazi Germany--not to mention Holocaust victims.

I am dissappointed but not surprised by the attitude of many, if not most the posters on this board. Zero condolence over this anniversary, and the cold hearted, merciless attitude towards the Japanese people.

If many Americans still have a grudge against the Japanese people for (the mostly military attack upon) Pearl Harbor, it was paid back in full, a thousand fold.

Many say that the "Japs" -- hundreds of thousands of civillians, deserved it, because the Imperial Army killed hundreds of thousands of civillians, and attacked Pearl Harbor.

And yet if those civillians are killed by being burned, nuked, and irradiated to death, it is not immoral. Having one's children have their skin slough off and then die, or being burned to death by phosporous is a horrifying death.

They are not a monolithic entity. In fact, most of the populace was denied a choice in what their _Totalitarian government_ did. And yet, it comes across as if they are regarded as all the same.

It is very tragic that they were denied a choice, and yet many were forced into the military (often ordered to fight to the death), and at home, whole families were burned alive.

If a dictatorship orders its army to attack another and commit atrocities, who bears the most responsibility and blame for those decisions? The Dictatorship.

On the other hand, IF a Democracy attacks or commits atrocities, who bears the most responsibility and blame? If given political freedom, and freedom of information, how moral is the populace who elects and continues to support governments which commit atrocities such as the deliberate targetting of hundreds of civillians, genocide, massacres, torture, immoral wars, etc... ?

So Japan attacks a US naval base, killing many military personnel and civilians in an act of war. And so we decide to prevent mass carnage and destruction by, creating mass carnage and destruction. Great logic.

There is absolutely NO JUSTIFICATION for dropping the bomb. None. Zero. It was an act of dishonor and cowardice. You have to be an absolute coward to hide behind a nuclear bomb.

For those of you that are HAPPY and THRILLED that we nuked over 300,000 innocent civilians, you have no hope. You will try to justify mass carnage and destruction in a way of suppressing your own guilt, but if you could say that you were happy that 300,000 civilians were incinerated, then I'm sure you didn't mind 9/11.

Oh wait, that was different. Those were American civilians, which are, clearly, more precious than anyone else.

I'm sickened and ashamed that some of you are posting that you're happy that the bomb saved military lives -- I guess the lives of innocent woman and children meant absolutely nothing.

The Japanese did have a brutal, deadly history. But we were supposed to have been better.

Soul of the destroying nation? What the he*l is the matter with her? Does she not understand why we used atomic weapons against Japan? Does she not realize we have never used them since?

One could assume from reading this tripe - and many products of revisionist public schools would believe - that Japan was the victim and we were the aggressors.

This is a sick, twisted individual. She needs to stay at someplace like the Kos where her mindset can truly be appreciated.

America has proven time and time again that she is good at killing. The irony of it all, is that when a relatively small disaster like VA Tech, or the MN bridge collapse occurs, the entire nation appears to grieve. In Iraq, scores of people are killed in a single instance, and you do not witness the length of grief coverage by the press as we do here. The aftermath of Hiroshima is that Americans are terrified of nuclear weapons, and will forever be haunted by them.

to Hideki:

You wrote "Like a team using a technological edge to beat out competitors in the Tour de France, the USA took the quick and dirty way out of the Pacific War."

You accuse America of being quick and dirty? After the first bombing, Japan was ready to sacrifice a million of its own people in hopes that the US would present a less restrictive surrender treaty. Japan was ready to fight to the bitter end. Dirty? The Japanese at Unit 731 weren't dirty?

I'm not sure I understand the source of this historical revisionism on Hiroshima that pops up every now and then. Perhaps this revisionism is rooted in a failure to read and analyze that primary source history. Or, perhaps this revisionism is rooted in an apparently faddish need to confess a national guilt. I'm not sure.

We have plenty of other national defects to feel guilty about than the legal use of a primitive superweapon that may have shortened the Second World War and saved a million or so lives by doing so. Racism in the US is one of those things that divides our nation and shakes our faith. That issue needs the quiet reflection that seems to be spent instead on rehashing the decisions made by allied thinkers sixty years ago to convince an increasingly truculant and suicidal Japanese Imperial Council that it urgently needed to end its belligerancy. The "national guilt" on using nuclear weapons to end World War Two falls squarely on the shoulders of Emperor Hirohito and his intransigent (and insubordinate) Imperial Council -- not on Oppenheimer, Groves, Marshall, Arnold, etc.

Hiroshima validated war as political policy and made it far easier for others who followed to defend military "solutions" to social problems. Hiroshima also represents a mistake so huge few in positions of political or social power can ever admit it's massive moral wrongness. If the energy spent defending and justifying Hiroshima had been used fighting hunger or researching a cure for AIDS, would the world be different today?

I think aggression, the need to subdue, and the desire to kill, are hard-wired into the human nervous system. There is a small part of our brains, and therefore our minds and spirits, that remains functionally identical to the brains of shrews and cats and other warm-blooded carnivores. That part of us is no more evident than a fly in a cathedral, but it constantly nudges us to choose Hiroshimas of all magnitudes and consequences. And if often succeeds.
All the world's religions and humanitarian value systems have not succeeded in subduing the tiny and terrible carnivore in us, yet without these efforts, who can say how much more harm we would have done as a species?

To my mind, George Bush is both dangerous and dispicable because he has justified and defended his own personal Hiroshima with the most specious arguments--world freedom, national security, and protection of the innocent. It does not speak well for America's moral health that they have supported him.

I have not read Ms. Gallagher's novel so I am not in a position to defend her essay above.

However, war does not solve anything, it merely postpones socio-cultural conflict to a later date. We're still witnessing what the Treaty of Versailles "accomplished" in eastern Europe and the Middle East.

The United States may not have lost its "soul" after the atomic genocide of Japan but it did lose a considerable amount of respect and moral authority in the world. Like a team using a technological edge to beat out competitors in the Tour de France, the USA took the quick and dirty way out of the Pacific War. As a previous post mentioned, the War Department knew that Japan couldn't fight much longer. (Kinda like the FBI knowing that Japanese-Americans posed no security risk but they put them in concentration camps anyway?)

On the other hand, the idea of honor in war is non-sensical unless one (or more) of the warring parties actually values human life. Why celebrate the return of a soldier when other citizens are sick and dying of malnutrition or are awaiting execution on the gallows? A moral society should also be mourning equally the 'honorable" dead soldiers of the opponent, as they are doing their job as much as our own.

The American spirit is and has been unique in the present world its energy and positive outlook. It is interesting and probably theraputic to argue the state of its soul and morality but the historical heart of America pulses with an opportunitistic corporate capitalism and legally a corporation cannot place any human/moral values above its profit line.

So it would have made YOU feel better if 200,000 U.S. soldiers had died instead? Not me . . .the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima has done nothing to my soul, nothing compared to your notion of right and wrong and your desire to have seen our soldiers die instead. That is apparently all too easy for YOU to think about.

just another fuzzy liberal. thank heavens

Harry Truman, who dropped the bombs, was a true

american patriot

Typical liberal tripe. God the left disgusts me with their utter intellectual dishonesty.

Naval Officer,
You are a person with great experience and hats off to you, you understand the tribal nature of Islam truly. To destroy the militant Mullah along with his rabid followers the only solution is to destroy the source; Mecca & Medina. If only that building is destroyed terrorism will cease.

To all the others who hate themselves because of the bomb; in all wars the technologically advanced nation wins, in this case it was the USA. The Japanese were no saints, you could also ask the question; if Japan had the bomb would they use it against the USA? I am quite sure they would, just like any Mullah will once they get their hands on one.

Why publish this shameless self-promotion under the banner of a discussion of morality? That the author only asks the hard questions at the end and then offer's her novel as an answer is about as hollow and empty as the world after Hiroshima.

Is this an essay or an advertisement for the author's novel? Ms. Gallagher could have very well addressed her central theme--which, at any rate, she fails to do in this essay, without hawking her novel as well. She never actually confronts the issue of what dropping the bomb did to the soul of the conquering nation--just uses the occasion as a pretext for mentioning--several times--that she has written a novel. Bad form.

As horrible as the effects of the use of the atomic bomb were, I think you have to view the decision to use it during the time period/era that the decision was made.

After nearly 5 years of war, and the death of many thousands of Americans, and the planned invasion of the Japanese mainland, along with the high casualties anticipated, the bomb had to be used.

I don't know if the author of this article had known that there was a standing order amongst the Japanese military to execute all American POW's at the begining of any invasion of the Japanese main island of Honchu. In addition, any prolonged engagement would have brought the Russians into the fight, and might have resulted in a North/South Japan, much like we see in Korea today.

to write such an article and not mention the horrors of the Battaan Death march, the conditions of POW camps run by the Japanese, the rape of Nan King, Unit 731 which conducted bio-chemical experiments on live Chinese subjects, all manifested by Japan, is obsurd.

One last point - If a bloody battle had ensued for the Japanese mainland, and it would have, surely more Japanese lives would have been lost, and as a result, the reconstruction of Japan, and any reconciliation between our two peoples would have been very difficult to accomplish.

I respect the Japanese people, and thier culture. I think we are strong allies because of the War and the brutality it brought to both sides. But to make America out as some evil country for finishing a war it didn't start really pisses me off, and it obscures the bravery, blood, and sacrifice that many Americans made to win the war and secure our freedoms.

Ms. Gallagher,

It's truly a shame that you wasted your time writing a novel. Perhaps it would have been better spent writing a documentary, interviewing the airmen and their teams involved in the strikes against Japan.

I believe if you were to speak to them today, they would tell you they were proud of their mission, but would never condone the use of nuclear weapons again; especially knowing it's even greater destructive force in today’s world.

Unfortunately, our country continues to produce, on occasion, ignorant leaders who continually use the threat of a nuclear attack. But fortunately, our country isn't ruled by an autocrat, since it takes more than one person to start the Armageddon.

Our problem is that the electorate mistakes competence as a leader with believing he's someone you'd like to have a beer with some day.

From another Gallagher, without the eloquence, but likes to believe he thinks rationally.

Six decades later, some may understandably question the morality of our decision to use
nuclear weapons against Japan.

I suspect, however, that President Truman never
doubted the stark necessity of the choice
he had to make in August 1945.

It is highly probable that an invasion of
the Japanese mainland would have resulted
in hundreds of thousands of American
casualties and millions of Japanese dead.

The bombs we dropped on Hiroshima and
Nagasaki ultimately forced Japan to surrender and
thus ended the war.

The enduring lesson of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
is there must never be another Hiroshima or
Nagasaki.

Somebody here is nuts, has never been engaged in battle, and was not on deck at Pearl Harbor. That person is Nora Gallagher. Come to your senses and stop contemplating your navel, Nora. You were not one of the thousands of US sailors eaten by sharks after being blown out of the water and then left for dead by the Japanese Navy. You did not perish and leave love ones, Nora, as a result of kamikaze attacks. Perhaps if you had seen and experiences those horrors you would write about something you know about. Get real, enlist, and try out being a chaplain in Iraq, Nora. You'll find out something else besides how to write about something during the cool of the afternoon on your back porch.

Jesus is God writes:

Jesus Christ is god manifest in the flesh.

No one speaks of christ, because there all Jesus Christ haters.

This site is for the ignorant and lame.

Freestinker responds:

Welcome aboard Jesus! Glad you could join us.

How come nobody cares if people get killed one or two at a time but everyone comes unglued when bunches die dramatically. My pet peeve is that no one seems to care about the 40,000+ who die every year in car wrecks, but act as if the end of the world has occurred when a bunch die in a bridge failure, even tho that it would take decades for bridge failure deaths to even add up to DUI deaths.

I couldn't believe that our pastor this weekend asked the parishioners to pray for those who died and for their loved ones, but did not mention those still in the hospital or those who died in Minneapolis in car wrecks the week of the bridge failure.

How many would have died one at a time had we not used the atom bomb. But then no one would have cared about that.

There is certainly no denying the horrific destruction the a-bomb created, and it is sad that such a thing occurred. But it was a necessary evil, I believe, and to characterize it as "ruthless annihilation" is to condemn the greatness of our country in defeating the persistent Japanese enemy. I'm not sure Hiroshima eroded our sense of morality at all. Quite the contrary. I think it has opened many people's eyes to the hell that is war, and, thus, has encouraged many to reconcile conflicts without bullets or fire or bombs.

It's simplistic to characterize Hiroshima, becuase of the sheer loss of life, as a mistake. Had we not dropped the bomb, how many more would have died? Most scholars and military historians say many, many more - as much as 1 million - because of the fanaticical resistence of the Japanese people. If you question this, read James Bradley's Flyboys - it is an exceptional historical account of the brainwashing that gripped the average Japanese and forced them into kamikaze missions, among many other disturbing deeds.

For whatever reason, the fact that so many perished due to the a-bomb strikes some as the most cruel action ever committed by humankind. But would it be any less cruel if hundreds of thousands more died in less compelling ways, especially considering many of those deaths would have been American?

EXCUSE ME,WHAT ABOUT PEARL HARBOR?LA REVENGE.BESIDES JAPAN WAS A BARBARIC NATION.ASK CHINA,KOREA AND OTHER NATIONS IN SE ASIA.

Japan's military leadership appeared ready to fight to the death of every last man, woman, and child in the State.

Apparently not! We frightened them into surrendering with two scary bombs. But I am sure that Japan was also frightened by other threats, like slavery to the Russians, starvation and inevitable defeat. So I agree that there were many factors in Truman's decision and the Japanese's. Simple thinking such as "big boom-war ends" is embarrassing.
As for morality, war is a bad venue for any type of morality so I guess we just need to convince ourselves that the losers deserved what they got. Now we are involved in a "war" of agression in Iraq an the author tries to tie Hiroshima with abu grahib. Perhaps the similarity is that we, like the Japanese considered the enemy(non japanese/muslims) as inferior humanity and over-reacted proactively by shock and awe. Atrocities follow when the government tacitly does not enforce the rules of engagement.
Clearly there are slippery slopes to wars and this needs to be discussed but not the logic after bullets start to fly.

I'm not sure it's really honest to focus too much on Hiroshima as some kind of grand event rivalling all the horrors that came before: those that remember the era and those who know their history are well aware that the Americans and British had spend the last 4 Summers before Hiroshima deliberately carpet-bombing the population of Germany in defiance of all morality in order to hasten an end to the war and, in the case of the British, to exact twisted vengeance for the German blitz on London. American conventional bombing of Hamburg incinerated as many people in one night as were lost at Hiroshima. The efficiency of the Hiroshima device doesn't make the event singular; the important matter is that we have not acknowledged the inherent criminality of our entire air campaign even in the distance of history, nor have the British owned up to the utterly indefensible immorality of the air campaign they thrust upon us as their new allies. Hiroshima was only part of a larger picture...

Nora,

Sorry but your story and opinion are nosense. The GOP are against all that is American. They do not have any morals.

The GOP are coloser to the NAZI and the Japenese Military that were destroyed in WWII than they are to Americans. Americans who used the Atomic Bomb to save millions of lives. Those lives save have had a lot of children that now enjoy life. That is what was at stake.

Equilating the GOP immoralitity with America morals is baseless and just nonsense.

Sorry you wrote an article like this.

