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I think I can sum up Frazzled' s position in one word:

'MURICA!

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:
I think I can sum up Frazzled' s position in one word:

'MURICA!

Texas! wait its not about Texas so
'Murica! wait its not about the US? then
Bacon! what we ate the bacon? then
Bourbon! (or rum depending on what week)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Different times dude. Civilians have only recently been seen as off limits in wartime because, rightly so, they are indeed part of any war effort. They have always been fair game since the dawn of warfare.

Actually in most parts of the world, they still are.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 kronk wrote:
I hope his daughter doesn't invade Pearl Harbor!

My mother in law didn't invade Pearl Harbour, she had only just been born when it happened.

I think he was referring to my daughter, thus incurring my demand for whippy stick justice. JUSTICE!!!

 Frazzled wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 kronk wrote:
I hope his daughter doesn't invade Pearl Harbor!

My mother in law didn't invade Pearl Harbour, she had only just been born when it happened.

I think he was referring to my daughter, thus incurring my demand for whippy stick justice. JUSTICE!!!

Yes, I was referring to Frazz's kiddo.

 kronk wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 kronk wrote:
I hope his daughter doesn't invade Pearl Harbor!

My mother in law didn't invade Pearl Harbour, she had only just been born when it happened.

I think he was referring to my daughter, thus incurring my demand for whippy stick justice. JUSTICE!!!

Yes, I was referring to Frazz's kiddo.

She got her license Tuesday. My little girl who's danced sitting in a shoe box is endangering lives as we speak. Its so dry here. I have some dust in my eye.

 Frazzled wrote:
Bourbon! (or rum depending on what week)

Bourbon? You horrible person! I do enjoy the occasional Jack Daniels with ice, but that's mostly because it tastes so awful that I have to slow down drinking and remain mostly sober... Whisky (or whiskey) for me is either Scotch or Irish.

Hmm, well, some Japanese distilleries actually make pretty good stuff too. And to be fair they wouldn't be doing it if they hadn't been properly occupied and de-Samuriefied (is that a word) at the end of WW2.

But to stay on topic, history isn't carved in stone except when it is - and in those cases it's most often because none of the conquered people remain to object. The Roman Peace was usually accomplished by killing everyone carrying a weapon and enslaving anyone who wasn't. No one left in the area to threaten the peace, mission accomplished. The Japanese had to see the Emperor admit he's not a god, and then had to change some things pretty fast. Providing industrial output to the Korean war gave them a focus and they soon became an industrial power instead of a military power, which has served them well.

 Ketara wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


If you can't win the argument, make it personal. I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

And on that note I am out. Making it personal was

Making it personal? I'm wishing your family the absolute best I can, namely that if anyone is ever in a position to harm them without retribution, they choose not to do so. If you take offensive at that, there's not much I can say.

You made it personal. You can't deny it . We all read the post. Nothing left to do but move on and continue the pointless argument.

 Frazzled wrote:
I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

Oh so thats OK then?

"Our enemy are monsters and they would have done it".

 Ketara wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
[

Meanwhile Chinese and Koreans would continue to be dying, and Allied POW's would continue to be dying. There's no logical reason for the allies to wait for anything. Time was Life.

Perhaps I'm not making this clear.

Event A (the dropping of the nuclear bomb) resulted in X number of definitive casualties. It is possible, that by waiting slightly longer and not initiating Event A, the number of casualties that would have resulted would have been less than that definitive number of casualties. It is also possible it would have been equivalent or greater. But weighing up the evidence, I am inclined to believe it would have been lesser.

maybe instead of if maybe and should having the states for dropping nukes that may or may not have ended the war

you should be should have maybe what ifing how many people would be alive if japan hadnt decided to go all killy on everyone in the area.

the facts are plain, the bombs were dropped and right away japan surrendered, maybe it was because they changed their minds because pokemon told them too, but its far more likely it was due to them being nuked. you dont get to put double blind scientific lab test levels of things on real life occurrences especially past ones.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

Oh so thats OK then?

"Our enemy are monsters and they would have done it".

I know this offends many left sensibilities... but war is literally kill or be killed... yes japan would have done it, if they are willing to *start the war* and kamikaze their own people, you can bet they were willing to nuke American cities had the roles been reversed.

the USA would also have quickly surrendered once it knew it had zero chance of survival if it didnt.

