Was the Nuke really necessary?

Uncle_Sam

Uncle_Sam

Active member
Many of people I talk, say it wasn't really essential to use the Nuke. I don't agree, the Japanese saw the power of the big one and capitulated, it just made much less US casualties.
But there is other question: Was that to show Soviets that after WWII they shouldn't mess with the West!
 
well it wasnt certanly necessary,but it seemed then to be a shorter way to win the war,and no i dont think it was droped to scare off the soviets
 
Well........ I'm not sure there is history that isn't written.... Know what I mean. After WWII we all know what started......
 
yep

i believe it was necesary, unless the allies wanted to lose 100's of thousands or possibly more men in taking the japanese main islands.
i aslo think they could off dropped a few more.
 
What da ****... :shock: are you creazy,this one was enough and TOO much.Have you seen the consequnces of the Nagasaki or Hiroshima,the poor people feel the effect of it eaven now :shock: :shock: I Dont belive this.............
 
They started it remember, 7 Dec. 1941! They were severely punished, they deserved it! We gave them 4 years to surrender and they didn't surrender, they attacked the US without war declaration! And they masacrated everything they found! I don't mean on all Japs don't get me wrong!
 
OK, can you both calm down a little here?
The exchange of ideas is good, but let's not get too emotional!

Some points to consider:

1. The Japanese government surrendered after the second bomb was dropped, so further bombings were not needed (besides, the US only had 2 bombs at that time).

2. The attacks actually saved Japanese lives as well as US. How many Japanese military and civilian casualties do you think Operation Olympic would have caused before the Japanese quit fighting – 1 million, 2 million, 3 million?

3. As far as impressing Stalin goes, the attacks were a bust! He already knew about the Manhattan Project thru the HUMINT sources inside the project and in the UK. That's how the Soviets were able to develop thier atomic weapons so soon after the close of WWII.
 
Uncle_Sam said:
Many of people I talk, say it wasn't really essential to use the Nuke. I don't agree, the Japanese saw the power of the big one and capitulated, it just made much less US casualties.
But there is other question: Was that to show Soviets that after WWII they shouldn't mess with the West!
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US strategic planning for casulties for any land invasion of Japan was put, conservatively, at 1 MILLION men DEAD just on the US side.

So yeah, it was absolutely neccessary. :D

You should know that, had relations broken down between Stalin and the Western Allies in 1945, the Red Army IMO could have driven all the way to the Atlantic, shattering the Allied armies in the process. So there's an element of truth in that it was designed to show off to the Soviets. Only a small element mind. The main reason was to cow Japan into a quick surrender and it worked.
 
Well the Soviets couldgo on, they were with the Nazis from the start, O.K. they were buying time, maybe, they werepreparing themselfes. But they saw one great thing when they attacked Finland to show Hitler they are as good as him, but everything gone wrong from the start, they realised that their soldiers were unreliable, noskilled, with bad morale,... And when WWII finished they had 20.000.000 casualties out of 22mil. recruited. Germans had 4mil an all fronts, while the US had 405.000 an all fronts, That all sais something about will, morale and tactics! Hmmmm...... I don't know that they were prepared to have their military annihilated totaly. So what am I saying is everything is very dubious....
 
Uncle_Sam said:
Well the Soviets couldgo on, they were with the Nazis from the start, O.K. they were buying time, maybe, they werepreparing themselfes. But they saw one great thing when they attacked Finland to show Hitler they are as good as him, but everything gone wrong from the start, they realised that their soldiers were unreliable, noskilled, with bad morale,... And when WWII finished they had 20.000.000 casualties out of 22mil. recruited. Germans had 4mil an all fronts, while the US had 405.000 an all fronts, That all sais something about will, morale and tactics! Hmmmm...... I don't know that they were prepared to have their military annihilated totaly. So what am I saying is everything is very dubious....
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Well that 20 million odd number you quoted included civilian casualties as well IIRC.

And it's not fair to compare German, Soviet and US casualties like-for-like when the Eastern Front was a much bigger theatre than the Western Front.

Don't forget also that the Red Army underwent a MASSIVE transformation during WW2. The Red Army that forced the Wehrmacht all the way back to Berlin was completely unrecognisable to the one that invaded Finland and was humiliated. The Red Army learned well the very harsh lessons of Blitzkrieg and effective combined arms that the Germans administered to them. They managed to defeat the best modern army in history (although the Germans shot themselves massively in the foot) and by the time they reached Berlin they were at the height of their powers. They conclusively outnumbered the Anglo-American armies, had much better artillery and tanks and their troops were battle hardened as only the Eastern Front could have produced.

Trust me, they woulda gone through us like a dose of the sh*ts.
 
I agree, but still it was quantity over quality!
"And it's not fair to compare German, Soviet and US casualties like-for-like when the Eastern Front was a much bigger theatre than the Western Front" Yes but Russians were only on one (two if we include Jap-Soviet wars) fronts, And America was fighting the enemy in Africa, Pacific, Italy, Normandy! Afterall Russians wouldn't do much if there wasn't constant Allied bombing of key industrial areas for producing anything for the German army. And we must not forget that if Hitler listened to it's generals they would win the east front. From Hitlers mistakes we won the war with much less casualties, that we would win if he listened to his generals. And US was facing the best German commanders and units pulled from east front and from anywhere else.
 
I don't believe in using nukes. They will never do anything good for the mankind or planet.

Why do people even create nukes? :?
 
SilverPhoenix said:
I don't believe in using nukes. They will never do anything good for the mankind or planet.

Why do people even create nukes? :?
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I totally agree with Silver...but the past cannot be changed. We must bury the past, and learn from the lessons taught.

As for why nukes were created, some of the less intellegent people thought nukes would protect the world. They THOUGHT millions of lives would be safer if the good guys had weapons of mass destruction. Well they were WRONG. Now most countries have weapons of mass destruction as well. Thus the beginning of the Cold War.
 
I agree with Darkmb, if there weren't Nukes the humanity would probably destroy itself by now. We can just hope it will never be used again.

1217 22mil were mobilised 11mil were army casualties, and the rest were civilian, anyway it is 11.4% of the population then in Soviet Union. But Army that attacked finland was really out of shape! What's unclear to You :roll:
 
Keep it civil, Uncle Sam. And you need to start providing sources for the information you include in your posts.
 
How to provide it?
I mean I read that in books, like WWII in 3 big books, I don't know how to distribute that info for you, only to scan it and than post it, but You better be knowing Serbian ;)
 
The Atomic Bomb may have done the trick, but the people who survived the blast were f***ed over by the radiation. For years to come, Hiroshima and Nagasaki will be radiation deathtraps.
 
Nukes have been our warranty for salvation for all the Cold War. No world War 3 ever broke out between US and USSR only because there was something called MAD preventing both from first strike. Which is, we all lived and grew up thanks to the existence of the nukes. Paradoxical enough?
Europe itself, now the symbol of pacifism in the world, was protected by US atomic shield for all the post war era. I'm not saying we should thank the nukes, but.... :?:
 
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