It is a large question, but having spent time these last few years with an atomic veteran, a former Marine now dying of atomic-related cancer, I would say that the Hiroshima bombing was something this country has had to face in the darkest ways ever since. Jung had this idea of collective shadow, where a whole nation, e.g. Nazi Germany, is enveloped in activities so evil they are beyond personal wrongdoing. I have never bought the idea that we saved lives by dropping that bomb on Japan. The Peace Park at Hiroshima is a constant reminder of the potential for committing to a notion of peace as the essential factor facing us today. It is either learning how to live together or some form of collective suicide. I suggest the American people learn how to fold paper cranes (in homage to Peace) rather than go about scornfully bragging about our power as a chosen nation. The intelligent nation, as both Gandhi and Marin Luther King knew very well, is the one who pursues at least a sanity about nuclear weapons, realizing that ultimately there are now winners when it comes to world destruction.

It is a large question, but having spent time these last few years with an atomic veteran, a former Marine now dying of atomic-related cancer, I would say that the Hiroshima bombing was something this country has had to face in the darkest ways ever since. Jung had this idea of collective shadow, where a whole nation, e.g. Nazi Germany, is enveloped in activities so evil they are beyond personal wrongdoing. I have never bought the idea that we saved lives by dropping that bomb on Japan. The Peace Park at Hiroshima is a constant reminder of the potential for committing to a notion of peace as the essential factor facing us today. It is either learning how to live together or some form of collective suicide. I suggest the American people learn how to fold paper cranes (in homage to Peace) rather than go about scornfully bragging about our power as a chosen nation. The intelligent nation, as both Gandhi and Marin Luther King knew very well, is the one who pursues at least a sanity about nuclear weapons, realizing that ultimately there are now winners when it comes to world destruction.

Why didn't we drop the first bomb off-shore and let a huge wave demonstrate the power of it without ruining the people of a city? Did we wait long enough after Hiroshima for the Japanese to react before setting off the next bomb?

We cannot forget that the fire-bombing of Tokyo and Dresden were really no different just a slight difference in scale.

And where does God fit in? AWOL once again as he always is whether not intervening between people or whether allowing disease and natural disasters to occur at will. Its up to us to choose the right way in our interactions and to use science to fight disease and predict disasters.

Clearly the deaths of so many in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were a tragedy - but I don't see how they were any different from the deaths of civilians in other cities in Europe or China or Russia or Japan. I don't see how killing with nuclear weapons is any worse than high explosive bombs, or fire bombs or gas chambers or starvation. The hope and thinking at the time was that dropping the bombs would end the war sooner - thereby saving lives in the end. And I believe that that probably was the end result, although I have often wondered whether we could have waited longer before dropping the second bomb - to give Japan more time to understand the situation and, hopefully, surrender without the second bomb. But, we'll never know whether they would have surendered without the second tragedy. While nuclear weapons certainly pose a continuing threat, it does appear that they have made war too terrible to contemplate - at least for rationale people - and as a result I think that they have actually served to save lives over the past 60 years. Without their threat, I think it would have been quite likely that there might have been a World War III. The big unanswered question for me is whether nuclear weapons will be used by the Islamic terrorists who, unlike nation states, appear to be much more likely to use any weapons they can obtain in the hope that they'll be rewarded in Heaven - that's a truly scary scenario. But even in that situation I don;t think that nuclear weapons pose near the risk that biological weapons would pose in the hands of terrorists.

Clearly the deaths of so many in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were a tragedy - but I don't see how they were any different from the deaths of civilians in other cities in Europe or China or Russia or Japan. I don't see how killing with nuclear weapons is any worse than high explosive bombs, or fire bombs or gas chambers or starvation. The hope and thinking at the time was that dropping the bombs would end the war sooner - thereby saving lives in the end. And I believe that that probably was the end result, although I have often wondered whether we could have waited longer before dropping the second bomb - to give Japan more time to understand the situation and, hopefully, surrender without the second bomb. But, we'll never know whether they would have surendered without the second tragedy. While nuclear weapons certainly pose a continuing threat, it does appear that they have made war too terrible to contemplate - at least for rationale people - and as a result I think that they have actually served to save lives over the past 60 years. Without their threat, I think it would have been quite likely that there might have been a World War III. The big unanswered question for me is whether nuclear weapons will be used by the Islamic terrorists who, unlike nation states, appear to be much more likely to use any weapons they can obtain in the hope that they'll be rewarded in Heaven - that's a truly scary scenario. But even in that situation I don;t think that nuclear weapons pose near the risk that biological weapons would pose in the hands of terrorists.

All I can say, is thank God for the bomb. We don't need to second guess the secret weapon that saved possibly 2 million American soldiers lives - my dad was in Lincoln, NE awaiting orders after forming a bombing crew that probably would have been shot down, so we have no regrets.

The Japs started the War, and as we know now, FDR encourage it. Talk about torture- look what the Japs did to the Chinese and Philippines!!!

Also, the nuclear bomb has so far kept to Soviets and communists Chinese from conquering the world!

The best, most cost efficient weapon we have, still today.

Our Nation's soul is not lost. Far from it. This article seems to lack the greater historical perspective of World War II and the military concept of "Total War." For those who still grieve for the Japanese who died when we dropped
the nuclear bomb, let me offer a short history review to consol your hearts. In the early 1960's I was in the 7th grade and we had a teacher
who was of Japanese descent. She showed us a film of the effects of dropping the bombs on Japan and we saw the pictures of the shadows of people on the wall and actual footage of an entire city in complete ruin for miles in every direction.
Afterwards, there was outrage from the parents in the community and the teacher soon left our school. I heard that the complaints came primarily from the parents who were veterans of World War II. They were concerned that we students were not getting the full picture, only a selected part of it. This article reminded
me of all of that once again.
Over the years, I heard the wartime experiences of my dad, a US Army Air Corps officer in training when the war ended, and my uncle,
an US Army Air Corps tail gunner in a B-17 that flew missions over Germany, and my wife's dad, an US Army Air Corps mechanic who kept the bombers
flying during the war. These men are all gone now, like many of our WWII veterans,
(and the US Army Air Corps is now the US Air Force). I try to keep their memory
alive and tell my sons about them and what they did and why. I took my sons out to the Arizona Memorial in Pearl Harbor to see the sunken battleship, still leaking oil to the surface, reminding us that it was the Japanese who attacked us. I took them on a tour of the USS Missouri and we saw the site where the Japanese signed the surrender document shortly after we dropped the nuclear bomb, ending the war
without us landing the US Marines to fight on the island of Japan. One of my high school teachers, also football coach, told us that he was a US Marine and was training to make the landing when the bomb was dropped. The Japanese were preparing women and children to fight to the death for their homeland and we would have had many
more American deaths without the bomb. Why does that fact always get left out the discussion?
Just last weekend I took my sons to the former site of the Pueblo Army Air Base (PAAB) where US Army Air Corps B-17 and B-24 bomber crews trained before heading to the Pacific Theater or European Theater of war. The museum doesn't get many visitors, not like Pearl Harbor, and depends on volunteers to keep things going. They operate on a shoestring budget.
Today, they have a B-29 on display, just like the one that dropped the bomb. We went inside it and there was an older gentleman explaining the crew positions, a former crewman himself, and WWII veteran. I would guess that he is in his late 80's now. If you have some extra money you want to donate, make the check payable to
PHAS, and send to International B-24 Museum, 31001 Magnuson, Pueblo, CO 81001. Visit
their web site - http://www.pwam.org.
This is all fading history now but there are lessons to be learned for our next generation, our children. I told my sons that the next nuclear bomb that goes off may be in their lifetimes and that it will probably be here in the United States, as an act of terrorism, perhaps carried in a briefcase, or, transported in a sea container into one of our nation's harbors, and the victims will be American
citizens. Our children must learn from history and keep themselves safe from those that would do us harm. Unfortunately, terrorists do not play by our rules and so the treaties, Congressional security resolutions, and "international commitment and cooperation" do not affect their planning very much. You may have already
read that bin Laden has been given permission by a cleric in Saudi Arabia authorizing al Qaeda to use nuclear weapons against the United States ... capping the casualties at 10 million (nuclear). So, you can sit around and blame America, or
you can vote for a Presidential candidate who comes out for a strong national defense and will not permit our country to become vulnerable to a terrorist attack. The stakes are high, teach your children well...

I think the soul turned out pretty good----secure in the knowledge that several hundred thousand American lives were saved.

Kudos to the author for totally failing to put the story into the context of broader struggle. To do otherwise would cost her some book sales.

I think we are missing the point of this thread. We debate whether it was right or wrong to bomb Hiroshima. Either way it was tragic. We are debating whether sacrificing 100,000 to save a million is a good thing. Regardless it was tragic. We debate are the children of Hiroshima more deserving of our sympathy that those who died at Pearl Harbor. It is all tragic. We debate the atrocities of one country over another. It is all tragic.

Other than scale is it any different to nuke a city or be a suicide bomber? Both can be justified depending one’s perspective.

The question is do we come up with better ways to kill each other and better arguments to justify these actions or do we find a way to peace.

I would suggest that the having to kill to prevent others being killed is an insane model to begin with. Have we as a global society learning anything from the tragedies of war and/or aggression? Instead of all sides justifying their actions we would be better served working to help ensure we don’t need to go down this path again.

i share your questions nora
i noticed that a question is a good question, when the answer is not easy to find, when you have to "think" about it.
explanations are brain things.
they make relations between two or more things;
its like an equatation: e=mc2
they explain an unknown "thing" by comparing it to things we know.
the unknown equals;

once i said to my sun, who is an astrophysicist.
you must be happy.
all of you are talking about facts, tahat are the same to everybody.
you are not talking about sentiments, feelings, fear or anger;

people are able to kill for a reason,becaus people are not reasonnable.

While civilized people grimice at the idea of nuking Mecca and Medina, what ideas do you offer? While serving in Afghainstan, I learned that these people have no concept of nation - only clan, tribe, and Allah. Taking out their capital city is meaningless to them. Taking out their clan might work if we could match the terrorist with his clan and then isolate the clan. If they really beleived we had the nerve to distroy the only eartly thing they care about, then maybe and only maybe, they might stop killing our people.

Islam sees this as their time for revenge for the Crusades, never mind that the US was not a nation then. They are a dark-age people with modern weapons.

it is not surprising to see so many people spouting off endlessly with no use for facts - that is the main function of this site. Here some info from wikipedia on what some people who thought it wasn't militarily necessary to drop the bomb. You will hopefully notice that such noted pacifists as Gen MacArthur and Eisenhower didn't think it was a good idea -
atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki - wikipedia

Those who argue that the bombings were unnecessary on military grounds hold that Japan was already essentially defeated and ready to surrender.

One of the most notable individuals with this opinion was then-General Dwight D. Eisenhower. He wrote in his memoir The White House Years:

"In 1945 Secretary of War Stimson, visiting my headquarters in Germany, informed me that our government was preparing to drop an atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who felt that there were a number of cogent reasons to question the wisdom of such an act. During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives."[90][91]

Other U.S. military officers who disagreed with the necessity of the bombings include General Douglas MacArthur (the highest-ranking officer in the Pacific Theater), Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy (the Chief of Staff to the President), General Carl Spaatz (commander of the U.S. Strategic Air Forces in the Pacific), Brigadier General Carter Clarke (the military intelligence officer who prepared intercepted Japanese cables for U.S. officials),[91] Admiral Ernest King, U.S. Chief of Naval Operations, Undersecretary of the Navy Ralph A. Bard,[92] and Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the Pacific Fleet.[93]

"The Japanese had, in fact, already sued for peace. The atomic bomb played no decisive part, from a purely military point of view, in the defeat of Japan." Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet.[94]

"The use of [the atomic bombs] at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender." Admiral William D. Leahy, Chief of Staff to President Truman.[94]

The United States Strategic Bombing Survey, after interviewing hundreds of Japanese civilian and military leaders after Japan surrendered, reported:

"Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts, and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated."[95][94]

The survey assumed that conventional bombing attacks on Japan would greatly increase as the bombing capabilities of July 1945 were ...a fraction of its planned proportion...[96] due to a steadily high production rate of new B-29s and the reallocation of European airpower to the Pacific. When hostilities ended, the USAAF had approximately 3700 B-29s of which only about 1000 were deployed.[97]

Had the war gone on these and still more aircraft would have brought devastation far worse than either bomb to many more cities. The results of conventional strategic bombing at the cease-fire were summed up thusly:

"...On the basis of photo coverage, intelligence estimated that 175 square miles of urban area in 66 cities were wiped out. Total civilian casualties stemming directly from the urban attacks were estimated at 330,000 killed, 476,000 injured, and 9,200,000 rendered homeless." General Haywood S. Hansell[97]

General MacArthur has also contended that Japan would have surrendered before the bombings if the U.S. had notified Japan that it would accept a surrender that allowed Emperor Hirohito to keep his position as titular leader of Japan, a condition the U.S. did in fact allow after Japan surrendered. U.S. leadership knew this, through intercepts of encoded Japanese messages, but refused to clarify Washington's willingness to accept this condition. Before the bombings, the position of the Japanese leadership with regards to surrender was divided. Several diplomats favored surrender, while the leaders of the Japanese military voiced a commitment to fighting a "decisive battle" on Kyūshū, hoping that they could negotiate better terms for an armistice afterward. The Japanese government did not decide what terms, beyond preservation of an imperial system, they would have accepted to end the war; as late as August 9, the Supreme War Council was still split, with the hard-liners insisting Japan should demobilize its own forces, no war crimes trials would be conducted, and no occupation of Japan would be allowed. Only the direct intervention of the emperor ended the dispute, and even then a military coup was attempted to prevent the surrender.

Historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa's research has led him to conclude that the atomic bombings themselves were not even the principal reason for capitulation. Instead, he contends, it was the swift and devastating Soviet victories in Manchuria that forced the Japanese surrender on August 15, 1945.[98]

Mr. Megaree,

An evil act cannot be justified by claiming good ends. Intentionally killing innocent civilians is always and everywhere evil. When you go down the road of trying to justify the means by the ends, you are dealing in hypotheticals: you never know what would have happenned if you had refrained from the evil act.

(Your form of justification is the same as a med student saying it would be good for her to get an abortion because then she'll be able to finish medschool and become a doctor and save lots of lives. If she does become a doctor and saves 5 lives, does that mean aborting her child was not an evil act? No, abortion is always and everywhere evil.)

Rather than kill hundreds of thousands of civilians, the US could have taken a number of different routes. None may seem as easy, but the right course is not always the easiest. The US could have negotiated an end to the war (not demanding "Total Surrender", which was a particularly tough demand in the face of Japanese pride). We don't know how this would have panned out because Truman went the route he did.

What's amazing now is to see Truman recently on the cover of Newsweek with an article about how both parties hunger for a new Truman. This is the idea of a great leader. Sure he was decisive. He decisively ordered the slaughter of civilian populations and then decisively recognized Israel, deep-sixing UN plans for a two state solution.

Richard Dunbar

"Humanity is made up of one person at a time" - a great sentence.

I don't think that it eroded anything. First, while it is remembered today as history, it is not remembered in a more visceral sense that would have an impact on ourselves. As a younger generation, I think that it was a climax, surely, but it wasn't unduly cruel as the war was cruel and it was far more humane to end it abruptly than to let it drag on with a land invasion.

In fact, it set off an anti-nuclear strain in the human conscious that might have saved us from a wider nuclear conflict in the 20th century.

And I have a question, don't you think it is a little funny to commit an entire column to plug your book?

"I now declare this question to be unanswerable, and I should know because I am GOD.

Just love your neighbor as yourself!"

Editorial suggestion, there, guy: People that pray for the devastation of New Orleans, San Fransisco, or Disneyworld on occasion there's gay people there might not actually love themselves all that well.

Out of monotheist writings, I tend to like the words that say, 'Whatever you do to the least of these, you do to me,'

And 'If you kill someone, it's as if you killed the world.'

