It's not racism for you but "ruining whole neighborhoods" rolls off your tongue with ease. I'm with you though Jim, let's take immigration laws off the books.

__________________
"I am to eliminate all free radicals."
- James Bond

GMTA. The excerpt that you posted is the same one from the link that I posted above.
'Adapted From: Transcript of "OPERATION DOWNFALL [US invasion of Japan]: US PLANS AND JAPANESE
COUNTER-MEASURES" by D. M. Giangreco, US Army Command and General Staff College, 16 February 1998.
Being badly typed, this has been amended and "anglicised" by myself on 4 Oct 02."

__________________
"The problem with Socialism is that sooner or later you run out of other people's money."
- Margaret Thatcher

"We had the machine scared and scrambling, and for them it is just the beginning of an election year filled with surprises. They will be challenged again and again across this country. When there's trouble in Massachusetts, there's trouble everywhere -- and now they know it." Senator Scott Brown (R MA)

Japan rejected the offer to surrender at Potsdam and was still sending troops to reinforce the coast after the A-Bomb at Hiroshima. Japan didn't act as Westerners would under the threat of invasion. They lived by the Code of Bushido. Dying for the Emperor was an honor. Even very young school children were being trained in how to kill the invaders.
Taking events out of historical context might strengthen the anti-bomb revisionists position, but it doesn't square with reality back in 1945.

The Allies wanted unconditional surrender of Japan which would ave meant the removal and denouncement of Hirohito as a "Divine". The Japanese would rather give their lives than to have Hirohito de-deified. I don't think that the West was cognizant on this aspect of Japanese culture....at first. Eventually, we did accept a conditional surrender.

Surely, you're not serious? Do you know how long that would have taken to be effective? Do you know what kind of sea power that would have taken long-term?

No, we didn't dehumanize Jerry the Kraut.

__________________
"The problem with Socialism is that sooner or later you run out of other people's money."
- Margaret Thatcher

"We had the machine scared and scrambling, and for them it is just the beginning of an election year filled with surprises. They will be challenged again and again across this country. When there's trouble in Massachusetts, there's trouble everywhere -- and now they know it." Senator Scott Brown (R MA)

Oh that makes it ok then. If someone only offers to surrender conditionally, it is moral, just and righteous to butcher their civilians with nuclear weapons until they admit total defeat.

Did you read this in a comic book? Japanese in world war 2 didn't live by the 'code of bushido', they didn't fight with samurai swords or with bows on horseback either. Yes, there were emotional appeals to certain cultural elements, propaganda so Japanese soldiers might feel nationalistic pride in their martial occupation, but to say they lived by the 'code of the bushido' is like saying American soldiers lived by the code of the 'wild west quickdraw'.

__________________
He or she who supports a State organized in a military way – whether directly or indirectly – participates in sin. Each man takes part in the sin by contributing to the maintenance of the State by paying taxes.

~ Gandhi

re: Racism
While undoubtedly present, from everything I've seen and read of WWII, the hatred of the enemy threatening your homeland was the overwhelming motivation for all soldiers. From bolshevik to hun, from yank to jap, all were apparently primarily the enemy.

I'd say that if Germany had not been defeated by the time the nukes were ready, the nuke production lines would simply have been split in two: even serials to Japan, odd serials to Germany.

Note that Germany was subject to devastating bombing campaigns which inflicted damage quite exceeding nuclear weapon use. The allies were not willing to show mercy any more to anyone.

The sorriest point of the war. How far hatred had gone.

re:bushido etc.
Japan was in a nationalistic restoration before the war (Meiji period being aimed at a strong Japan that is no longer subject to the whims of foreigners). There was quite a lot of fanaticism going on, see Saburo Sakai's last flight, after the surrender. While not every citizen was carrying a katana and just waiting for the gajin to come close enough, the will to resist was strong in the military higher ranks, and the Japanese are noted as oboedient to authority. I find it very likely that they would have fought tooth and nail to the end.

