dagblog - Comments for "Going to Hiroshima is the right call!"

Anyway, when did Roosevelt

Aaron Carine — Fri, 13 May 2016 19:17:21 +0000

Anyway, when did Roosevelt say "hands off or war"? I haven't yet come across an account that says FDR threatened Japan with war--although I admit I haven't done an exhaustive search.

Meyer's citation doesn't

Aaron Carine — Fri, 13 May 2016 19:13:57 +0000

In reply to Pearl Harbor wasn't attacked

Meyer's citation doesn't support his claim that MacArthur was authorized to attack the Japanese. Yeah, we "provoked" Japan by refusing to lift the embargo unless they ended the aggression against China. I guess in the old days South Africa could have attacked America or Europe and claim that they were provoked by sanctions.

Rising Sun by Toland is a

PeraclesPlease — Fri, 13 May 2016 11:30:17 +0000

In reply to I have only the usual layman

Rising Sun by Toland is a good read.

The point is we gave the Japanes conditions we knew would push them to war and we knew the timeframe. They were out of oil and we said hands off Indonesia or war. We gave MacArthurthe go-ahead to attack in Nov 28, so if the Japanese didnt do it first we would have. Of course we wouldnt put that on the NY Times front page, especially not ahead of time. And in the end it's better to act wronged than complicit in getting young men to sign up. "Day of infamy" indeed. (Hitler & Stalin didnt pre-announce splitting Poland in 2, and Hitler didnt warn of Operation Barbarossa either)

In any case, Japanese expansion in Asia had to be stopped. We did it. Re: the surrender, I still think it had more to do with the Russian entry into the war and hopping 2000km in 2 weeks plus being a few miles by sea from Hokkaido. The Japanese got that "whoa shit" feeling. They could hide elsewhere from atom bombs; not from Ivan.

I have only the usual layman

Flavius — Fri, 13 May 2016 11:10:09 +0000

In reply to Pearl Harbor wasn't attacked

I have only the usual layman´s knowledge which includes the fact that a Japanese delegation was in Washington negotiating at the time.

A family member was in Pearl Harbor on Dec 7 and he was certainly taken by surprise.

Another in- law , on the Naval Academy faculty on that day , occasionally repeated the widely shared (in the Navy ) nonsense that FDR had advance knowledge of the attack and decided not to provide that information to the commander in Hawaii so we would have a plausible excuse for declaring War.

I suppose that the Hull ultimatum could be described as a provocation but I consider that being ¨wise after the event¨. And I´ m dimly aware of the warning message sent to Pearl Harbor through normal Western Union facilities. Yawn.

FDR was hated, the 1941 Navy was far less competent than it became during the War itself, and the ¨conspiracy " to conceal the advance information about the coming attack is about as credible as Hillary ´s murder of Vince Foster.

Pearl Harbor wasn't attacked

PeraclesPlease — Fri, 13 May 2016 04:55:20 +0000

In reply to Thanks CVille. The only

Pearl Harbor wasn't attacked "unprovoked" despite our propaganda. We gave Japan the Hull Ultimatum in which "Hull made a 3-month counterproposal agreement [modus vivendi], which he expected the Japanese to reject, so he could blame them for the war". Additionally, "on November 27 General MacArthur, in the Philippines, received permission to attack the Japanese at his discretion." 10 days before Japan attacked. Effectively, negotiations had failed, and the Japanese could not continue without the oil we'd embargoed, so we knew war was coming even without the intercepted message saying something drastic would happen after Nov 29.

Thanks CVille. The only

HSG — Fri, 13 May 2016 01:46:18 +0000

In reply to Wow. We have so many

Thanks CVille. The only country that definitely owes us an apology for anything in my view is Japan for Pearl Harbor. As far as I can tell, it has never issued a formal apology for the unprovoked attack. One could argue I suppose Great Britain should apologize for the War of 1812 but the Brits would probably claim we attacked them in Canada and their Native American allies first.

Both the House and Senate have apologized to African Americans for slavery and Jim Crow. We have also apologized to Native Americans and Hawaiian Americans for stealing their land and killing them.

We have paid reparations to Japanese Americans whom we imprisoned based on their ancestry during World War II. All of our actions in this vein appear to have been ethically mandated although belated and insufficient.

Regarding Nagasaki, we bombed it only three days after Hiroshima. I have never read or heard any plausible justification for killing over 100,000 civilians at that moment. I believe we should formally apologize while there are still some survivors left, although I recognize it might well be seen as a hollow meaningless gesture.

Wow. We have so many

CVille Dem — Fri, 13 May 2016 00:48:34 +0000

In reply to An apology for Nagasaki, at

Wow. We have so many apologies to make...truly. Has anyone (any country) ever apologized to us? Ever?

BTW, if we could figure out a way to apologize to the world for our nuclear program, I would be all for it.

An apology for Nagasaki, at

Aaron Carine — Thu, 12 May 2016 22:47:47 +0000

In reply to Going to Hiroshima is the right call!

An apology for Nagasaki, at least, would be a good thing. I can't say whether the U.S. should apologize for Hiroshima. I blame Truman for not trying other options first(like dropping the thing on a military target). But we'll never know if the other options would have worked.