Just if you wanted to lay down 'the law' or anything. :)

Every year at this time the world goes into a bout of grieving over the Japanese deaths from nuclear weapons. When is there a day of world grieving over the tens of millions of non-Japanese who died in that war? Let's next have an editorial from a Chinese person to remind us how that war started. About 3000 Americans died on 9/11 and look what it did to the national psyche. It's a big deal today if just a few dozen Americans die in some accident. But by August 6, 1945, the US had more than 300,000 dead and almost 700,000 wounded (many of those maimed, e.g. Senator Bob Dole), in a war started by the Japanese. I don't think those of us born since then can understand, or be qualified to pass judgement on, the frame of mind of average Americans by 1945 regarding whether to inflict civilian deaths on Japan.

Has it evaded the notice of Ms. Gallagher and her bloggers that American neoconservatives and Hillary Clinton, among others, have RECENTLY said use of American nuclear weapons against "enemies" in the Mideast and South Asia is "not off the table"? Like them, the Bush administration has explicitly lowered the threshold of nuclear war against non-nuclear states and is pushing to develop nuclear 'bunkerbusters" and formulate new tactical uses of nuclear weapons. The cries of "nuke 'em" among America's trailer park goobers frustrated with American military failure in Iraq and Afghanistan grows louder Yet all this stark, raving madness goes largely unremarked by media and opinion makers. Once-settled restraint in U.S. nuclear doctrine has broken down, with Cheney's finger on the nuclear trigger, neocons at his elbow and U.S. Air Force hawks sounding more and more like the late, unlamented Curtis LeMay. The America that in WW2 took killing of civilian populations to an industrial level not seen since the Mongol Hordes is now poised to make nuclear weapons a normal feature of warfare. Is anybody listening?

I had a small job on the Manhattan Project at the University of Chicago. Before the bomb was dropped, all of the persons at our site (and probably all the other sites on and off coampus)were polled. We were asked to choose among several alternatives, among which were keep it (the bomb) a scecret, dropit on a purely military target, drop it on an uninhabited island, drop it on a city. Because I feared the Russians, my own inclination was to keep it a secret with using it against a military target as second choice. However, I did not feel that it was morally objectionable to use it on a city on the grounds that the Axis nations had ceclared the war to be a total war involving their entire nations and had perpetrated Rotterdam, Coventry, the rocket bombardment of English civilian targets, Shanghai, Pearl Harbor. I had some doubts about it and I still do. We had fire-bombed Dresdem with a loss of 135,000. The justification? The population was organized in an effort literally to overthrow what we understand and kunderstoode then to be civilization. I regret to admit that I still do not have moral clarity about it.

There is no link between Hiroshima and Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib.

Had we not dropped the bomb, it was estimated that as many as a million Americans would have been killed in the taking of the Japanese Islands. It is perhaps good that we have some idea of how horrible nuclear weapons can be in the hope we never use them again. Had we not used them, would anyone really be moved by a "mathimatical model of the potential effects," I don't think so.

I believe your post is "excellent!"
I wondered after 9/11 if we were not standing in the face of an opportunity to show the world - the entire world - what it would be like to be so powerful and yet, to simply say, "That is ok. You will not bully us into this world game of an eye for an eye." But, I also knew we do not have that kind of strength as a nation - nor the strong of faith in our compassionate teachings. And so, we have become what we despise. And we call it justice. We looked the opportunity in the face, and turned away. Now, other bodies burn and we feel ok simply because they are not burning in our streets.... yet.

As a child of a Marine poised to invade Japan in 1945 I see the dropping of the bombs as my path to life. Having attended conventions of these men from the sixties to the eighties and heard their stories I feel that they expected a fierce battle with not only the men in arms but the civilian population as well. I have heard, from them, estimates of two million U.S. casualties with 10 million Japanese. It seems the bombs saved Japan. I can imagine after paying such a large price the U.S. would still occupy Japan. Also, many people of the day wanted to destroy Tokyo and Yokohama instead of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I think you need to be a part of generation that went through the war and knew the barbarity of the Japanese armed forces to both prisoners and conquered people. There were quite a few of the survivors who would have been happy to see Japan totally wiped off the Earth.
They were lucky.

The gays did it! They are bringing our great nation down! One gay in particular: Enola

What would have happen to our soul as a nation if we had to invade the islands of Japan? Would we have killed more Japanese than were killed in Hiroshima? Would there have been more death of American and allied soldiers, marines and airman? What would that have done to those families' souls and the way that they view the world? I wish that man kind could find a way to settle their differences without war but so far we have not been able to. There was something wrong with our souls before Hiroshima and sadly Abu Ghraib would have happened whether or not Hiroshima ever took place.

Steve Tonjes

I question if the writer remembers Bataan, Singapore, Wake, or the number of people, military and civilian that would have been killed had the war continued. It is easy to have emotions and feel bad about what one has done, but, had it not been done, then what? No one can condone killing except when it is to save one self or others. Often it is the only answer unless you desire to offer yourself, friends or others for a sacrifice to your so-called morality. It is so silly to put Guantanamo, Hiroshima and Abu Ghraib in the same sentence. As a young Marine, in training I underwent much more demeaning harassment and physical pain then those at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. Wake up before you put yourself into despair and depression. I know we are a better people then you would have us be.

what an awful article. nowhere does japanese facism and agression, the war in the pacific, american war dead, and japanese obstinacy in the face of looming defeat -- meaning hundreds of thousands more dead on both sides, ever enter the discussion. in favor of syrupy godspeak and new-agey sounding sentimentalism, this author ignores any sort of rationale for the united states defending itself and winning wars in two hemispheres over hellbent dictators. what a doofus, and how far removed are we from reality and a sense of real threat, even today. if the tone of her novel is anything like the drippy tone of this this article, it must be unbearable.

I have had the opportunity to meet many survivors, all of whom were children at the time of the bombings. One woman said her flesh melted like wax. Another saw a woman's charred body, with only the breast she'd been using to feed her baby left unburned. She still held the dead baby in her arms. Another couldn't recognize her schoolmate lying on the ground because the girl's head was black and swollen like a balloon, with just a little mouth in the middle calling to her for help. Another one watched her little brother die in the middle of singing a song. All of them tell of the thousands of bodies in the river, people who jumped in to try to soothe the severe burns, but who didn't survive their injuries. All tell of being kids searching for their moms and dads, sometimes finding them, sometimes not.

These people said they learned to see the US leaders who dropped the bomb as separate from ordinary Americans. We, too, need to have compassion for those who were killed or injured while still condemning the atrocities committed by Japanese soldiers. War is rarely "good guys" and "bad guys" anyhow. And there are Japanese who want their government to be accountable for the terrible acts of the war, people who are alarmed by the current government.

I do think burning and irradiating the civilians of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a low moral point for this country. But we also irradiated our own people in Southern Utah and Nevada while performing above ground tests, including soldiers who watched them. We sickened Pacific Island people during tests, including kids who played in fallout like it was snow. We sickened our nuclear facility workers and the communities living around the plants. We injured uranium miners on reservations in New Mexico, where the workers were never told about the dangers of the ore. And we have continued to waste our money and our ideas pursuing weapons that are far more catastrophic than any other. We're not alone in this mess. But we must reverse course and to responsibility for the people and places we have harmed.

It's so easy to armchair quarterback 62 years after the fact but you could, at the very least, offer a balanced view.  

Let me add these (and I could add a lot more) to your list that you have conveniently ignored:  Had we not developed the first bomb, would we even be here?  That's another side of the equation you so righteously overlook in your haste to denigrate your own country.  What's the connection between our own existence as a nation and the fact that we developed and with restraint deployed a weapon that was used twice in history?  Would any other world power of that era have shown the same restraint?  Did we attack the Japanese at Pearl Harbor in 1941?  What about Nanking in 1937? Want to also ignore Poland in 1939?

Your "art of noticing" appears to notice only those "what ifs" and events that help your argument, not to aid in a true discussion of the pros and cons of nuclear weapons and the circumstances that brought about their existence and necessity for being used in the first place.

Ms. Gallagher does indeed pose important questions, but to those I would add two that we must ponder, if we reject the validity of dropping the bomb. First, how would we have gotten Japan to surrender? And second, would we have been willing to accept the costs, to us, to the Japanese, and to the other peoples who were then under Japanese occupation?

The alternatives were not pretty. An invasion might not have succeeded, and would have cost hundreds of thousands of American lives and probably millions of Japanese lives. Continuing the blockade would have doomed millions of Japanese to starvation. And either option would have led to the deaths of further hundreds of thousands in Japanese-occupied territories, where the authorities were certainly not troubled by the sorts of moral questions we now debate.

In my view, we did a terrible but necessary thing.

[For an exhaustive examination of the decision to drop the bomb, including the alternatives, I recommend Richard Franks' book, Downfall.]

I guess some people when they question the dropping of the atomic bomb have forgotten how many Japanese civilians we killed in Tokyo and other cities with incendiary bombs from American B-29s. Many more than were killed by the atomic bomb! And this killing would have continued save for the Manhattan Project. Dropping the bomb most assuredly saved Japanese lives, not to mention American lives.

Quick >> stick me in the eye.. I need a tear or two. This bull-crap about the imorality of the uSA using the A-bomb will go on forever I guess.. The USA did the right thing by dropping the bomb.. It actually probablly saved more lives than if we had continued along the conventional route... firebombing Japaneese cities..

You migh want to stick a paragraph about the sailors asleep in their racks on the USS Arizona on a DEC morning>> when their lives came to a firery end via the business end of a Jap bomb.. or maybe a paragraph from a Battan death march survivor...

The Japs started this war > and we ended it. We have nothing to apoligize about.. War is war.. Unless youbeen there - done that > no credibility in my book

I guess some people when they question the dropping of the atomic bomb have forgotten how many Japanese civilians we killed in Tokyo and other cities with incendiary bombs from American B-29s. Many more than were killed by the atomic bomb! And this killing would have continued save for the Manhattan Project. Dropping the bomb most assuredly saved Japanese lives, not to mention American lives.

Imagine a government who did not know the inpact of an atomic bomb. Would the Russians have invaded Europe in the late forties? How many bombs might we have used in response? How many would the Russians dropped as a response? Would Truman have let MaCarthur use the A-Bomb in Korea if the bomb had not be dropped in Japan?

Fortunately, American Indians and African slaves didn't have Nuclear Weapons at the time.

Or else, they would have had the same moral justification to use it on European & American Colonists and Slavers, and the civillian populations.

I hope that people in the middle east aren't too upset with us for bombing, starting civil wars, and taking land also. I hope that antagonistic groups don't have the same type of "moral" military reasoning if they gain nuclear weapons, and rationalize their possible use of WMD as "inevitable" and to kill civillians to save the lives of their miserabley misguided fighters.

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In many respects, morality has become a tool of the victors & status quo to justify their own actions, and deny the other of justifications of competing interests.

What settled WW2 is power. General LeMay enacted the strategy of "Total War." -- War of annhilation upon all, including civillians. Which was a strategy not much better than that of Imperal Japan. There was no moral high-ground, and it is absurd to claim such moral high-ground. What happened was a slippery slope to victory at all costs.

In War, while there are no Atheists in foxholes, high and mighty ideals are tossed out of the trench to make room for grenades.

Might made right, and fortunately the victors turned out to be better guys than the defeated.

And Heaven forbid that anything like WW2 happen again.

The US has done alot bad things while under sway of bad people (especially to non-white people: mass slavery of Africans, genocide of American Indians, invasion & massacre in the Philipinnes, Operation Phoenix & declaring "Free Fire Zones" to burn down villages in Vietnam, etc...), but the good people within the US have been able to prevail and do alot of good for the world.

Our grand United States is not just "One People", it is a nation undergoing continual flux, continually free to be able to struggle with its soul. The battle between good and evil fights within because America's power & seats of influence attracts exploitative corrupt forces.

God could not stop the horrors of WW2, but fortunately in Democracies, good people are free to try to make a difference.

It seems to me the suffering of the Hiroshima survivors could have just as well have been related by survivors of a whole range of wartime events: the Japanese "Rape of Nanking," the massacre of Polish prisoners of war in the Katyn Forest by the Soviet Union, the German bombing of Rotterdam and London, Nazi SS-einsatzgruppen Japanese biological warfare experiments, the Holocaust, the razing of the Warsaw ghetto, the Allied bombing of Hamburg and Dresden, or the U.S. firebombing of Japanese cities. The wholesale destruction of cities was abhorrent at the beginning of the war, but commonplace by the end.

It seems to me there was plenty of ruthlessness to go around during World War II. The U.S. razed dozens of cities to the ground before Hiroshima and Nagasaki were destroyed, so I don't see why the destruction of these two cities in particular should demonstrate a sense of morality (or lack thereof) any more than the cities we destroyed before them. As Robert E. Lee said, "It is well that war is so terrible. We should grow too fond of it."

Perhaps the question to be explored is not, "What do events of 60 years ago (Hiroshima and Nagasaki) say about U.S. morality," but "What are the implications to morality of the fact that nuclear weapons have never been used in the last 60 years, despite many opportunities and provocations?" For example: by the U.S. (in Vietnam), Britain (against Argentina), the Soviet Union (against China), Israel (against the Arabs), and India and Pakistan (against each other).

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I now declare this question to be unanswerable, and I should know because I am GOD.

Just love your neighbor as yourself!

DO NOT DISPUTE THE WORD OF GOD!

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Ah, yes, another novelist's dream world collides with the realities of the actual world. No doubt the lady has been too occupied with her novel to study history and particularly that of world war two. The Japanese fought ferociously to defend islands like Guadalcanal and Iwo Jima and US and Japanese casualties were enormous. Liberal Democrat President Truman calculated the numbers of military personnel and Japanese civilians who would die in the land invasion the US would have to make on Japan itself. He believed many lives would be saved in dropping the atom bomb. He was right. Fighting a war is much more difficult than writing novels. This ultimatley silly woman finds evil only in what her own country does. How can her sensitive soul stand living in the United States?

Once again someone decides to highlight the terrible act of dropping an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Before we begin to lament how horrible we were to use the bomb let's not forget why we used the bomb.

It was estimated that the Allies would suffer approximately 1,000,000 casualties in an invasion of Japan. The Japanese themselves would have doubtlessly suffered even more casualties than those suffered at Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined. 200,000 civilians lost their lives during the invasion of Okinawa. Imagine how this would have compared to an invasion of mainland Japan.

There are people who claim we did not need to invade Japan, but instead could have waited her out as we slowly cut her off from the rest of the world via blockade. How long would this have taken? 6 months? A year? And while we waited, what would have happened to the people in the territories and countries controlled by the Japanese? It is estimated that approximately 100,000 people a month died in the areas controlled by the Japanese during the war. If we had waited, how many more would have perished?

Was dropping an atomic bomb on Hiroshima a tragedy? Yes. However, how tragic would it have been if we hadn't?

I knew clicking on the comments link was a mistake. As usual, it is a sea of the whiny and ill-informed.

The use of the atomic bomb on Japan was unpleasant, but it was a final option. The United States had learned over YEARS of invading island fortresses that the Japanese were fanatical fighters. They defended every tiny little atoll to the last man, and even a village idiot could understand the insane ferocity with which they would defend their actual home islands. Go back and actually read some of the NY Times cover pages from the day - the US routinely lost thousands of its best soldiers *every day* of an island invasion.

