Is it not just the misinterpretation of the fact that the US wanted to end the war quicker to prevent sending more soldiers into a meatgrinder?
You can certainly call that “necessary” to prevent further deaths of US soldiers.
Comment on Can you think of any now?
skisnow@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago“The atomic bombings were necessary” was something we were expected to internalize as an indisputable hard fact, like gravity and oxbow lakes.
kameecoding@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
skisnow@lemmy.ca 3 weeks ago
The narrative of the Pacific theater still being an intractable or unbeatable long-term conflict in 1945 was hugely overstated, and also leant heavily on racist notions of the Japanese being “brainwashed”.
Also, most wars could be ended more quickly by committing war crimes, we don’t allow it as a justification when it’s done by the losing side.
logicbomb@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
The “brainwashed” thing is somewhat true, at least from the perspective of an outsider, not due to a racial thing, but there is a cultural aspect in addition to the tendency for all sides to be brainwashed by their own propaganda.
But the Japanese propaganda told their soldiers to fight to the death, because if the Americans captured you, it would be worse than death. So, from the outside, they did appear to be brainwashed in that regard. Of course, Americans had similar propaganda making Japanese seem as evil as possible, often in the most racist way.
Also, culturally, I think American culture emphasizes each person more, while Japanese emphasizes community more, which means things like kamikaze are easier to sell. And that sort of thing also appears like brainwashing to the outside.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
I mean, kamikaze fighters did exist, so there had to be a certain level of what you’re calling “brainwashing”.
And unless it’s also a myth (completely possible), but weren’t there Japanese soldiers found on an island years after the war had ended who were convinced that it was still going on?
JcbAzPx@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
I’m pretty sure the largest consideration was keeping the Soviets from claiming land in Asia the same way they did in Europe.
Also, we had this shiny new toy and a war was on; we weren’t going to not use it.
Celestial6370@programming.dev 3 weeks ago
I’d be curious if you listened to this what you would think. It does a really good job of laying out the timeline of decisions. I don’t think the atomic bombs were nessecary to draw the war to a close.
prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 weeks ago
I think there might be an argument for the first bomb, but the second was completely unnecessary.
nuggie_ss@lemmings.world 3 weeks ago
Not true.
Even after the second bomb, Japan almost faced a military coup in order to keep the war going. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyūjō_incident
They were not going to surrender without a massive show of force because of their culture.
Alcoholicorn@mander.xyz 3 weeks ago
They had literally agreed to surrender before the first bomb dropped, their only condition being that the emperor remain, which the US agreed to anyway.
DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 3 weeks ago
Whereas the actual phrase should be “the atomic bombings were necessary to force an immediate total surrender and scare them damn commies before they could take any credit for the Pacific theatre”