You should feel extraordinarily lucky that a state like the USA was the first to come up with the bomb.

that I and frazzled think it was the right choice, does not mean we endorse baby killing... every single japanese person who died is just more blood on the hands of the people who *started the war* if you want to lay blame.

 dusara217 wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:


If you can't win the argument, make it personal. I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

And on that note I am out. Making it personal was

Making it personal? I'm wishing your family the absolute best I can, namely that if anyone is ever in a position to harm them without retribution, they choose not to do so. If you take offensive at that, there's not much I can say.

You made it personal. You can't deny it . We all read the post. Nothing left to do but move on and continue the pointless argument.

So Frazzled is OK with the vaporization and horrific mutilation of hundreds of thousands of Japanese people (many of them daughters), but the moment someone brings up his own daughter and expresses a wish that should the situation ever be reversed that his enemy would have mercy...suddenly THAT is inappropriate?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 easysauce wrote:


I know this offends many left sensibilities... but war is literally kill or be killed... yes japan would have done it, if they are willing to *start the war* and kamikaze their own people, you can bet they were willing to nuke American cities had the roles been reversed.

the USA would also have quickly surrendered once it knew it had zero chance of survival if it didnt.

You should feel extraordinarily lucky that a state like the USA was the first to come up with the bomb.

Try applying that logic to ISIS.

Still think its OK to be every bit as evil and brutal as your enemy?

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

Oh so thats OK then?

"Our enemy are monsters and they would have done it".

You're saying it like its a bad thing.

So Frazzled is OK with the vaporization and horrific mutilation of hundreds of thousands of Japanese people (many of them daughters), but the moment someone brings up his own daughter and expresses a wish that should the situation ever be reversed that his enemy would have mercy...suddenly THAT is inappropriate?

I said that was the calculus of the Allies and the absolute right way for them to view it from their perspective.

Try applying that logic to ISIS.

Still think its OK to be every bit as evil and brutal as your enemy?

Since we keep playing the personal attack game I will answer. I would do far worse far more quickly.
They are using good old fashioned terror tactics. Highly effective. Highly logical.
Historically the best way to stop that is wipe out the opposite utterly. Not defeat them but wipe them out.

Thats what the Sunnis are afraid the Shiites are winding up to do. Because they are.

 Frazzled wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

Oh so thats OK then?

"Our enemy are monsters and they would have done it".

You're saying it like its a bad thing.

You're saying that being a sick sadistic fether is a good thing?

All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
I'm confident that had the situation been reversed, the bombs would have dropped on the US and this conversation would never have come up.

Oh so thats OK then?

"Our enemy are monsters and they would have done it".

You're saying it like its a bad thing.

You're saying that being a sick sadistic fether is a good thing?

I'm saying its just like playing patty cake. Winning isn't the most important thing, its the only thing.
If I win I am the good guy because you are dead and I say what happened. If I lose then you are the good guy because I am dead and you say what happened.

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

All that does is create an ever escalating cycle of violence.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

All that does is create an ever escalating cycle of violence.

If that was true Japan and Germany would be warmongers today.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

All that does is create an ever escalating cycle of violence.

Until you are dead or in terror of course, which is the whole ing point.

I am trying to figure out why you're trying to play thies high horse game, tht are supporting an action that would have led to hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of dead.
To use an Obama ism: Let me be clear, the Allies did not start the war. They responded to vicious attacks by an Empire, The Empire picked the wrong people to with and the descendants of that are remembering the losses they took. Understandable.

But lets not forget how we got there, and what the alternatives were.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

All that does is create an ever escalating cycle of violence.

Then don't partake a surprise attack on US soil.

Full unconditional surrender was the only option.

To be fair, while the Allies did not want the war, they basically put Japan into a situation where (given the Japanese government of the time) they were going to have to go to war with somebody (and one could argue that warfare had already begun by economic means), and the western allies were the logical target in many respects, and had a not-unrealistic chance of making something work.

EDIT: the "unconditional surrender" demand was also somewhat controversial even at the time, at least behind closed doors, for multiple reasons (not the least of which was that it certainly stiffened the spine of opposing leadership), and there's a reason most wars don't end that way.

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

 Vaktathi wrote:
To be fair, while the Allies did not want the war, they basically put Japan into a situation where (given the Japanese government of the time) they were going to have to go to war with somebody (and one could argue that warfare had already begun by economic means), and the western allies were the logical target in many respects, and had a not-unrealistic chance of making something work.