Without the atomic bomb, the fanatical Japanese Tojo-ites would have sacrificed their ENTIRE POPULATION fighting off an American invasion of Japan. They had already been training women and children to fight rather than surrender. Millions would have died on both sides. Dropping the atomic bomb (not even on Tokyo, I might add) was an *ethical* decision - it exhibited the United States's overwhelming military destructive power in terms so obvious that no despotic system (as Japan's was) could possibly hide it from the people. It demonstrated that resistance was pointless, because the US would not have to invade - it could simply obliterate Japan entirely and then walk ashore uncontested.

As evidence of the sadism of the Japanese military, one bomb wasn't even enough! People to this day still bleat like morons about how "unfair" the US was to use a second atomic bomb - are you kidding me? The real question is why did it require another to make Japan surrender! If you understand this question, you will understand the true depth of commitment Japan had to its Empire, and understand why the A-bomb was needed to finally break them of it. This is also why we didn't have to nuke Germany - we were winning the conventional war there. By contrast, it remains unclear to this day whether we could have succeeded with a land invasion of Japan.

Truman made the decision to kill a lot of people quickly in order to spare far more people later. It was a decision he was forced to make, and he made the right one. Pathetic 21st century guilt and historical revisionism does a huge disservice to the realties of the day and the true ethical choice that was made. Ironically, the same whining is usually made by people who love to throw around the word "quagmire" with regard to US military operations - can you possibly imagine how big of a quagmire Japan would have been?

The question, "How did Hiroshima erode our sense of morality?" assumes facts not in evidence. Before you ask HOW Hiroshima eroded our sense of morality, you have to establish that we are less moral today than we were in 1945. And even if you can prove that (good luck), you then have to prove that it's because we destroyed Hiroshima.

Do you think Americans are less moral today than they were in 1945? Prove it. Let's see some facts and figures. And don't even think about calling on the Iraq war as exhibit A, because in the 60-plus years since Hiroshima, we've developed weapons designed explicitly to cause FEWER civilian casualties; the civilian death toll during both Iraq invasions was insignificant, compared with history's previous wars. Is that the behavior of a country whose morals have been eroded?

I submit that contrary to the proposition, Hiroshima made us a MORE moral people, by showing us war so terrible that it made us draw back in horror, and do what we could to build weapons that would kill an enemy's armies, not his civilian population, destroy his tanks and aircraft, not his hospitals and mosques.

All the retrospection in the world can never place us in the circumstances which existed from December 7, 1941, when
the Empire of Japan attacked the United States without warning.

All the credible historical evidence affirms that Japan was not
going to surrender, and that an invasion would have cost hundreds of thousands of American lives, and Japanese lives as well. We did not start this war, but we had to finish it.

Revisionists will always overlook or minimize the state of the world in those years. They will always ignore the lies which the Japanese government told its own citizens: that American soldiers would rape and murder civilians once they had landed.

We have no guilt or shame hanging over us for being the victors
in World War II. Both the Japanese and German governments would have enslaved all humanity had they prevailed. We have no apologies to make for dropping the atomic bombs. We should stop wringing our hands and be proud of how we treated our defeated enemies. Would the Japanese or German governments have behaved so decently? We know they would not have.

I would not waste thirty seconds of my time glancing at Ms.
Gallagher's novel. Novels, after all, are mere fiction --- like
Ms. Gallagher's attempt to impose her personal guilt on everyone else.

I have always felt that destroying 2 Japanese cities with the atomic bomb is the greatest war crime ever committed. A mass of civilians was the target. They were not unfortunates caught up in cross fire. Of course, as is the custom, the victors are never prosecuted - only the reverse. I don't ever see how the US can claim higher moral ground than its adversaries while this large, indelible stain remains on the fabric of our society. Conveniently, after initial explanations about how this ( incinerating over 100,000 innocent citizens ) would ultimately save lives, the matter has been swept under the carpet. It was a diabolical, criminal and cynical act, quite dwarfing anything that came afterwards ( including the Twin Towers ). I will always be disgusted over this.

Most Americans have no guilt, nor should they, about the use of the Atomic Bomb vs. Japan. In Japan we had a treacherous, evil enemy whose defeat was justified by all and any means found. Some of us regret we did not have the chance to A bomb the Nazi Germans.

We are dang lucky to have had President Truman drop the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The decision prevented future bombs from being dropped. It also saved many lives at the time.

The message of that era is lost on many today in the United States.

The Japanese had a choice. They chose to continue fighting the war until Aug. 15, 1945. Japan chose not to end hostilities before Aug. 6, 1945. That seems to be Japan's problem, not ours.

Interestingly, Japan chose to surrender on Aug. 15, 1945, less than a week after Nagasaki was bombed.

The United States, in the 1940's, was able to penetrate Russian and Cuban security and steal the nuclear bombs which were dropped by the United States on Japan. This mistake will never be repeated by Russia, which now guards all nuclear weapons with Russian armed forces, as well as Russian foreign and domestic intelligence agencies, the FSS, FSB, successors to the KGB, and not Cubans, who were once partners in guarding the weapons. Russian nuclear weapons are furthermore protected by nuclear power and modern communications technology.This modern technology, armed forces, and Russian intelligence security will never be penetrated. Any attempts to penetrate this security, of the slightest degree, are countered with immediate nuclear reprisal against those involved, particularly the United States which frequently attempts to use other individuals to accomplish it's objectives so as to absolve itself from blame. Thus, any attempt to penetrate Russian nuclear security by anyone will be countered by nuclear reprisal against United States targets, the white American establishment, houses, apartments, individuals, cars. The United States has no nuclear arsenal. The myth that the U.S. has nuclear weapons has been perpetrated by the U.S. government and the press so as to have U.S. citizens, the white establishment, believe that they are secure from nuclear reprisal, which they are not. Furthermore, any attempt by anyone to harm an ethnic Russian or Russia will be countered by nuclear reprisal against the white American establishment, which have been identified and can be destroyed, collectively, in under one minute.

You ask a very loaded question that reflects only your own personal belief, very specific to your own condition, and an attempt to hitch history to this belief of yours today. This is wrong. Ask that same question in China today and see what answer you get. Ask my father, a marine in Philippines in 1945, preparing for the big-push. Ask any American at that time. Ghandi may have been correct that the effect on the soul of America was not yet known, but for Japan, it was certainly the destiny of a multitude of actions that Nation had taken since 1931.

sorry i was so slow to catch on. because the japanese government acted brutally, it's okay to kill japanese civilans.

so if the american government acts brutally, i'm sure you'll agree it's okay to kill american civilians. bin ladin will be so pleased you support his tactics.

fact is, lot of folks here seem to actually admire the terrorists; most efficent they are. with only one strike, they've achieved what hitler and tojo could only have dreamt of: the abandonment by america of any pretense to higher moral values. free speech, habeus corpus? out the window, along with the geneva conventions.

i swear, i've never seen a whole country wet it's collective pants before. sounds like the christians need a hug and a nappy change. better yet, just go nuke somebody, eh? that'll do the trick.

i guess the ends do indeed justify the means. sure explains a lot of american history, that's for sure.

in the words of homer simpson: "your thoughts intrigue me and i'd like to subscribe to your newsletter."

In 1996 my wife and I visited Hiroshima. We looked up from the epicenter(near the dome)and tried to imagine the terrible force that was released that day. Walking the grounds, visiting the Peace Museum we saw few Americans. This is not an American Shrine we so instantly come to understand. To the southeast several thousand miles tears fill the eyes of Americans visiting the Memorial over the USS Arizona. The visitors are mostly American. There are no Japanese here. This is not a Japanese shrine. One has to experience both Hiroshima and Pearl Harbor to begin to understand what each and both mean to the peoples of the respective countries that went to war with each other as we approached the mid-20th century. War happens because part of humanity wills it to be.

This is incredible logic. We dropped the bombs on Japan to preclude an invasion which would have destroyed most of Japan and killed many hundreds of thousands more.

Since then, this nation has never used it again.

Does the author work under some insane notion that we have been frequent users of atomic weapons?

That Japan was some sort of victim in this process?

I, personally, am glad we dropped the bomb. Everyone of Japans neighbors were glad we dropped the bomb. Maybe she would like to tell the story of the Chinese in Nanking, or the Philippine's story. Or the Okinawans. Or the story of the Koreans forced into prostitution. Or the prisoners of war who really were tortured - not the imbecilic notions of today that pass for torture. We actually should have dropped it sooner - a lot more Americans would be alive.

The moral stewards of today who never experienced the horrors of the Japanese invasions I am sure will tell a different story. They are too busy making excuses for murderous thugs and demonizing America to consider the truth.

But we really don't care. History speaks for itself.

To Nick:

"What about a National Day to honor all the victims who died at the hand of the evil and torturous Japanese?"

This was meant to be a rhetorical question. The Japanese already have a National Day to remember the event. The US should not have to wring its hands over the decision to drop the bomb. By creating such a holiday would be to acquiesce to the Japanese that they were right in their aggression and that there is no need for a long overdue formal,official State apology from the Japanese government for all the atrocities committed. I am an American too. We should neither grieve or exult. What was done was done out of necessity.

Hirohito claimed he decided to surrender to prevent the loss of more innocent Japanese lives. He forgot the loss of lives was the direct result of his aggression.

The Japanese reaped what they had sown...death and destruction. During the war they forced thousands of women into sex slavery to service their soldiers (which they officially still deny). Today they still rape the environment, logging ancient forests in Indonesia, killing hundreds of whales for "scientific reasons", purchasing the body parts of rare, endangered species, and stripping the ocean floor of all fish in huge netting operations. The list goes on, and on. Just like the horrendous acts of brutality they committed so many years ago.

It's easy for us to sit back now and judge the events of that war.

It's easy for us to question now the use of such force to end the war.

It's easy for us to forget the horror our forefathers bore on a daily basis during that war.

We didn't have super computers.

We didn't have knowledge of the long term effects of radiation.

We had a weapon that it was thought could bring a fast end to the war.

And it did.

It was the right choice at the time.

I have only read one or maybe two mentions of the very real possibility of having simply blockaded the Home Islands. In mid-1945, Japan possessed zero capability to project force or launch offensive action. Any attempts to build such equipment could have been easily suppressed. A blockade places the responsibility squarely upon the citizens of the blockaded nation. Since the general citizenry had been armed and trained to defend against ground invasion, the capability would have already been in place for that citizenry to rebel against their government if that government remained unwilling to surrender. It is simply ludicrous to continue to discuss a land invasion of the Home Islands. It would never have been necessary. Truman simply wanted an increasingly unpopular war OVER before the American populace completely ran out of money and interest.

respectfully,
Nick Gill
Frankfort, KY

Forgetting or ignoring the circumstances leading to the use of A-bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the American effort to rebuild Japan and Europe after the war misses the point. Have any lessons learned from prior wars been applied to our current conflict? Is our president ahistorical? Are we?

Oh, but if we could just push back the hands of time for your sweet little ass to hit the beaches of Japan instead of dropping the big one.

Let me offer my perspective as a native of Japan whose mother experienced the fire bombing of Nagoya, and who served in the US Air Force in Japan, at NORAD and at Strategic Air Command.

The point has been made by other commenters that the allied bombing campaign in Europe had set a precedent for mass killing of civilians by aerial bombardment with the fire bombing of Dresden. The combination of the development of the B-29 (built in Omaha, where Strategic Air Command was based) and the capture of the Marianas Islands placed major Japanese cities within range of mass bomber raids.

By August 1, 1945, almost all of the major cities of Japan had been decimated by fire bombs dropped from hundreds of planes flying in formation. IN Nagoya, my mother's family jumped over flaming napalm as they escaped to a nearby park, where they watched their city burn. They escaped starvation by traveling by train and on foot to my grandmother's ancestral silk farm in the mountains of Takayama.

The efficiency of the Air Force in destroying cities contributed to a crisis. They were running out of major targets that were big enough to be worth using an atomic bomb against. The Soviet Union was transporting troops to Siberia by train and was poised to fulfill its pledge to declare war on Japan on August 9, after the two old enemies from the 1905 Russo-Japanese War had stayed neutral throughout the conflict with Hitler.

The equivalent of billions of today's dollars had been spent on creating the two kinds of atomic bombs, employing not only the hundreds of scientists at Los Alamos, but also thousands of industrial plant workers gathering enriched uranium at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and thousands of others building and operating nuclear reactors on the Columbia River near Hanford, Washington, and the plants that extracted the small amounts of plutonium from the "cooked" uranium fuel rods. The plutonium process had the potential for creating far more weaponable material, but it was difficult to make it implode into a chain reaction. The trigger design was what the Rosenbergs stole for Stalin, and despite the success at Trinity and Nagasaki, several of the next test explosions were duds.

The massive investment in the Manhattan Project needed to show a dividend, or it would be condemned after the war as a boondoggle. Truman had become vice president based on the reputation he earned in the Senate for exposing war profiteering, and he probably did not relish the complaints if he did not get a bang for the many bucks that had been spent at Los Alamos, Oak Ridge and Hanford. It had to be used before the war ended.

Some of Truman's advisors were intent on using the bombs to put some fear into Stalin. They also wanted to avoid giving the Soviets an occupied territory in Japan as they were already getting in Germany.

An invasion of Japan would certainly have been costly to America. Japan still had reserves of munitions that US planes had never reached, buried in caves and transported by 20 mile long tunnels to Yokosuka Naval Base. Actually occupying a land where people were willing to die in the process of killing Americans is a difficult proposition (as we can see in Iraq). Many in Japan were fanatical in their belief that their nation would be protected just as it had been against the two Mongol invasion fleets. Even after the two nuclear attacks, when the emperor recorded a surrender message, a last minute attempt was made by fanatics to destroy the recording and take the emperor hostage, that was disrupted by an overflight of B-29s en route to Akita for a mass air raid, and by the eventual response of the mass of the Japanese Army supporting the emperor.

In the end, the nuclear bombs becoming available just before the Soviet declaration of war, the uncertainty about surrender, the need to make use of such an expensive weapon, the precedent of many incendiary attacks on cities, and the risks of an invasion, made it obvious that all of the factors weighed in favor of using the nuclear bombs. If Truman held back, and launched an invasion that killed tens of thousands of Americans, and it was later learned that he did not use every means at his disposal, he would have been crucified by the press and the Republican Party.

The ultimate success of the D-Day assault in Europe gives us too much confidence that an amphibious invasion against Japan would have worked. D-Day was actually very chancy. And unlike landing in Normandy, attacking Japan meant setting out across hundreds of miles of ocean. While the US could have eventually worn down Japan, and starved it out, it could have taken another year and hundreds of thousands more American lives. An attack by the Red Army in northern Japan could have been more successful, coming the short distance from Siberia, and it was possible that Japan could have become, in toto, a Soviet satellite state, meaning Korea would have been also.

It is possible that Japan could have surrendered without the nuclear bombs being dropped. However, there was nothing at the time that told Truman it was worth taking that gamble, rather than throwing every weapon he had into beating down Japan before an invasion became necessary. The moral line of killing a hundred thousand civilians at one stroke had already been crossed with the incendiary attacks. The cost to Americans of a nuclear bomb that would have about the same effect as incendiaries at far less cost in men and planes made it seem like the obvious choice.

We now know that both Germany and Japan had nuclear weapon programs. After all, much of the seminal work had been done in Germany. If D-Day had failed, the Nazis may well have been able to develop a bomb and use it against London or Moscow by 1946 of 1947.

Basically, because the bombs were available before Japan surrendered, it was almost inevitable that they would be used. Until Americans entered the two cities and reported the devastation, I doubt that Truman understood the full impact. The fact that he was unwilling to use nuclear weapons even when the communists were on the verge of winning Korea says to me that he had a better understanding of nuclear weapons in 1950 than he did in 1945.

