For the WWII buffs

[Nonfiction]

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Terrorizing/killing a country's populace is by far the most efficient way to win a full scale modern war.

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On what do you base this on? My understanding is that the bombing of civilians instead of military targets during the Battle of Britain and in the bombing campaign of Germany in WWII allowed the respective sides getting bombed to maintain and actually increase military production. It also galvanized the civilians getting bombed to perservere.

Similar kinds of reports in the US bombing of North Vietnam in the Vietnam war.

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I refer more to the Cold War than ww2, although you can see similar arguments in Japan in ww2. But nuclear weapons are by far the best terror device for intimidating or slaughtering a populace. Destroying an enemy country's entire population with nuclear weapons is much more efficient (and cheaper!) than attempting to subdue/conquer/occupy the country.

[tame_deuces]

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Today in modern war loss of civilian lives is usually seen as a political loss and tactical accident, in those days they were legitimate targets.


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I fail to see where you are getting this opinion from.

Nuclear weapons were used to effectively hold the civilian populace of both sides hostage during the Cold war. If you are referring to "modern wars" as afghanistan/iraq, then civilian targets are the best targets for any guerrilla fighters.

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1.) I said usually.
2.) I was obviously not referring to all wars being fought or all who fight them. If you read it that way, then sorry I'll define my terms stricter the next time.
3.) There is actually international law on how wars should be fought, that's mostly where I got my opinion - noting how these conventions have changed.

[Nonfiction]

[ QUOTE ]
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Today in modern war loss of civilian lives is usually seen as a political loss and tactical accident, in those days they were legitimate targets.


[/ QUOTE ]
I fail to see where you are getting this opinion from.

Nuclear weapons were used to effectively hold the civilian populace of both sides hostage during the Cold war. If you are referring to "modern wars" as afghanistan/iraq, then civilian targets are the best targets for any guerrilla fighters.

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1.) I said usually.
2.) I was obviously not referring to all wars being fought or all who fight them. If you read it that way, then sorry I'll define my terms stricter the next time.
3.) There is actually international law on how wars should be fought, that's mostly where I got my opinion.

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The international law was written by powerful industrialized nations who would not be fighting in a guerrilla warfare style, and quite often would be fighting against it, so obviously they want to restrict the only way they can lose from being "legal." On top of that, the US obviously does not follow international law with regards to prisoners of war, why should they expect other nations/groups to follow it with regards to killing civilians?

[tame_deuces]

Well, I have no interest in debating your views of the geneva conventions somehow being imperialistic tools - you can start a new thread on that if you wish.

The topic of thread is the bombing of hiroshima/nagasaki, so let's stick with it - I've been accused of hijacking one thread too many.

[adios]

[ QUOTE ]
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[ QUOTE ]
Terrorizing/killing a country's populace is by far the most efficient way to win a full scale modern war.

[/ QUOTE ]

On what do you base this on? My understanding is that the bombing of civilians instead of military targets during the Battle of Britain and in the bombing campaign of Germany in WWII allowed the respective sides getting bombed to maintain and actually increase military production. It also galvanized the civilians getting bombed to perservere.

Similar kinds of reports in the US bombing of North Vietnam in the Vietnam war.

[/ QUOTE ]
I refer more to the Cold War than ww2, although you can see similar arguments in Japan in ww2. But nuclear weapons are by far the best terror device for intimidating or slaughtering a populace. Destroying an enemy country's entire population with nuclear weapons is much more efficient (and cheaper!) than attempting to subdue/conquer/occupy the country.

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Yeah I understand that point of view and had actually forgotten what it was like living in the cold war days. Along these lines, it brings back memories of hypothetical scenarios about surviving a first strike and such. Thanks for taking the time to explain.

[andyfox]

OP asked for "the reason." Things are usually not black and white in the sense that there is a single reason that motivated all the pariticipants to the same degree. On the American side, Byrnes might have had one set of motivations, Truman another. Similarly on the Japanese side, it might not be possible to say for sure what exactly the "government" would have done had the bombs not been used, had the Russian's not entered the war, etc.

[tame_deuces]

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OP asked for "the reason." Things are usually not black and white in the sense that there is a single reason that motivated all the pariticipants to the same degree. On the American side, Byrnes might have had one set of motivations, Truman another. Similarly on the Japanese side, it might not be possible to say for sure what exactly the "government" would have done had the bombs not been used, had the Russian's not entered the war, etc.

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Agreed, and having this view is the only 'healthy' way to look at history. Looking for some simplified answer isn't useful.

[Nonfiction]

The interesting thing that I always appreciated was the huge bluff that Truman and the American high command was running. After dropping the 2 bombs, America said in effect "lol we can destroy a city every week forever." However, the US had only 1 more bomb left in its arsenal, with production taking several months for the next one. This was part of the reason why the US didn't heed scientists advice and demonstrate the power of the atomic bomb on a deserted island with Japanese/international observers. If that test failed, not only would it be a major public relations disaster, wit hthe US looking very foolish, only 2 bombs would remain for actual use against the Japanese

Also, in my opinion (stated in my essay posted above), the primary reason for dropping the bomb was saving American lives. Intimidating the Russians was simply an added bonus. Obviously there were other reasons that went into it, such as public hatred and the desire for revenge on the Japanese as well as the loads of money spent on the project needing to be spent for a reason.

[tolbiny]

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3.) There is actually international law on how wars should be fought, that's mostly where I got my opinion - noting how these conventions have changed.

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To be fair there are a lot of technological issues that forced these changes as well. Prior to WW1 there wasn't a need to address bombing of cities with civilians as the capability wasn't there in such force. Even with the monstrous artillery like the Paris gun the weapons still had to be relatively close, couldn't be moved to different targets as quickly and couldn't be deployed from distance en masse. The idea that an entire city could be destroyed in a day, let alone an entire city well behind enemy lines, was totally new and the ramifications of that cannot be understated. I don't think its fair to attribute those changes fully to a change in how people viewed war without considering that war actually had to change dramatically first before those views were even to be considered.

[bobman0330]

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3.) There is actually international law on how wars should be fought, that's mostly where I got my opinion - noting how these conventions have changed.

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To be fair there are a lot of technological issues that forced these changes as well. Prior to WW1 there wasn't a need to address bombing of cities with civilians as the capability wasn't there in such force. Even with the monstrous artillery like the Paris gun the weapons still had to be relatively close, couldn't be moved to different targets as quickly and couldn't be deployed from distance en masse. The idea that an entire city could be destroyed in a day, let alone an entire city well behind enemy lines, was totally new and the ramifications of that cannot be understated. I don't think its fair to attribute those changes fully to a change in how people viewed war without considering that war actually had to change dramatically first before those views were even to be considered.

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The other key factor is that pre-airplanes, if you were in a position to kill a bunch of civilians in a city, you were probably in a position to also just occupy that city. The only purpose of killing would be to terrorize or to punish. With airplanes, there were lots of cities that you could only take out of the war by destroying.