Thats blindingly incorrect and reveals serious misjudgement.

They put an embargo on Japan because of its depredations in China and their move to take over French Indochina and do the same there.
Japan could have, you know, quit raping and murdering people by the thousands. I know it would have been a burden.

They could have acquired oil from the Axis friendly powers. Was the USSR part of the embargo? If not, they had oil out the yin yang.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

What about it? (EDIT: HAH BEAT YOU GT!!! IN YOUR FACE BOHEMIA) It has nothing to do with
WWII
Japan
Japan's activities with kidnapping comfort women.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

What about it?

 Grey Templar wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

What about it?

Everything

 Grey Templar wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

What about it?

Was that fair? Was that okay just because it was in a war?

It was a terrible thing. That's war for you.

You're no better than the Japanese, if you think its acceptable to match their atrocities, never mind exceed them.

You don't defeat evil by becoming it.


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 Grey Templar wrote:
It was a terrible thing. That's war for you.

Then why the feth are you guys complaining about japan's atrocities, like Pearl Harbour and Nanking? After all, thats war for you.

I am trying to figure out why you're trying to play thies high horse game, tht are supporting an action that would have led to hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of dead.

No games here, I'm just trying to be consistent when condemning what I consider to be evil acts. Unlike you, who seems to think two wrongs make a right.

Nanking was wrong.
Pearl Harbour was wrong.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were wrong.
The Holocaust was wrong.
The Holodomor was wrong.
May Lai was wrong.

Feth America. Feth Japan. Feth ANYBODY that commits atrocities, like Nanking, Holocaust, Pearl Harbour, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Holodomor.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

What about it?

Was that fair? Was that okay just because it was in a war?

No. It did not further the war effort. T further the war effort it would have had to have been all the villages in North Vietnam, and none left alive.
Now before you try to compare, lets really compare. In Japan during Nanking they made up trading cards and did running tallies in the newspapers on the number of kills certain soldiers made that day. Eventually the US investigated My Lai, and put the offenders in prison after admitting what happened.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Frazzled wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
All is fair in love and war. Pulling punches makes no sense unless the other guy is also doing it.

What about My Lai?

What about it?

Was that fair? Was that okay just because it was in a war?

No. It did not further the war effort. T further the war effort it would have had to have been all the villages in North Vietnam, and none left alive.
Now before you try to compare, lets really compare. In Japan during Nanking they made up trading cards and did running tallies in the newspapers on the number of kills certain soldiers made that day. Eventually the US investigated My Lai, and put the offenders in prison after admitting what happened.

You don't defeat evil by becoming it.

We didn't. To follow your example. After we conquered Japan would have had to rape and kill (not necessarily in that order) EVERYONE in the capital, and waste about 10% of the population.

The worse thing we did was introduce the horrifically bad for you American diet, and the horror that is baseball.

 Shadow Captain Edithae wrote:

You don't defeat evil by becoming it.

I seriously want to post a Bane meme here...


Fact is, you may not defeat evil by "becoming" it, but you sure as gak DO defeat it by being harder than, and more willing to go where evil doesn't want to go.

I wasnt aware we were trying to defeat evil and be the good guys.

They attacked us and we fethed them up.

also doing it in a aggressive and powerful looking pose to intimidate Russia to stay the feth away.

I don't think people are considering money here.

The amount of money put into the was pretty big. They had set up factories and so on to get this bomb a reality. Germany was no longer a viable target since the war had ended there and they needed to test this bomb in reality to justify continuing the use of the weapon. Also think about the money that could be made by further development of the weapon. I think it was something like 2 billion at the end of the project was spent?

If they had invaded (which I reckon would not have been that bad had it happened) they would then they would have the cost of mobilizing armies and landing armies supplying them and so on all of which would add more cost for little gain.

It makes sense they used the bomb and it was undoubtedly faster. However it is very unlikely the bomb could be justified from a loss of life stand point. I mean more Japanese died from those 2 bombs than the USA lost from the pacific theater (111,000 losses in pacific, most of them non combat related too). That is just from the 2 Nuclear Bombs. The thinking that japan could kill half a million men with what was left of its people with seems pretty far fetched. There is no way Japan in 1945 could equal the Americans killed in the war (when the war started Japan was at it's most well equipped as it could not keep it's men supplied even then properly).

