From: "Johannes Madel"
Date: 11/9/2003 12:21 PM Central Standard Time
Message-id:

ok, you are right, i forgot WW1 :-)

but the usage of gas in WW1 does not excuse the usage of the 2 A-Bombs.

Jo

OK, let's see why the atomic bombs were used: to keep the Soviets out of Japan,
to keep the war from dragging on, to minimize casualties and because the world
was just plain tired of war.

Had the invasions of the home islands gone on on as scheduled the war would
have lasted the better part of another half year. I used the plural of invasion
because there were to be a series of them starting in November 1945. Most
people take into account the casualties incurred during the actual invasions
but not the casualties incurred by an ongoing war. The war was simply not going
to be put on hold while awaiting the invasions. How many more human beings
would have died had the bombs not been used not counting those killed during
the invasions? I bet the number would far excede the number killed by the atom
bombs.

Granted the U.S. and U.K. were aware the Japanese were sending out peace
feelers to the Soviets in attempt to surrender, but let's see what would have
happened if the Soviets were to agree to intercede in exchange for territories
they lost to the Japanese in an earlier war. Let's assume the various stages of
negotions and implementation added up to 3 months how many people would have
died if fighting continued let alone the slaughter of Allied POWs? OK, let's
assume hostilities would have been suspended once it became clear the
negotations were sincere. If this happened the slaughter of POWs would have
begun immediately and been unhindered by fighting. In either case there would
also have been an elimination of civilian prisoners and slave labourers as
well.

Would the Japanese not have expanded their use of biological warfare already
going on in China? To this day there are periodic outbreaks of plague tracible
to the use of that "weapon of mass destrution" by the Japanese during WW2.

Dan, U.S. Air Force, retired