In my five years living in Japan as an adult, I did not encounter any Japanese person of an age to remember World War II who seemed to blame America for the devastation wrought by the war. My own grandfather, a veteran of the Japanese Army and proprietor of a camera repair shop, on hearing the announcement of the attack on Pearl Harbor, told my mother that America, now aroused, would defeat Japan. Most Japanese understand that America's actions were in response to Japan's imperial conquest of its neighbors as it murdered and raped its way across Asia. They believe that Japan reaped the whirlwind. They had seen America less as an enemy than as a competitor.

Only at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, with the encouragement of various factions in America and other nations, have the Japanese been encouraged to disregard all the horrendous brutality of the war they started, and instead see themselves as victims and America as somehow uniquely culpable for taking an action that the Imperial Navy would not have hesitated to take if it had possessed a nuclear bomb on December 7, 1941.

Raymond Takashi Swenson
Lt. Colonel, USAF (Retired)
Attorney at Law

Why, thanks, Islamist, for things way back there. JJ's language... takes some work to understand.

This was asked, though:

" FWB:

What is the connection of the A-bomb to Pearl Harbor, the Bataan Death march, Cabanatuan and Camp O'Donnell?"

There is none.

One could say that the same fascistic Emperor-worship and nationalism that started the war, made atrocities acceptable also meant that the Japanese were fighting to the last human life they had ...made the overwhelming show of force 'necessary,' but that's as far as it goes.

It's *not* about this:

"Where was the morality and heart of Japan in those places? "

In terms of the A-bomb, that doesn't matter.
Nuking civilians is *never* justified on a 'moral' basis. This was sheer military and psychosocial practicality.

If not for the A-bombs, it's likely the Japanese would not have surrendered without far more being killed. This was the one and only rationale for the A-bombs. Horrible, nasty, a scar on the psyche, but so's the use of bayonets or incendiaries.

There is *no* moralistic justification for doing that to people.

It was merely *war.*

People being "moralistic" about nukes is why there's so many old Soviet nuclear materials that may be in the *wind* for all we know, cause America, shortsightedly, *didn't buy up enough of the stuff and expertise that was being tended by people who weren't getting *paid* cause we didn't make it a priority when it was really for sale.*

This kind of thing is *never* morally-justified. Never.

People who think the Biblical stories of Sodom and Gomorrah try to say that it was 'morally-justified' to imagine a God basically-nuking a couple of cities, in their imagination, there were gay people there, (Actually, in the cultural context of the time, it was for abusing guest-right, but that's another story.)

Whatever you believe, we humans are not that kind of 'God.'

No one, no nation, is 'morally-condemnable' enough to be eradicated by nukes or by any other means.

The only *real* reason there could be, whatever we may think of it, for the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was to prevent greater harm.

Gods help us from ever thinking a *nuke* is the 'lesser harm' ever again.

Always trying to link the problems of today to behaviors of yesterday, and portray today's problems as the worst that ever existed. The fact is, even in WWII, the USA fought a more civilized war -- considering the stakes -- than most wars throughout human history...treating prisoners with respect, care and kindness for the most part (rather than killing or enslaving them, the norm throughout most of history); striving to limit fighting and killing only to military personnel or civilians or locations directly employed in the enemy war effort (hiroshima, nagasaki). Linking hiroshima to Guantanamo (which for terrorists is nothing more than a high-security prison with interrogation, or Abu Graib betrays her politics and this constant drumbeat by the left to blame America for everything in the world. You may as well try to link the abuses of Vietnam to Korea or WWII, and the abuses of WWII to WWI or the Civil War, or the abuses of the Civil War to the Indian Wars, and so on ad nauseum. The fact is, war brings out the best and worst in human beings. Some people find a moral compass, some people live according to theirs, some people throw their moral compass away, and still others find opportunity in the chaos of wartime environments to demonstrate they have no moral compass at all. None of that has anything to do with previous wars or what we as a nation found ourselves prepared to do in a specific conflict. The rules of engagement and the training of American soldiers in this war is far more rigorous and civilian-friendly than in Vietnam, WWII or any other war. Stop indulging in your guilt and projecting it upon the nation, which has every right to survive in any situation it finds itself in, some of which are of its own making, some of which are not, and most of which are a mixture of the two.

In my previous post, I wrote, “The decision must have been horrible for President Truman, but he made the right choice.”

In response to my post, Anonymous wrote, “I'm sure the dead kids that were burned would be interested in your justifications for their deaths.”

Robert wrote, “It is chilling to read a post from someone who calls himself a Reverend (Rev. Brian A. Mahoney) justify killing innocent lives. A military man can make that argument and I could see his perspective, but for a Reverend or someone who clearly sees himself as a Christian to make that justification is just chilling.” Further, “…lets also make sure to have our facts right…. by the time the atomic bombs were ready to be deployed, Japan had already agreed to surrender. It was not Unconditional, but clearly they had conceded defeat and were nearing a breaking point. … To me, the saddest part of all of this is not Hiroshima, but Nagasaki. After Hiroshima, Japan agreed to unconditional surrender. But it is claimed that the US did not accept this unconditional surrender”

It is important to note that Japanese military officials were opposed to any negotiations before the use of the atomic bomb. Civilian leadership could not negotiate surrender or even a cease-fire because Japan, as a constitutional monarchy, could only legally enter into a peace agreement with the unanimous support of the Japanese cabinet. In the summer of 1945, the Japanese Supreme War Council, consisting of representatives of the Army, the Navy and the civilian government, could not reach a consensus on how to proceed and a political stalemate developed between the military and civilian leaders. The military was increasingly determined to fight despite all costs and odds. Further, either the Army or the Navy could veto any decision by having its Minister resign.
Waiting for the Japanese to surrender was not a cost-free option—as a result of the war, noncombatants were dying throughout Asia at a rate of about 200,000 per month.

After the bombing, the situation changed significantly. Kōichi Kido, one of Emperor Hirohito's closest advisers, stated: "We of the peace party were assisted by the atomic bomb in our endeavor to end the war." Hisatsune Sakomizu, the chief Cabinet secretary in 1945, called the bombing "a golden opportunity given by heaven for Japan to end the war."
The use of atomic bombs hastened the end of the war, liberating millions in occupied areas, including thousands of interned civilians and prisoners of war from Japanese camps. For example, in the case of the Dutch East Indies, these included about 200,000 Dutch and 400,000 Indonesians romusha (slave laborers). In Java alone, between four and 10 million romusha were forced to work by the Japanese military. About 270,000 Javanese romusha were sent to other Japanese-held areas in South East Asia. Only 52,000 were repatriated to Java, meaning that there was a death rate of 80%.

Moreover, Japanese troops had committed atrocities against millions of civilians, by means including the sanko sakusen ("scorched earth") policies, the infamous Nanking Massacre and the use of chemical and bacteriological weapons. Further, an order given by the Japanese War Ministry on August 1, 1944, ordering the disposal and execution of all Allied POWs, numbering over 100,000, if an invasion of the Japanese mainland took place. The early end to the war prevented further bloodshed.

Millions of Asian civilians died of famine under Japanese rule. For example, a UN report states that four million people died in the Dutch East Indies as a result of famine and forced labor during the Japanese occupation, including 30,000 European civilian internee deaths. These war crimes were ongoing, and use of the atomic bombs brought them to an abrupt end.

Philippine justice Delfin Jaranillla, member of the Tokyo tribunal, wrote in his judgement:
"If a means is justified by an end, the use of the atomic bomb was justified for it brought Japan to her knees and ended the horrible war. If the war had gone longer, without the use of the atomic bomb, how many thousands and thousands of helpless men, women and children would have needlessely died and suffered ...?

Also, keep in mind what we learned in the war against Germany. By waging conventional warfare, we laid waste to the land, the industry and the method of life of the German people. Waging conventional war against the Japanese until they surrendered would have meant the inevitable and complete destruction of the Japanese armed forces and just as inevitably the utter devastation of the Japanese homeland.

So, I repeat, the decision must have been horrible for President Truman, but he made the right choice.

A very poignant and thought provoking piece. Of course, the pathos of a monumental tragedy lies always in the individual threads of the brocade.
It is also supremely ironic that despite its actions in Hirishima and Nagasaki, USA went on to occupy the moral high ground after WW-II.
It is also ironic that this ultimate act of aggression didnt actually escalate the violence, but actually led to the end of the war, as people had warned.
Gandhi's play with words is very interesting to read, but it is hard to believe in the concept of a soul of a nation. With a spread out leadership and diffused responsibility of a nation's actions, on individual citizens, it is hard to imagine one person feeling the scars on her or his soul, resulting from actions taken by the govt. And then for that feeling to be general enough.
Japan did lose its soul. It submitted and still remains submissive.

Spritually, and on face value, dropping the bomb was an evil act. Yet Truman was faced with the prospect of continuing the war against a foe that refused to surrender. Invading the Japanese homeland would have produced far greater casualties, on both sides, than the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Which is more evil? Dropping a city destroying bomb and limiting casualties or causing the deaths of many more by continuing conventional war?

A very poignant and thought provoking piece. Of course, the pathos of a monumental tragedy lies always in the individual threads of the brocade.
It is also supremely ironic that despite its actions in Hirishima and Nagasaki, USA went on to occupy the moral high ground after WW-II.
It is also ironic that this ultimate act of aggression didnt actually escalate the violence, but actually led to the end of the war, as people had warned.
Gandhi's play with words is very interesting to read, but it is hard to believe in the concept of a soul of a nation. With a spread out leadership and diffused responsibility of a nation's actions, on individual citizens, it is hard to imagine one person feeling the scars on her or his soul, resulting from actions taken by the govt. And then for that feeling to be general enough.
Japan did lose its soul. It submitted and still remains submissive.

Detonation of the 1st and 2d atomic weapons over Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively were the tragic consequences of the brutal calculus of war without mercy.

Nevertheless having the decision to deploy them dropped in his lap after Roosevelt's death, Pres. Truman included in his thinking their potential impact on Emperor Hirohito's Privy Council's debate over whether to sue for Peace.

The War Faction led by the Emperor's military tried to convince him to carry on the struggle even after the Bombs had been dropped. Hirohito having become convinced the Allies would incinerate the country through one means or another had the war continued, however inclined towards the Peace Faction led by his Foreign Minister thus ending perhaps the most brutal conflict of the last century.

Though anguishing to say the deaths of a quarter million at Hiroshima and Nagasaki were an essential factor in hastening the War in the Pacific's end in 1945 rather than in 1948 or even 1950 after millions more Japanese and Allied civilians and soldiers had perished.

It should also not be overlooked that Japan though far behind Germany; even further behind Los Alamos was also exploring the challenges of building a nuclear device. Had they managed to construct it; even a rather crude one at that, think of the consequences if such an instrument had been brought by submarine into San Francisco Bay and what we would have done to Japan as a consequence.

>DRNelson

My understanding is that the Japanese Government denied the request to surrender after Hiroshima, and even went so far as to tell its people that it was simply a new kind of phosphorous bombs (versus the phosphorous bombs widely used at the time to create firestorms in cities). My understanding that it was not until the Japanese Emperor intervened after Nagasaki, and spoke directly to the people (for the first time), that Japan accepted the existence of this devastating weapon.

Q: Japan's military leadership appeared ready to fight to the death of every last man, woman, and child in the State - unless you turn the other cheek, and accept the consequences (death, and worse, for you and many others), how do you fight that? A: With nuclear weapons, and the resolve to use them, and the willingness to accept capitulation, and to stop using them.

I wonder if this morality tale of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has space for a broader discussion of the role of the bomb in ending a horrific war that claimed the lives of perhaps 80 million souls, and removing a bloodthirsty dictatorship from Japan.

I am sure it does not, since the author's discussion treats the humanness of the soldier as less than that of the civilian (as in civilian to military deaths were 6 to 1). How striking this approach, as it cannot account for the difference between an 18 Iowa draftee spared a battlefield death, and a Japanese government official killed in Hiroshima.

War is indeed bad -- I have fought in two in the past 20 years -- but the dead from bombs and bayonets look remarkably the same. The sad dissipation of the spirit from what is inevitably a young man (or hapless civilian) is what matters.

What makes the two experiences - bomb and bayonet - different is the capacity for so many comfortably situated authors to see themselves in Hiroshima, but never, ever, ever in a infantry unit in the attack.

I think I'll just re-read Paul Fussell's essay, "Thank God for the Atom Bomb." Then perhaps top that off with a reading of Japan's Constitution permitting universal suffrage and a bill of rights.

There are problems with Reverand Mahoney's argument, as there are with the notion that the bombing of these cities saved lives, and that the bombings were a necessary evil. From the standpoint of Christian thought, the bombings were indefensible. There are two main streams of thought in Christianity regarding the waging of wars. One is pacifism,allowing for no retaliation. This is closest to the teachings of Jesus, who taught that we are not to return evil for evil, and are to "offer the otehr cheek." Many Christians have felt, however, that the state can do what the individual Christian cannot in this regard, and have found in Paul some backing for this idea of the state "welding the sword." Augustine put this into a theory to which the church has historically subscribed called the "Just War Theory." Augustine meant this as not a permissonn-giving device for nations which wanted to go to war, but rather as a means of limiting justification for war. Among the criterion for a "Just War," is that civilian populations cannot be targeted, which is what we did in both the fire-bombings and the dropping of atomic bombs on Japan.

We can never say how many would or would not have been killed if we had not dropped the bombs. Perhaps they could have been dropped on something other than a city, if exploding a nuvlear device was truly necessary. There are a dozen different possible endings to any story, none of which can be determined until the story is actually played out. But there are always choices to be made. We chose an immoral one - one which caused the incineration of hundreds of thousands of people, and the tortuous death of many hundreds of thousands more.

Another teaching of the church is that the end does not justify the means. Our dropping of weapons of mass destruction on civilian populations certainly has affected the soul of this nation - see how easily people talk of doing the same to others whom we call "enemies."

The French ethicist, Jacques Ellul, talks about "necessity" being the base of most of the evil that is done. When we say, "we had to do this," "we had no choice," we engage in two forms of deceit - first of all, because there are always choices, and second, because we refuse do take responsibility for our decisions. Rev. Mahoney is wrong because he gives up on the God who holds us morally culpable, and because he has given himself over to a philosophy of death, rather than one of hope.

PC asks:
What about a National Day to honor all the victims who died at the hand of the evil and torturous Japanese? The government of Japan refuses to apologize to this day for all the atrocities perpetrated on the people of Asia. Shinzo Abe believes that the history books should be changed to show the Japanese as liberators and not aggressors. Those who committed war crimes are not considered as criminals under Japanese domestic law. Remember, the Japanese modeled their military after the Nazi regime.

Nick here:
What does that have to do with Americans?
We already have Memorial Day to properly mourn those who died in service to our country. Certainly, I would recommend mourning and seeking after forgiveness as the proper course of action for the Japanese as well, but I am not in any position to do so. I am an American, and it is my responsibility to call my own nation to set things to rights. No one should take pride in slaying another human being. Anyone placed in such a position should grieve, not exult.

respectfully,
Nick Gill
Frankfort, KY

Not suprisingly, this woman takes a selective view of morality. For example, she doesn't give the perspective of the time of the Japanese attrocities against China, the US nor the firebombing raids which nightly killed 10s of thousands of Japanese civilians and never made Japan stop its warmaking. How about the Japanese soldier who would gladly die rather than surrender even an island like Iwo Jima.

This is modern liberalism/progressivism for you, all emotion, anti American and no substance or context given.