Lowest estimate of DEATH from the bombs = 129,000
Americans KILLED from the pacific theater = 111,606 (a lot of these disease or accidents etc)

I am very certain Japan using spears and whatever rifles they had left (most of them terrible quality) could not match the killing potential of Japan at it's height in the second world war.

 Frazzled wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:
To be fair, while the Allies did not want the war, they basically put Japan into a situation where (given the Japanese government of the time) they were going to have to go to war with somebody (and one could argue that warfare had already begun by economic means), and the western allies were the logical target in many respects, and had a not-unrealistic chance of making something work.

Thats blindingly incorrect and reveals serious misjudgement.

Only if you're not fully accounting for the qualifier "with the government at the time" and the existing geopolitical realities of the time.

They put an embargo on Japan because of its depredations in China and their move to take over French Indochina and do the same there.
Japan could have, you know, quit raping and murdering people by the thousands. I know it would have been a burden.

In theory sure. Would it ever happen with the ultranationalist government that was in totalitarian control of Japan at the time? No. Would such a government even be capable of backing down? Not really, particularly when the Army largely did whatever the hell it wanted and started the war in China in large part by its own initiative. Have such sanctions ever stopped a conflict in progress before? No.

To put it another way, if some big strong dude comes across a smaller drunk dude beating up on his crippled neighbor and tells him he won't sell him any more Pabst for being an donkey-cave, would you just expect the drunk dude to stop, just because?

Furthermore, if the bigger dude is mostly distracted by a bigger fight on the other side of the room and still recovering from a wicked hangover and just waking up (the US was still recovering from the Depression and was not fully mobilized for war) and is blocking the drunk dude's path to the liquor cabinet, what other result would you expect than for the smaller drunk dude to take a swing in the hopes of a quick knockout?

if one inserts themselves into a fight, they shouldn't be surprised when they get hit, particularly if they're not geared up for a fight yet.

I'm not trying to justify anything Japan did, only explain what happened and why it wasn't a clear cut case of "they should have just stopped what they were doing " and "well they just attacked out of nowhere for no reason". Those sanctions, to the minds of the Japanese leadership, were a direct provocation and an interference in Japan's sovereign destiny, basically short of a declaration of war in name only. Are there serious issues with why that's messed up? Absolutely, but it is what it is. Lots of people thought that a war was going to break out much as it did. The US made itself a target and made the mistake of giving Japan a realistic opening. Had the US naval oil reserves (larger than Japan's entire national reserve) at Pearl Harbor been attacked and destroyed by the aborted 3rd wave attack on Pearl Harbor and the US carriers been in port to be attacked, it's possible the Japanese could have achieved the goals they were aiming for simply because the US would not have been able to mount any sort of response, Midway could not have happened, etc.

They could have acquired oil from the Axis friendly powers.

Neither of which had oil of their own short of extremely limited artificial production, primarily dependent on Romania for the major supply of oil, and what they could pull out of occupied USSR territory in 1941. It's not like the other Axis powers had oil to spare, and certainly no way to deliver it to Japan on the other side of the planet in any meaningful quantities, particularly past the British Navy.

Was the USSR part of the embargo? If not, they had oil out the yin yang.

The USSR certainly wasn't going to sell oil to Japan. First and foremost, they needed everything they had, with the most destructive conflict in human history taking place on their soil at the time. Second, and almost as important, the USSR had been Japan's chief military nemesis for the previous 40 years, most of Japan's strategic planning had been around another war with the Russians following the Russo-Japanese war in 1905. These two were serious rivals, and the USSR was very much afraid of a Japanese invasion from the east until just a couple of weeks before Pearl Harbor (and is why the USSR only began to move forces out of Siberia after nearly 6 months of war with Germany, just barely in time to defend Moscow).

Note that I'm not trying to argue that Japan was some innocent victim or that the Japanese Empire did deserve much of what happened to it, but rather that the western allies did a lot to make that situation possible and in large part put themselves into the line of fire.

Wow that's way longer than I intended it to be

TL;DR Japan wasn't going to get oil from people who had none to give and/or weren't on great terms with Japan anyway, Japan's mindset was not one that would see sanctions as anything but a threat and provocation, and the US in large part invited attack by inserting herself into a conflict when she was not yet ready for one.