The nukes were a symbolic weapon most of all. A weapon that nothing could defend against. They were enough to break the will of the opponents.

No more than "Tommy the limey". "Kraut" is equivalent to "Limey". In fact their origins are similarly rooted in naval history. "Kraut" or "Limey" is hardly "monkey" or "rat".

__________________
"I am to eliminate all free radicals."
- James Bond

Your ignorance of history is showing, so let me edumakate you.

And below is an excerpt from an article discussing why the Allies used the phrase "I cease resistance" in order to overcome the Code of Bushido.
For a comic book belief, the Allied forces sure went through a lot of effort to circumvent it.

__________________
"The problem with Socialism is that sooner or later you run out of other people's money."
- Margaret Thatcher

"We had the machine scared and scrambling, and for them it is just the beginning of an election year filled with surprises. They will be challenged again and again across this country. When there's trouble in Massachusetts, there's trouble everywhere -- and now they know it." Senator Scott Brown (R MA)

Maybe what historians address as questionable necessity of invasion is separate from whether an invasion would have happened anyway.

So you see little difference in what had been done at Hiroshima and what had been done at Dresden, yet Hiroshima was racially motivated because they are the brown ones? Not quite sure I follow your logic there chief.

__________________
"Guns don't kill people, people kill people, and monkeys do too (if they have a gun)". -Eddie Izzard

Long is the way
And hard, that out of Hell leads up to Light. -Milton

The motivation was to win the war. I honestly believe it was morally acceptable because of the racial factor. I think you make a good point though so I will research to see how parallel the two events may or may not be.

__________________
"I am to eliminate all free radicals."
- James Bond

I agree that we dehumanized the Germans in order to bomb Dresden. But we didn't lock up German-Americans the way we locked up Japanese-Americans. Nor is Dresden even a close comparison to two atomic bombs.

There is no doubt in my mind that racism played a role in the decision though it does not appear to be a major reason. That racism helps us rationalize an inherently immoral, if still necessary, decision.

In the end, there is no glory in war. No purely righteous winners.

Hopefully, we've learned enough from World War II and the wars since to avoid a World War III.

Germany was the enemy. Why would we have to dehumanize the enemy to attack them?

Over 11,000 of them. Read your history.

Why? What is the real difference between firebombing a city and dropping the A bomb on a city? If you think that Dresden was an isolated incident, you are mistaken. Dresden is but one of many examples of firebombing during the war. There were probably about double the casualty figures from the firebombing of Hamburg, yet if I mention Hamburg nobody seems to know anything about it. Nor would they recognize the names Mainz, Stuttgart, Darmstadt, Pforzheim, Kassel, among many others. The only significant difference is the method employed. The results, death and destruction, were the same. Had germany still been a formidable enemy at the time the bomb was ready, we probably would have dropped one on them.

__________________
"Guns don't kill people, people kill people, and monkeys do too (if they have a gun)". -Eddie Izzard

Long is the way
And hard, that out of Hell leads up to Light. -Milton

What do you think turning someone into "the enemy" is?

Where, please? My understanding is that we did not forcibly remove or inter any German-Americans, yet we forcibly removed and intered 78,000 American citizens of Japanese heritage.

You've got to be kidding me. Take cancer legacy, just for starters.

Strawman.

Perhaps if you provided them citations for your claims, you might be more convincing. For while I think you would be hard-pressed to produce anything reputable to back your statement on anything comparable with German-Americans (to the forced removal and internment of Japanese-Americans), I imagine there is plenty of web stuff on the 50,000 dead and over a million homeless as a result of Operation Gommorah.

Who knows? AFAICS, racism still played a role in our decision to drop 2 A-bombs on Japan, and plays a role in our ability to rationalize the decision, however "necessary" or not it was.

Isn't "necessary" an odd way to talk about any of these horrific things?

I doubt that racism played any part in the decision to drop the A-bomb.

The need to shorten the war as quicly as possible and not to waste any more allied lives unecessarily were the bases