In the end, this author seems to have done nothing to advance our understanding of this horrific war and the horrific bombing that ended it.

Why do people like her even get legitimized?

Interesting hypothesis about how the war was ended and what our nation is doing today. There is absolutely no connection.

I clearly remember Pearl Harbor, the war in the Pacific, and how it all ended. I have since read a great deal about the atrocities committed by the Japanese, especially in its treatment of our citizens who became POWs. Our hands are far from clean, of course, but living through the horrors of the war in the Pacific, justified (to nearly everyone at the time) anything we had to do to prevent the ongoing loss of life.

Although we became paranoid about the rise of the Soviet Union, our nation was generally as humanitarian as any state ever was. The reconstruction of Europe and Japan are notably civilized.

What the nation has been doing the last several years is undeniably dispicable. We continue to overreact about the threat of terrorism without trying to understand the cultures of others. We have sunk to new lows in the annals of "civilized" nations. It will take generations to make any decent recovery.

But I maintain our deeds of today have any relationship to how we chose to end the war as quickly as possible. If we had chosed to make subsequent use of the atomic bomb, one might be able to draw a connection.

Essentially none of our "leaders" today have any direct recollection of the war or of the weapon. They are acting entirely on their own, not as part of a culture that somehow arose because of Hiroshima. Our culture has come a long way since 1945--some very good, and some very twisted. But one could not have led to the other at this late date.

Thanks.

Interesting hypothesis about how the war was ended and what our nation is doing today. There is absolutely no connection.

I clearly remember Pearl Harbor, the war in the Pacific, and how it all ended. I have since read a great deal about the atrocities committed by the Japanese, especially in its treatment of our citizens who became POWs. Our hands are far from clean, of course, but living through the horrors of the war in the Pacific, justified (to nearly everyone at the time) anything we had to do to prevent the ongoing loss of life.

Although we became paranoid about the rise of the Soviet Union, our nation was generally as humanitarian as any state ever was. The reconstruction of Europe and Japan are notably civilized.

What the nation has been doing the last several years is undeniably dispicable. We continue to overreact about the threat of terrorism without trying to understand the cultures of others. We have sunk to new lows in the annals of "civilized" nations. It will take generations to make any decent recovery.

But I maintain our deeds of today have any relationship to how we chose to end the war as quickly as possible. If we had chosed to make subsequent use of the atomic bomb, one might be able to draw a connection.

Essentially none of our "leaders" today have any direct recollection of the war or of the weapon. They are acting entirely on their own, not as part of a culture that somehow arose because of Hiroshima. Our culture has come a long way since 1945--some very good, and some very twisted. But one could not have led to the other at this late date.

Thanks.

x2,

This piece is so trite that its not even worth a reply.

Nevertheless...

It did not destroy our soul because I was born way after the event, so it really had no effect on me other than being a cautionary tale of war.

The bombing did affect future presidents, since none have used it ever since despite ample opportunity, i.e. the Korean and Vietnam wars.

In fact, the military really wanted to use it during the Korean war, but was overruled since the President thought it too horrific to use.

Finally, Japan wouldn't stop fighting until the bombs were used. We were losing 10,000+ troops every battle in the Pacific and would have lost a lot more trying to beat Japan during WWII with a conventional invasion.

That's 10,000+ troops a battle. Almost 3x what we lost in Irag and Afganistan so far in the entire "war on terror". So if people are so anti-war now with our current casualities, it's not surprising how they felt back then. So using the bomb to end the war quickly was the only option.

Hindsight can be pretty good in some instances, but in this instance it is naive at best.

I agree that the current U.S. administration is without a heart or soul. It's also possible to argue that Nixon suffered from the same malady. I would argue, however, that Nixon gave far more to America than he took, in spite of Watergate. Unfortunately for Nixon, he had a personality that was virtually impossible to respect.

When President Harry S. Truman ordered the first atomic weapon airmailed to Japan, the United States and the world had become war weary and drained. Hundreds of thousands of Americans had been killed in Europe and the Pacific, and there was no clear end in sight.

Many scholars question the necessity and wisdom of the second atomic weapon, but Truman felt it necessary and none of us can put ourselves in his position at the time.

Perhaps more importantly, the characterization that Americans "celebrate" the atomic weapon attacks on Japan is factually incorrect, a vile prevarication, and is morally reprehensible.

This is a sick view of reality and contributes nothing to our understanding of world circumstances more than 60 years ago.

somebody or other said: "Japan suffered terribly--BUT, I would say she caused 10 times that suffering to innocents around her by the aggressive actions of her warrior elite..."

glad to get that cleared up. so it's okay to kill innocent japanese women, children and old folks since their 'warrior elites' were so nasty and mean? same was true of those evil stock and bond traders on 9/11 i suppose? nice to know that we civilians are fair game for you christians. not that i ever doubted your capacity to kill; that's never been in question, eh? but at least you're more honest now and don't claim any moral high ground or anything. you at last realize that you are no better than terrorists, right?

good thing our military heros are such paragons of virtue. i'm glad i can be proud of our founders: washington, jefferson, etc. they were truly men of honor and christian virtue; if you don't believe me, just ask their slaves.

Nonsense. The atomic bomb was just another step on a continuum which went through Guernica, the London Blitz, Bomber Harris and our firebomb raids on Japan.

If human life is the issue, then why is the form of technology used to end it in question?

Why is it implied that the American people accept Gitmo and, even more so, Abu Ghraib? Is the idea that the Bush Administration would act differently if it did not have Hiroshima to refer to? That seems tenuous.

The clearer connection is between Hiroshima & Guernica, between Hiroshima & Okinawa, and between Hiroshima & Tokyo.

Dear Rob,

While I appreciate your compliment, I must scold you a bit for silly writing.

Did you really mean to type "We all create the reality we experience on this planet"?

Something tells me that the children in Hiroshima and Nagasaki did not create the nuclear fireball that devastated their world.

respectfully,
Nick

what would have happened if we had found out about the russian gulags before patton was killed? he sure would have looked like a prophet,stalin would have got the kremlin nuked in 1945. wahlah,no cold war.

The Japanese brought great death and destruction to it's neighbors in the 1930's and 1940's. They were responsible for obscene acts of brutality against the Chinese and Korean civilian population. Hundreds of thousands of women were used as sex slaves, thousands were forced into cruel medical experimentation. The list goes on and on. Although, I am sorry for the suffering of those in Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the lession the Japanese should have learned is that because of this horrible war of their making they reaped what they had sown.

Japan had lost its soul long before the bombs where dropped. What they did to China and the rest of Asia while at the hight of thier empire was something truly evil, equal to the atrocities of the Nazi regime.

The atomic bombs came as a means to end a war that was not started by the Americans.

In this case the Americans have nothing to be ashamed of. They did what it had to be done in order to crush a true evil empire.

The U.S. can cant not wring its hands in guilt over an event that they did not start but did put a definitive end to.

Japan has more blood on its hands and has never truly accepted its responsibility of its acts during the war.

Let them worry about thier collective soul as a nation.

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I've thought a lot about why we hit civilians in Nagasaki and Hiroshima rather than making a couple of military bases disappear in Japan. I think it was primarily for the shock value, but my more cynical side tells me that we hit the cities just to find out how many people we could kill with an A-bomb.

And, we also needed our revenge, which is why we are now saddled with the Guantanamo Bay debacle and the quagmires that are Iraq and Afghanistan.

An angry and fearful population can be moved to commit many horrible and inhumane acts. George Bush, Dick Cheney, and their minions of evil have played each American like a violin. They exploited every fear and fueled our desire for vengeance.

But, where are the children of Cheney and Bush? Not in Iraq or anywhere near it. No way, they are partying in South America or in Washington or in California while the rest of our sons and daughters die overseas so that Bush can look like a big man.

Shared sacrifice? Ha! Cheney hasn't missed too many meals, and Bush says he sleeps well every night. And, while dear ol' King George extends the tours of duty for our soldiers, he hasn't missed a single day of vacation.

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What a load of bullhonkey, Nora. We dropped a bomb b/c the Japanese attacked our nation and wouldn't surrender. It's all about technology and military force. God never existed except in the heads of the muddle-minded, likeyou.

Ms. Gallagher unfortunately forgot the entire context of WWII, and treats the dropping of the bomb as an isolated event devoid of any reason, of any national need. She anguishes over that event as if the United States were not fighting for its very existence, as if the Japanese conquest, domination and rape of 1/4 of the earth's population was not the cause of this event. She conveniently forgets that the war ended days after the bombs were dropped, because they were dropped, and that the suicide rate of Japanese civilians on the outlying islands proves that the deaths due to conventional conquest would be every bit as high or higher than those caused by the bombs. Her amnesia is stunning in its naivety.

My questions are direct - how does an author who steps into the role of student of history fail to see the context of WWII as a contributor to the decision to use nuclear weapons to crush a blood-thirsty foe in a world war? Does she next plan to write about a limbless victim of the Japanese rape of Nanking, or is this essay (and the book she shamelessly hawks) her single shining achievement?

What is the connection of the A-bomb to Pearl Harbor, the Bataan Death march, Cabanatuan and Camp O'Donnell? Where was the morality and heart of Japan in those places? Where were the German people during the Holocaust? These questions are easy to think about. Do you think that the Japanese emperor, Tojo, Hitler, Goering, Himmler, Goebbels et al would have used an A-bomb had they developed one in time? They used everything else at their disposal. I mourn for the civilians lost in Japan and Germany, but people need to think and act before they allow their governments to be hijacked by monsters.

Nora nailed it. It's refreshing to have someone look directly at the specificity of our dropping the bombs on Hiroshima & Nagasaki without flinching. It is both horrifying & redemptive if we are willing to take it in. It could give us the possibility of turning around, or in other words, of turning our swords into plowshares. It takes equal amounts of courage to look directly at our absolute plundering of Hiroshima and Nagasaki & determining as a nation that we will now turn our swords into plowshares in memory of the 200,000 & more deaths, overwhelmingly civilian. That event did mark in a horrific way our end of innocence as a nation in the twentieth century, or more accurately the end of our denial of how we have done immense harm to others throughout our history. If we wish to be truly great, we need to embrace the fact of our dark side (our capacity for evil) as a nation. It holds the key to our
transformation.

Nora,
while your characters are searching their souls in the desert--and getting in touch with what it means that a "nation loses it's soul"...

...I think you failed to lay out the chapter about the 2nd cousin of elenor in Dutch east indies who was overrun by japanese--and how she was forced to work as a sex slave for the japanese occupiers--along with all her friends who weren't killed outright, seeing dozens of soldiers every day--eventually leading to her suicide...

Or, the distant family of her maid in china who were bayonetted to death in Nanking by invading japanese troops---and how their 1 year old grand child was pararded around the city on a soldier's bayonet that day....

Or the Allied soldiers who were enslaved, tortured and killed---and how their tragic numbers TRULY pale in comparison to numbers of Asian innocents who suffered the wanton killing and rampant rape and abuse the Japanese Army instituted throughout their "Economic Prosperity Sphere"....

And how the people of the Japanese homeland were training to oppose the invasion and to die in the effort to stop the "white devils" from coming into their homeland (fearing the types of behaviors they were well known for...)...for their emperor

And how these weapons, repugnant as they are from the distance of 62 years--after the benefits of winning the war and the desperation of that time has so waned in our perspectives.., saved 100s and 1000s of Allied lives and stopped the killing of 1000s of innocents by a warrior caste intent on going down in flames and taking all they could with them...

No---the bombs were a good thing.
Japan suffered terribly--BUT, I would say she caused 10 times that suffering to innocents around her by the aggressive actions of her warrior elite...

Enough of the knashing of teeth about how we saved american lives by using a weapon that our enemies would have used without hesitation, that our enemies actions and evil really cause to pale in comparison.

The people who started and allowed that war of aggression were defeated, Totally.

done.

I guess we should have let the Germans or the Japanese build the bonb first, then we could have all been in concentration camps, I would hope that you would be first into the oven for writing this silly article.

Or maybe we should have just sent all of those solders and marines to their death attacking the Japanese mainland!

You make me sick!

Nora,

Laudable as your piece about 'the soul of the destroying nation' or about ' the scandal of the particular' is, nukes are NOT any more romantic than William Blake's "Tiger, Tiger, Did He That Created the Lamb Also Create Thee".

The very hard reality is that 200,000 had died after 5 years; the very hard reality about Gandhi (as Richard Attenborough told hoi polloi in his movie, but as had been lived in the flesh by South African human rights activists long before a struggling lawyer from Gujrat landed in Durban) is that he learnt his non-violence from Mr. Khan in South Africa where, the past week, it was revealed that Nobel Peace Prize-winning President F.W. De Klerk had been involved in the murder of two sisters in their sleep five days before he was awarded the coveted prize (and also, his son became an alcoholic and briefly converted to Islam).

A hard-nosed solution would be to take the flame of denuclearization (starting with those who have the largest number of warheads, but including the upstarts on a pro rata basis) militancy forward some significant distance, the same way that Cindy Sheehan has carried the antiwar/pacifism flame and has now shifted to a higher gear and is seeking impeachment.

For THAT, we underlings of the human fraternity would be grateful to you.

I AM myself seriously considering making the effort to graduate from being an underling.

I feel that our National soul has been warped not by the act of dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but rather by 50+ years of hubris and, of late, largely unchallenged world domination!

As a child of the post-war era, I can never hope to understand what the population of the US was feeling at that time. Clearly, the general population had no idea what the A-bomb really represented, and only knew the grief and fear of lost brothers, sons and fathers, and a desire for an end to the war. I believe that the development of the atomic bomb must have seemed a miraculous delivery from a seemingly endless war.

The deaths of those poor civilians, while profound in their significance, were but a spark within a raging inferno... an orgy of death and destruction. As other posts here allude to, there is great divergence of opinion regarding the necessity of the use of the atomic bombs, but clearly, once the project began, the die was cast. That which is conceived will be built, and that which is built will be used.

I, too, wonder at the significance of our post-war rebuilding efforts in both Europe and Japan, and say that it speaks to an essential goodness of that generation of Americans. I believe that they were truly magnanimous in victory! As to the intentions of the Nation's leaders and the industrial interests, my 21st century jaded perspective on the corporate state suspects something far from idealistic at work.

For myself, I could never justify the future use of such weapons. I know that there are those who feel that we have the right to "protect" ourselves at any cost, but I cannot convince myself of that. I cannot believe that an all-powerful God calls us to death and destruction, nor that such a Being could favor one aspect of It's creation over another. That is childish in the extreme!!

Perhaps the greatest net effect upon us as a nation is that, for many of us, we view ourselves as the "doers of Good", the fortress of Democracy... somehow set above everyone else. Perhaps this is merely innate xenophobia, though I suspect there is much more to it. We have grown unable to differentiate the idealized view of ourselves from the real and flawed nation that we are.

I fear for our future. I feel that the leadership of this once-great Nation no longer represents the average American... that they, in the thrall of large pan-national corporations, will follow the money rather that any true morality.

i'm sure that bin ladin is quite encouraged by all the support his tactic of killing civilians has garnered here from conservative christians. they are, of course, his natural allies.

hiroshima, nagasaki, the fire bombings of dresden and tokyo, 9/11, 7/7 all were direct attacks on innocent civilians for political purposes.

truman, bin ladin, bush. the holy trinity.

I guess when you put ourselves in 1945, would it have been better to lose about 500,000 - 1,000,000 American soldiers, marines, and airmen? Not to mention the 100's of thousand Japanese, probablt more then the A-Bomb it self. I think not. Japan started it, we just finished it with losing the least amount of life.

