Subject:
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Re: Vote against/for...
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 12 Nov 2002 13:50:12 GMT
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Viewed:
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976 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Fredrik Glöckner writes:
> "Pedro Silva" <el_gordo@netc.pt> writes:
>
> > Actually, the bomb was dropped to scare the Japanese, thus ending
> > the war. I don't see that as terrorism, though - terrorism implies
> > a much more prolonged chain of events than a couple weeks in August
> > '45.
>
>
> The two atomic bomb raids were not the only US bomb raids on Japan
> during the second world war.
I know that. I was referring to the use of the two bombs as part of a larger
conflict - they were not a terrorist act themselves, IMHO.
> US low level incendiary bomb raids
> started much earlier. The aim of the night time bomb raids were the
> civillian population, which largely lived in houses composed out of
> wood and paper. Some estimates indicate that these fire bomb raids
> killed as many civillians as the two atomic bombs combined, but over a
> much longer time span. The bomb raids were designed to lower enemy
> morale and productivity.
>
> Some quotes:
>
> "Estimates of economic damage ecpected indicate that incendiary
> attack on Japanese cities may be at least five times as effective,
> ton for ton, as precision bombing [...] However, the dry economic
> statistics, impressive as they may be, still do not take account
> of the further and unpredictable effect on the Japanese war effort
> of a national catastrophe of such magnitude- entirely
> unprecedented in history." -- Office of Scientific Research and
> Development recommendation, Fall '44
>
> "There are no innocent civilians. It is their government and you
> are fighting a people, you are not trying to fight an armed force
> anymore. So it doesn't bother me so much to be killing innocent
> bystanders." -- General Lemay
>
> "The entire population of Japan is a proper military target [...]
> There are no civilians in Japan." -- 5th Air Force Weekly
> Intelligence Review, July '45
>
> (Quotes from Michael Sherry, "The rise of American Airpower", Yale
> University Press, New Haven, Conn., 1987.)
>
>
> I think that this is closer to terrorism.
It is not terrorism, but it is close. The name for it is "total war", a
concept that was born in the thirties. Prior to that, most victims of a
conflict were soldiers on the front line or civilians struck by
famine/illness derived from it.
It was during the Spanish Civil War that the concept was tested, with
astonishing results - that is what Guernica (1) is all about.
Pedro
(1) - Guernica, or Guernika, is a city in the basque country which was
targeted by the first civilian-aimed air-raid, back in 1937. Picasso painted
a famous picture about it.
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Vote against/for...
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| (...) The two atomic bomb raids were not the only US bomb raids on Japan during the second world war. US low level incendiary bomb raids started much earlier. The aim of the night time bomb raids were the civillian population, which largely lived in (...) (22 years ago, 12-Nov-02, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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