Hiroshima and nuclear weapons (Didn't End War) By Ward Wilson

OpEdNews

Original Content at http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_ward_wil_070806_hiroshima_and_nuclea.htm


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
August 6, 2007

Hiroshima and nuclear weapons

By Ward Wilson



....Japan's leaders seem to have been largely unaffected by this city bombing. Which shouldn't surprise us. Churchill didn't surrender when London was bombed or Coventry flattened. Germany withstood hundreds of thousands more casualties from city bombing. If bombing Hamburg, Dresden or Tokyo didn't coerce surrender, why should bombing Hiroshima?

Third, the Soviet intervention touched off a crisis; the bombing of Hiroshima did not. Diaries and official documents in the three days after Hiroshima treat the bombing as just one more, albeit serious, piece of bad news. But not a crisis. When the Soviets declare war, on the other hand, martial law is declared (that morning) and a military coup is discussed.

Fourth, most of the “evidence” that the bomb was decisive (post-war testimony from Japan's leaders) is suspect. These men had just led their nation into a catastrophic war. They had concealed how badly things were going. Should they admit serious errors of judgment? Confess their mistakes? Or point to the Bomb and say “Our enemies made a revolutionary leap forward in science (which no one could have predicted) and that's why we lost”?

And pride and prestige would make it hard (even today) for Americans to consider that the Bomb didn't win the war. If bombing Hiroshima ended the war, after all, we get the credit. It's a terrible deed, but our influence and power are enhanced. But if the Soviets “won” the war . . .


I RECOMMEND READING THE WHOLE ARTICLE--IT'S SHORT AND COGENT




Authors Website: www.rethinkingnuclearweapons.org

Authors Bio: I'm an independent scholar who has written about nuclear weapons issues for 25 years. I've been published in International Security, Dissent, and The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. I believe that nuclear weapons are not very useful and that that is the best argument for abolishing them.

And it may be right on....but a fear I would have over this article would be
that if the nuclear weapon loses its "ultimate weapon" mystique then it would
become just another weapon to use in a military arsenal & no big deal to use.

Japan was trying to surrender when they were nuked. Period. They were beaten. It was plain to see. The finale was just theatre. Move along, nothing to see here...

and all weapons is that they are totally immoral. I am not of Ernest Teller's frame of mind. Immoral means bad, wicked, things that should not be used.