All good questions. Another is this: What would the conquest of Japan, an invasion that pitted US soldiers and marines against suicidal Imperial Army resistance with Japan's entire population caught in between, have done to the American soul? No need to ask what it would have done to Japan's soul, since there wouldn't have been any Japan left when it was over.

You're stretching a long way to connect things that have no connection. Hiroshima somehow damaging the soul of America, causing us to deteriorate as a society, somehow relating to decisions and events associated with Iraq?
Give me a break.
You have too much time on your hands.

i was barely a year old when the bomb was dropped. i've had a lifetime, including a war of my own, to consider the pros and cons of the decision harry truman made, and i must say that i find no fault at all in what he did.

i am not one of those given to drawing the sword every time america wants its own way. that, i gladly leave to the neo-cons and the non-servers of the g.o.p. but, neither am i blithely oblivious of reality. the japan america faced was racist, imperialist, and as brutal as nazi germany. for those who doubt, i invite to consider the object lessons of nanking, bataan, and pearl harbor.

that strain was not entirely cauterized by the necessary and justified administration of the bomb. just ask the korean women forced to serve as japan's prostitutes (a fact which japan refuses to this day to acknowledge as a matter of national policy). for them, for the victims of bataan, nanking and pearl harbor, i will weep. for japan, i will not shed a tear.

"The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem. It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one."
--- Albert Einstein

Your ?: "What has happened to the soul of the destroying nation?"

It has elected to commit suicide,

waving its plastic made-in-China flag while committing genocide in Iraq,

worshipping its false God--

the one it advertises on the dollar bill.

God, the real ones that the Greeks understood so well,

has never given a damn about nations,

especially one like ours founded on genocide and slavery,

one like ours that is dedicated to perpetuating the same

in the name of Leiberman.

My wife, a Japanese lady who was Naturalized in June 2005, and I toured Hiroshima and the memorial two years ago.

As we did, we considered how our fathers lives were saved because of the event. My dad, because he was poised as an invasionary force and her dad, who was not compelled to fight-to-the-death defending his homeland. Those spared lives produced children that have also produced children who may, and may not, attribute their lives - in part - to the event.

I learned one thing during the tour and I am still processing the information. The memorial explains that US planners selected Hiroshima because there was no intelligence that US Airmen/Prisoners were being held in that City. That information struck me when processed against the images of a school that once stood along the river, across from the dome-topped landmark that is Hiroshima.

Toland, and others, believe that more lives were spared because of the event. If true, the exponential expansion of successive generations increases the count of lives spared - on both sides.

You would have hoped that being the only country to ever use nuclear weapons would have added some humility and humanity to our foreign policy and future thoughts of the use of WMD's. Apparently not. I was totally stunned by numerous presidential candidates who would actually consider using "tactical" nuclear weapons on Iran to end Iran's civilian nuclear program. Interesting that we invade Iraq for their apparent seeking of nuclear weapons and keep everything on the table to stop Iran from attaining them yet we would consider using them on Iran to acheive our goals. Doesn't this add justification for every country to have nuclear weapons?

To the Rev. Brian Mahoney:

You are exactly right. Truman did make the right choice. Asia would be a totally different country today if the Japanese aggression had not been stopped.

To Nick Gill:

What about a National Day to honor all the victims who died at the hand of the evil and torturous Japanese? The government of Japan refuses to apologize to this day for all the atrocities perpetrated on the people of Asia. Shinzo Abe believes that the history books should be changed to show the Japanese as liberators and not aggressors. Those who committed war crimes are not considered as criminals under Japanese domestic law. Remember, the Japanese modeled their military after the Nazi regime.

To Robert:

The Japanese did not consent to full surrender after the first bomb was dropped. They were incredulous that the US could have such power and doubted that a second bomb could exist. The Japanese were still planning to attack before the second bomb fell.

Robert, you said:

The key factors for nuking Japan were:

1) To finish the war quickly before Stalin could set his sights on Japan. Stalin inteded to invade and retake islands Japan had ceased from the pre-Bolshevik Russia. Stalin infact declared war on Japan after Germany's defeat.

2) Truman felt that this weapon would project power to the rest of the world, in particular Russia, as it was becoming clear that post-World War would be followed by a Cold-War between the war-time allies.

To me, the saddest part of all of this is not Hiroshima, but Nagasaki. After Hiroshima, Japan agreed to unconditional surrender. But it is claimed that the US did not accept this unconditional surrender (which was the request we had made prior to Hiroshima) and went ahead with the second atomic bomb in Nagasaki to confirm the results of the first.

That to me is where I say that perhaps we did lose our souls from that day forward.

My reply:

On your #1 and #2, you are quite correct. I would add #3 to Truman's reasons: to save American lives.

As to the surrender - I know of no evidence that Japan had accepted unconditional surrender until Nagasaki. Do you have a source for that?

And I still don't think I lost our souls there. If we had simply blockaded Japan and let millions starve to death, would that really have been better?

God, what a moral conundrum! I hope I am not opening yet another can of worms.

Ms.Gallagher,
The question is:Does a nation that nukes civilians have a soul?This is the ugliest most horrendous act of terrorism in human history-and 911,thou deplorable-is dwarfed by it.

Rev. Brian A. Mahoney,
Are you really a man of God? What ever happened to this Jesus of yours-and of Harry Truman? So the Japaense barberians and fascits are your good example.A decent human being sets his own moral standards and does not descend to the standars of the brutes.Your justification is regrettable as its shameful.
I wonder what how Truman is justfying his crime to "God" in case he believes in one.

I can say that I have learned that nuclear proliferation destroys life and should be outlawed by modern society, from a Japanese gentlman named Josei Toda and Daisaku Ikeda, of the value-creation education society, now called the Soka Gakkai, whom lived during the aftermath of those two bombings, and taught the later of the two to feel the same. I feel the same as they do.

The US killed innocent civilians in Japan without hesitation and the US continues to do so today.

I do not think the US has learned anything positive from the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Japan, although I think the Japanese people have learned some moral lessons, empathy for other's suffering!

Tim, you realize that we make money rebuilding nations after we destroy them, right? You think military contractors are in the poor house?

Let's not forget that we supported Russia when they entered Berlin, and they raped plenty more women during their occupation of Berlin and everywhere else along the way. Don't dare claim that America doesn't have that blood on their hands. Our country still attacked Nagasaki after Japan's unconditional surrender - and allowed the Red Army to effectively sack Berlin.

Hmm...you know, after reading this, I know a lot more about your novel than I do about the notion that Hiroshima had anything to do with the soul of our nation. Reading a number of other posts, I can see that I'm not alone in that state. Heck, I don't even quite grasp what your novel has to do with the purported topic listed in the title here, unless this is little more than a vehicle for self-promotion. Shame on you, spouting ethics and mourning everyone's morality out of one side of the mouth while you plug your own book with the other.

I also have a comment for Concerned the Christian Now Liberated, you are an idiot. Suicide bombings were not invented by the Japanese.

It is chilling to read a post from someone who calls himself a Reverend (Rev. Brian A. Mahoney) justify killing innocent lives. A military man can make that argument and I could see his perspective, but for a Reverend or someone who clearly sees himself as a Christian to make that justification is just chilling.

Lets debate if it was right or wrong, but lets also make sure to have our facts right. Japan did commit major atrocities during from the 1920's to the 1940's in China and elsewhere. But by the time the atomic bombs were ready to be deployed, Japan had already agreed to surrender. It was not Unconditional, but clearly they had conceded defeat and were nearing a breaking point.

The key factors for nuking Japan were:

1) To finish the war quickly before Stalin could set his sights on Japan. Stalin inteded to invade and retake islands Japan had ceased from the pre-Bolshevik Russia. Stalin infact declared war on Japan after Germany's defeat.

2) Truman felt that this weapon would project power to the rest of the world, in particular Russia, as it was becoming clear that post-World War would be followed by a Cold-War between the war-time allies.

To me, the saddest part of all of this is not Hiroshima, but Nagasaki. After Hiroshima, Japan agreed to unconditional surrender. But it is claimed that the US did not accept this unconditional surrender (which was the request we had made prior to Hiroshima) and went ahead with the second atomic bomb in Nagasaki to confirm the results of the first.

That to me is where I say that perhaps we did lose our souls from that day forward.

World War II was the struggle of ultimate evil abominations. The Nazis, the Fascists, the Japanese Army, the Red Army, U.S. atomic bombs, British firebombs. I cannot even reconcile all the evil that occurred and was partially (hopefully) purged. I pray to God in wonder how any of my Grandparents' generation survived with any sanity. Maybe that's what made them so great.

I am hopeful that America somewhat understands the need to grieve both for those we have harmed, and for the black mark on our nation's soul. But I am less hopeful that as we realize this, we commit more atrocities in the world.

Israel of God V.S. Israel of Herzl

Herzl’s Israel:

· Created by Herzl (See “The Jewish State” 1896)

· Jewish State (90% Ashkenazi)

· Fascist-Democratic-Nationalist Government System

· 4th Most Powerful Army in the World with the United States as it’s tutelary (guardian)

· 95% Atheists

· Israel is a violent nation, arguably the most diabolical and insidious State in the World, due to in-humane policies, such as its neo-gulags and systematic impoverishment, incarceration and slaughter of the Palestinian people. (Isaiah 34:13& Malachi 1:4)

God’s Israel:

· Created by God

· Ruled by Jesus Christ ( Psalm 2:9, Isaiah 9:6, Revelation 2:27; 12:5 & 19:15)

· Neither Gentile nor Jew, for Jesus Christ does not respect person’s based on racial ethnicity (Mark 3:35, John 1:13, Romans 2:29, Romans 8:15, Galatians 3:14, Galatians 5:6 & Galatians 6:15-17)

· True Socio-Communist Government ( Jeremiah 23:4, Acts 4:34 & 2 Corinthians 8:15 )

· No Army, God its tutelary (Isaiah 60:14, Zechariah 14:3, Psalms 68, Jude 1:14 & Revelation 20:9)

· All citizens are 100% believers in Jesus Christ (Acts 20:21, Romans 3:22, Romans 5:1, Galatians 2:16, Galatians 3:26 & Ephesians 1:1)

· 100% Absolutely no violence in the Israel of God (Isaiah 60:18, Isaiah 65:24, Jeremiah 22:3 & Micah 4:4)

---Peacetroll, 8/5/07

http://godisjesus.net/Israel%20of%20God%20V.htm

Islamist, you said:

"No, Tancredo is not the first chap to want or suggest to nuke Mecca and Medina. Saudi Arabia has declared war on its ally the United States? Nuking Mecca and Medina, the spiritual heart of Islam, is nuking the whole Muslim world's soul. That is what some want, mostly Christian supremacists and atheists who want to obliterate all religions and beliefs."

Tancredo may or may not be the first- but he is the only one that I'm aware of who made such a statement publicly who is attempting to run for president.

The destruction of the sites would lead to a lot more Muslims ready to fight. There are a billion+ Muslims in the world, and right now only a few of them are giving the rest of the religion a bad image. I doubt those numhers would stay the same if their holy cities were wiped out.

I haven't heard about Saudi Arabia declaring war on us. If Mecca and Medina were nuked, that would probably change.

Christian dominionists, I agree with you there. However I have yet to meet an atheist, even those who don't find anything worthwhile in religion, who would ever advocate such an extreme action. Every atheist I've ever met thus far does hold life to be inherently valuable regardless of where they think it came from.

Bottom line is we've all got to stop reacting in such a knee-jerk, vengeance oriented way. That only leads to more violence.

Let's see ... what did the USA do after winning WWII? Well, we rebuilt Europe and Japan. You know the Marshall Plan. Maybe we should have just taken our exclusive nuclear annihilation capability and bombed the hell out of Russia and the Middle East. Maybe we should have reduced the world to our domination under threat of a nuclear attack. We did not do this -- so the soul of the nation was not damaged by the action we took to save lives and end the war. If anything it made us stronger.

We did something very different. Because it was out of character for a victorious nation with the ultimate weapon; a weapon that was beyond anything ever imagined by Alexander the Great, Napoleon, The Spanish, or all those who had tried to rule the world in the past to stand down. To show restraint and to actually rebuild the enemy. To the victor would go the spoils and in this case with the exclusive rights to the nuclear bomb this would have meant total world domination, if our soul had been somehow damaged.

So the whole premise of the author is wrong if you just look at our actions. The Greatest Generation shinned. They did what they had to do at the time yet they extended the hand of friendship when they held all the cards.

What has changed America is the possibility of Nuclear Weapons in the hands of religious nuts. We had no choice but to develop these weapons and used them wisely. It has been generally agreed that their use actually saved lives on both sides. Just ask any person in the military fighting the Japanese and especially those who may have been involved in Iwo Jima.

We did not change after developing or using these weapons. Yet now we have changed as we entered a new phase of nuclear terror; think Iraq. This change is not because of what we did during WWII but because of who may end up with bomb now. This woman is living in the past. The future is this: More changes will happen and need to happen because the world just can not afford to have a nuclear bomb go off in London, Paris, NYC, WDC or any other major city in the world. This is what has changed us and the world; it all has to do with who has the bomb not that the USA origianlly developed it and used it.

Permissibility is an odd framing. The trite comes to mind: it is easier to ask forgiveness, than permission.

But forgiveness is really the key to moving forward. And despite the often fierce economic competitiveness of our two countries, I believe Japan and the US share an uncommon bond that I don't think anyone could characterize as imperial, or conquerer/conquered, victor/vanquished, heroic/shamed. I might posit that lack of forgiveness is exactly what keeps China and Japan from moving forward. But I'm thoroughly ignorant of the particulars in either case and likely quite wrong...

I don't know that our sense of morality has been eroded by either Hiroshima or Guantanamo. If you accept the premise of war, you swallow the whole noodle. Sam Harris has done an extraordinary analysis of the particulars of torture, which I am too weak-minded to refute.

But my intuition begs to differ, because cruel acts affect the actor, to his detriment, regardless if such actions are within his right.

However, right and good are different animals when framed within the ethics of emergencies. And it is in the chaos rising out of that original emergency that we forget to ask why we are being cruel; it simply becomes habit. It is not for a dead and mutilated terrorist that I am sorry, but for the ruined psyche of the habituated mutilator who comes home no longer able to function as a human.

Richard Feynman's great regret about Los Alamos is that he didn't recheck the premise for building the bomb after Germany had surrendered. Germany was working on its own bomb; now they were no longer a threat to American cities. But he was caught up in the process of making it work. As so often happens, emergencies put us on auto-pilot and we don't actively think past our own survival.

I don't think that Hiroshima has desensitized us to make us any more cruel than we might otherwise be. World War II remains the benchmark of cruelty to which we've never risen since. Perhaps it is Hiroshima and Nagasaki that have squelched our worst impulses--because the true deterrent behind MAD was that everyone knew the consequences and to accept them again would be madness realized.

But what we have now is, indeed, "a far cry from the world we thought we'd inherit" having survived the cold war. We are in a position, perhaps, of having adversaries who, upon accepting a warped faith, would delight in the consequences; adversaries to whom realizing the madness is the expression of god's love.

And to that, there are no particular answers; to that, nuclear stockpiles are no particular deterrent--and for that, I can find no particular way to forgive.

---FIUS

Paganplace

Thanks. I can't remember or read history as much as a friend called J :). I've only been reading On Faith since "Muslims Speak Out". I like your posts and those by other pagans/wiccans here, but Jacob Jozevz's posts are something else. Do anyone actually read and understand his posts?

Cheers

Whoa, JJ... Is this breaking news, breaking rumor, or just something out of the rumormill in general?

" Islamist:

Why use the atomic bombs on Japanese cities and not German?"

Cause... the Germans were beaten by the time the bombs were available, and without such extreme measures?

OSAMA BIN LADEN IS DEAD! Osama Bin Laden & his Aladins Lamp is dead!

In Early June He died of a Heroin/Opium overdose & kidney Problems! Ask "AL JAZEERA" news folk , friends of Al Qaeda, if you do not believe Me!

Note: Bin Ladens SON who is Marying an Old British Harlot is just a distraction to this fact, so arrest them both. And His Niece in living in America is suddenly Gone, and cannot be found anywhere, because she is in mourning for her famous uncle Bin the king of SIN!

Hip Hip Horray! CHEERS!

O S A M A B I N L A D E N I S D E A D!

Priver - "I was shocked by Tancredo's ideas about wanting to nuke both Mecca and Medina. I think he's actually serious. This man must NOT become president, or even dog catcher."

No, Tancredo is not the first chap to want or suggest to nuke Mecca and Medina. Saudi Arabia has declared war on its ally the United States? Nuking Mecca and Medina, the spiritual heart of Islam, is nuking the whole Muslim world's soul. That is what some want, mostly Christian supremacists and atheists who want to obliterate all religions and beliefs.

Cheers

This is just the kind of essay to post this question to.

Is anyone else alarmed by the fact that the only president our current 'decider' has ever taken an interest in cracking a book and learning more about is also the only one who ever nuked another country?

I was shocked by Tancredo's ideas about wanting to nuke both Mecca and Medina. I think he's actually serious. This man must NOT become president, or even dog catcher.

We spend about 20 billion dollars a year just to maintain our own nukes. It takes only 6 to take out a country the size of Russia. We have 10,000 or more. We're also the only ones who've ever used them. Can somebody please explain to me how that makes us any better than those out there, whose numbers seem to be growing, who want to blow US to kingdom come?

It's hard to remain an optimist in the face of the type of world we're living in today. I just hope people wake up and realize we're all in this together. No matter what you believe.

Why use the atomic bombs on Japanese cities and not German? The Germans killed millions more people than the Japanese during World War II. Why think that not bombing Kyoto (as the then Secretary of State thinks should not as it is the cultural heart of Japan) would lessen the impact of atomic-bombing civilians in Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Why draw God into this human decisions to go to war, to make and use atomic bombs? God tells us to make atomic bombs? Atomic bombs don't kill, people do? What about the souls of the Japanese who died in the bombings?

It's a very significant question as to what has happened to our nation's soul? We must remember the typical natural behaviors of humans before Paganism, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Shintoism, Taoism, etc. We also must remember the individual and societal transformation that occurred when any one of the great religions were established.
Before religion was established in any region early humans acted upon instinct and emotional impulses. Some of the most questionable behaviors of people are descendant behaviors of our distant ancestors when religion wasn't present including, vengeance, anger, fear, and desire. Early humans actively engaged into four principal activities in life; fighting, feeding, fleeing and mating.
Once the great religions and other philosophical viewpoints of the sacred emerged, the most paradoxical event in Earth's natural history has commenced. For the first time ever, a living species has transformed their basic behavioral patterns and introduced a new way of life, which includes but is not limited to restraint, extended love beyond the immediate family, charity, loyalty, devotion, pluralism, atonement, etc.
What's even more fascinating is that despite at least 2,000,000 living species on Earth today and at least 100,000,000,000 different life forms that emerged and gone extinct throughout Earth's history since the Precambrian Times that ranged between 4.5 billion to 600 million years ago; we're the only living inhabitants of Earth who've transformed our principal behavior, which ultimately introduced symbols, writing, mathematics, art, and a formal legal system.
What we must understand is that science showed how unique we really are. We're an unprecedented living exception of Earth's long history.
Although we've as a species has accomplished the impossible, we've also developed various traits of behavior over the course of a very long time and they're still with us today. Unfortunately, we don't have to search long to detect such emotional, reactionary, vengeful, and instinctive behaviors showed often in the media.
Our best solution in finding common ground is that almost every human being agrees to call this planet Earth. we all agree that all 6,000,000,000+ people on Earth are members of the same species. As such we must understand the ruthless aspects of our nature is as real as our enormous potential, diverse virtues and extensive accomplishments that continues to triumph throughout this day and far, far beyond.
For every mistake or misjudgment we make we'll sometimes say that we're just human. It is a principal explanation but we shouldn't use it as a common excuse. We should also discover that diversity is the next great gift we'll receive as we learn from other cultures and viewpoints, we'll have an opportunity to expand our minds by learning the full extent of the human variation.
Although we often perceive ourselves in troubling times, maybe we should think about the immanent opportunities that awaits for anyone brave enough to search beyond their limited perceptions.

Globomo:

Put down that weapon. Haven't you heard?

"If you talk to dictators -you can immediately get them on your side."

So is your novel asking what kind of god would allow His people to die in such a holocaust as Hiroshima?
Or is it examining the irony of gentle Christians
savagely blowing fellow human beings to kingdom come in WW2?
God does not exist,of course.Or if he does exist he probably enjoys the excitement of wars,and explosions,and killings and tsunamis,and earthquakes,and typhoons and all the rest of it,
because he never does a damn thing to prevent anything. He probably says "Bring it on!"

Re: Hiroshima. If I attack you with a knife, and you pull a gun in response, who is to blame for the discharge of the firearm?

(Regarding the notion that Japan was already beaten...) You insist that I put my knife down, and yet I refuse.

(Regarding the notion that unconditional surrender was an excessive demand...) I smile at the barrel, chuckle, and say "let's talk, friend!" And yet I still have not put my knife down.

The gun goes off every time.

Rev. Brian A. Mahoney:

You are so very, very correct!! And suicide bombings were invented by the Japanese. Can you imagine what these crazy Kamikazes would have done on land to invaders of the "homeland"!!!!!! On the other hand maybe we could have simply starved them into submission.

This again raises the just war question. As was discussed on some posts last week it is a slippery slope. One man’s justification is not another man’s justification. One country’s justification is not another country’s justification. One culture’s justification is not another culture’s justification.

We all create the reality we experience on this planet. Peace begets peace, violence begets violence. The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, thus drawing the US into war and setting events into motion that lead to those tragic days in 1945; though one could argue that every day of war is a tragic day.

I don’t know that we can say dropping the bomb was justified or not. For the sake of argument let’s assume it was justified and saved millions of lives. Even if dropping the bomb was the ‘right’ solution it says we (humans) erred greatly in the first place. What does it say about the human race when it comes down to choosing to ‘sacrifice’ hundreds of thousands of innocent people to save significantly more?

I think Hiroshima is perfect example of the slippery slope that has no happy ending. As
Arminius said it is scary to think of the path we may choose should Al-Qaeda detonate a nuclear weapon.

Falantedios I liked your. You are correct we are created equal and the sooner we understand that the better chance we have for peace.

Is Obama wrong for declaring a "no-use" nuke policy? Doesn't that "straighten out" the moral ambiguity of the cold war? Are we so lost that we still need to pretend to be crazy enough to use them? If a terrorist set off a nuke in new york city... who would we nuke in response? what would it accomplish? Even if we traced the materials to Iran, would we simply lay waste to entire cities? Would were perhaps seek to kill every single city-dwelling Iranian? That's nonsense. Our response would be entirely conventional (in more ways than one, undoubtedly).

I grieve for the lives destroyed by Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I believe we should have a National Day of Mourning for those who've died at our hands.

The Declaration of Independence says, "All men are created equal." It doesn't say, "all Americans are created equal and everybody else is expendable."

The only one wise enough to cope with these scars, this great evil, dispensed his wisdom to those who were willing to remain social outcasts under the yoke of tyranny in order to display his glory and wisdom. When they chose to throw off that yoke, to turn away from prayer and compassion, turning to the sword and violence, they began to bear the fruit of his prophecy in their lives.

The only healing possible is to begin right now in our own homes and lives; return good for evil. Offer compassion and grace to the suffering. Apologize for the wounds caused by your ancestors. Turn from self-serving agendas to lives of sacrificial love.

respectfully,
Nick Gill
Frankfort, KY

JA JOZ,

Your thinking is a bit nutty, but does it explain why Palestinians also have to be punished for the sins of the Nazis? And who else is in line?

Perhaps Osama uses such nutty logic to justify 911 -- that civillians must be killed for some justification...

BTW, Germany was defeated BEFORE the nuclear bombs were dropped. So nuking & killing 200,000+ civillians that wasn't a means to stop the Holocaust. But making that an excuse is probably Nazi-like.

People destroy & start wars for the craziest reasons...

Terra,

Well, I intentionally stopped my post before getting into the current situation. As to the torture - I was sickened at that, and I think much of America was too. The cries of protest were drowned out by the right wing shrieking. And yes, the current bunch of numbnuts in the administration have given veiled threats of nukes being used - 'all options are on the table'. And we have a serious nutcase, Rep Tancredo (R, CO) who has publicly advocated nuking Mecca if there is another 9/11. And he is trying to run for president.

Maybe hidden deep within my cynical thick hide there is an optimist struggling to get out - I cannot believe we would uncork that bottle again. If Al Qaida or other groups get hold of one, though, all bets are off. And that IS scary. Even Iran is too smart to do that.

Jozevz:
Thanks for the reply, but please take your medication. You simply do not make any sense.

Oooopss. Because of the Japanese Religion SHINTOISM, that was how "Royal Japan" nuked themselves without shooting a nuke themsleves!

Please See this Wikilink for SHINTO:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shinto

Hint: Finatic Religious mesmerized Nationalism Japan. Note: Hitler murdered [Gas Chambered] most of my family on me dad's side! So 200,000 Japanese nuked to save countless more is a good exchange for a better future. Yes, history indeed is our future! Let's not repeat It Nuclear un-wise!

Actually, there's more to what you say at the end there than some people might think: humans as a species are social creatures: normally we find a balance between folks more of a 'nurturing sustainer bent,' an attractive social force, and the 'ruling defender' model.

A problem with a Republic is that there's a tendency to forget that the purpose of such a system isn't to try and finagle things so that the aggressive, restrictive conquering types can claim something like monolithic, kingly, sex-controlling absolute rulership 'fair and square,' ...it's so that the government will hopefully better-represent the *whole* American and human community.

The advent of the 'jealous-God-like' power of the atomic bomb is and has been one of the many things that polarize those of a (charitably-put) 'protector' bent (who think the less-aggressive need only be put in their places) against those who have a little more perspective on the *point* of government being to represent whole communities.

Our America.

More demands for monolithic power and control have brought us to many of the situations we find ourselves in today, not because there's no need for defense, but because treating that as the prime and only concern actually just creates strife to prevent people from getting on with the process of actually living together.

There does have to be a balance, (and it's certainly not in imposing apocalyptic threats of religion and thermonuclear bombs as normative,) but it's also not even close to what we're told is 'moderate,' these days.

Moderation is *fact-based.*

Monotheist 'faith-based' ideas of 'moderation' involve 'not-suppressing-so-badly-as-we-can-imagine-doing-andyou'lllike it' ...those who say there's more to life than scrabbling for control and then 'defending' it, and we have to care for each other or send Western civilization into a premature, (if nicely-appointed,) watery grave.

Good article, thank you.

I also grew up in New Mexico. I've visited "Lost Alamos" many times, including its museum that covers the history of the Manhattan Project.

I've also stood at the Trinity Site several times and picked up the green fused-sand glass (trinitite) that was formed that morning in 1945 and wondered what it must have been like there at that moment.

I don't have any answers to the questions you and others pose. I doubt anyone does.

We always claimed we would not commit torture also..but we have a President and a populous that seems to think that in some cases torture is ok.
So like the man talking to the hooker...it's not what we are..it's the cost.

So what got us into Iraq? What would it take for a nuke to be dropped by someone that felt the end justifies the means?

We, as a some what bent Democracy have to take our brains out of our back pockets and shake the lint and dust out...and use them.

terra

Ms Gallagher,

A very interesting and thought provoking bit of writing. Thanks.

Yes, we did let the evil genie out of the proverbial bottle. Ironically, it probably saved several million Japanese and American lives by making the invasion of Japan unnecessary. But that is beside the point; the question is, what did it do to us?

Well, we have never used it since then, that must say something. But it did affect our culture profoundly. I know - I was there. I grew up in the 1950's in Oak Ridge, Tennessee (USA), the 'Atomic City'. This is where the enriched uranium used in the Hiroshima bomb was produced. At that time, it was a matter of great pride to us. But as time went on, and matters became more 'interesting', opinions began to change. I think the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962, which was a very close call, began to wake people up, and voices of reason began to be heard. Of course the arms race continued, but both sides realized that it was suicidal to start such a war - MAD (mutually assured destruction). Treaties were signed. Eventually a scaling-down of the insane number of warheads happened.

To sum up, then. We never used the Bomb again, and we probably, God willing, never will. Most of America during this time, and now, did not and does not want to use them. I think we have come to terms with it. But the scars still remain. There was a lot of fear during those years.

Rev. Mahoney and Jacob,

I'm sure the dead kids that were burned would be interested in your justifications for their deaths.

Do you people hate killing civillians and nuking people, or not?
Or do you need excuses and justifications, just like the terrorists?

Faced with a choice between the use of atomic weapons and a costly invasion of the Japanese mainland, did President Truman really have a choice considering that between 1937 and 1945, the Japanese military murdered near 3,000,000 to over 10,000,000 people, most probably 6,000,000 Chinese, Indonesians, Koreans, Filipinos, and Indochinese, among others, including Western prisoners of war. In China alone, during 1937-45, approximately 3.9 million Chinese were killed, mostly civilians, as a direct result of the Japanese operations and 10.2 million during the course of the war.

The most infamous incident during this period was the Nanking Massacre of 1937-38, when the Japanese Army massacred as many as 430,000 civilians and prisoners of war. Historian Mitsuyoshi Himeta claims that the "Three Alls Policy" sanctioned by Hirohito himself, was responsible for the deaths of "more than 2.7 million Chinese civilians.

The decision must have been horrible for President Truman, but he made the right choice.

Jesus Christ is god manifest in the flesh.

No one speaks of christ, because there all Jesus Christ haters.

This site is for the ignorant and lame.

Nora Gallagher,

I haven't read your novel yet and I don't have answers to your questions. Do you have answers to your questions? If so, do the answers appear in your novel?

All I have are more questions:

Is what happened at Hiroshima qualitatively different from what happened in the firebombings of Tokyo and Dresden?

Is what happened at Hiroshima qualitatively different from what happened in the story of Cain and Abel?

Is what happened at Hiroshima qualitatively different from General Pershing's burying dead Muslim insurgents in the Phillipines in pigskins to horrify and intimidate the living insurgents?

Is what happened at Hiroshima qualitatively different from Lord Jeffrey Amherst's giving smallpox-infested blankets to the Indians he'd been fighting as an ostensible gift of friendship?

Is the meaning of what happened at Hiroshima any different from that of the last line of Dylan Thomas's poem, "A Refusal To Mourn The Death, By Fire, Of A Child In London"? :

"After the first death, there is no other."

It's a complicated question, really. Compared to firebombing Tokyo... how did it affect America's soul?

Well... it certainly did.

More than that, though, I consider the effects of what came after... The nuclear Sword of Damocles that we felt to have over our heads throughout the Cold War... I wonder sometimes if the apocalyptic bent religion seems to have taken on isn't a legacy of so many of us actually having lived and grown up in full expectation that the 'end of the world' might come at any time...

How did *that* affect our soul?

Our psychology?