How can an attack on military base Pearl Harbor be an excuse for nuclear attacks?

Question

Americans aften give lame duck excuses to justify the worst ever terrorist attacks in entire human history, that is, nuclear attacks on Heroshima and Nagasaki. They claim that Japan has first attacked the Pearl Harbor Naval Base. Pearl Harbor Naval Base was a legitimate military target, it was not civilian facility. Attack on a military target can not justify an attack on civilian population.

Answer 1

The Government needed an excuse to see if the nukes really worked.

Answer 2

Pearl Harbor was not a legitimate target because there was not yet a state of war between Japan and the US. It was in the midst of the attack that the Japanese ambassador gave the US formal declaration. The reason they attacked was because they (the Japanese) were in the process of invading Korea, Manchuria, Malaya, the Philippines, Hong Kong, etc. They saw the US and its pacific fleet as an obstacle to their plans. The Nuclear weapons were dropped 4 years later in the hope that it would stun the Japanese into a quick surrender, which they ultimately did. The alternative would have been a massive invasion of the Japanese home islands with an estimated 1,000,000 dead on both sides, mostly civilians. At that point in the war both sides, Axis and Allies, were bombing civilian targets so that was nothing new. Even the numbers of people killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were nothing new. Allied bombing raids on Dresden and Tokyo killed 10's of thousands of people at a time. What was new was the radiation and its short and long term effects. Those were not well understood at the time. Hiroshima was a legitimate target at that point because of its munitions factories. It's easy to second guess decisions made 60 years using information that was not available to people at the time. In this case Hiroshima was seen as a way to save lives in the long run. However I have always felt that Nagasaki might not have been necessary. The Japanese parliament was spread throughout the country and didn't have time to meet, let alone full comprehend and make decision based on what had happened at Hiroshima.

Answer 3

Let's dissect this: "They claim that Japan has first attacked the Pearl Harbor Naval Base."

What on earth does that mean...'they claim'? Right there.! There's the problem. It's not a claim if it's history. It's a fact.

The one time nuclear weapons were used on a civilian population is certainly a topic for discussion...but the way you ask the question doesn't warrant a answer or my opinion. Leave your political leanings out of the question or you'll do better off.

How about this: Do you think America was justified in dropping nuclear weapons in 1945?

And it's not lame duck excuses. That makes no sense.
A lame duck means a president who is completing a term of office and chooses not to run or is ineligible to run for reelection. You mean 'lame' excuses.

Answer 4

One of the threshold issues presented by the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is the nature of the target itself. Many people have asked how it came to be that whole civilian populations could become the proper object of direct and purposeful military action. That is, the target at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was principally the civilian population itself.

There was no "militarily" significant target to speak of beyond that, although Hiroshima did support an army headquarters. The answer has to do, in part, with the changing concept of modern warfare:

World War I ushered in the period of total war, a type of war consisting of the combination of many allies, enormous cost, unlimited use of highly destructive weapons, and unlimited war aims. Hostilities were conducted over greater territory . . . than ever before. More troops were employed, supported by the home front population.

As a consequence, the age-old distinction between enemy combatants and noncombatants began to blur. It became clear that the civilian population was absolutely necessary if a nation were to successfully prosecute a total war effort. Without economic and war-production aid from the "civilian front," military war fighters would be less able to continue their efforts.

Thus, a gradual escalation of war fighting occurred, which included a nation's war-fighting sustainment capability and its civilian population. This trend manifested itself in the firebombing attacks on Dresden and Tokyo, the V-weapon attacks against London, and-eventually-the atomic attacks at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The rationale most often proffered to justify the use of such awesome weapons is "military necessity." That is, dropping the bombs actually served to save lives. One must consider that the immediate military context of the decision to use atomic weapons was the Okinawa campaign-the last major battle of the war. Located 350 miles off the coast of mainland Japan, Okinawa "was to be used as a jumping-off place for the long-anticipated invasion of Japan." During the Okinawa campaign, 49,151 US servicemen were killed or wounded.

Okinawa was the first campaign in which the notorious kamikaze appeared. Over 5,000 American sailors died as a result of approximately 350 kamikaze missions-the heaviest toll the US Navy had suffered in any episode of the war, including Pearl Harbor. More than just militarily significant, the kamikaze represented the totally committed enemy-even to the point of fanaticism. If a full-scale invasion of the Japanese home islands became necessary, the kamikaze was a harbinger of the degree of military difficulty that, in all likelihood, awaited an invasion force.

Answer 5

Nobody uses the Pearl Harbor attack as a reason for dropping the big ones. The attacks drew us into a war we where not in and we where not at war with Japan. It was a sneak attack on a country. The bombs kept Americans from being killed. Do you think we targeted civilians? No, it was industrial cities by destroying them accomplished several goals 1. reduce the Japs ability to wage war 2. show them we had a weopon so terrible they would not survive if they didn't surrender. 3. prevented an inavsion of the main island, thus preserving our soldiers lives
You can walk around being a big pu**y the rest of your life, I don't really care but we where at war and the goal is to win and save American lives. We did that. People like you that believe crap like this ought to be slapped around by a WWII veteran.

Answer 6

Japan had no reason to attack Pearl Harbor in the first place.

But since they did commit this unprovoked act of war, the U.S. had a moral obligation to end it as quickly and decisively as possible with as few American casualties as possible. This is the objective of any war.

It took years, and hundreds of thousands of American soldiers' lives (some of whom died during the Bataan Death March, by the way ... where's your justification for that?).

Ultimately, since the Japs were not going to surrender and thus end the fighting, we were faced with two choices; A.) full-scale land invasion of Tokyo that would've cost an estimated 100,000 lives on the American side alone, or B.) nuke two cities that did contain military installations and hope the emperor would spare Tokyo the same fate.

Truman agonized over the decision, but he made the right call. It's partly because of that horror that we truly appreciate the gravity of nuclear power. It's no longer just theoretical; it's real because it happened. And because we've seen its effects, the world is a more enlightened place for it.

Answer 7

A bomb is a bomb. The mission of the U.S. military during WWII was, amongst other things, to defeat the Japanese in the quickest and most efficient manner. The U.S. wasn't particularly interested in whether or not their enemies found "justification" in their means of defense.

The Japs had no "legitimate" reason to begin the war in the first place...so there was no "legitimate" targets...military or otherwise.

Regardless, they used their latest technology to launch an unprovoked attack on a sovereign country. We could ask "Why did the Japs use torpedo bombers and not Samurai soldiers to carry out the attack?"

It was far more efficient for the United States to use 2 bombs and 2 bombers to hasten the war's end.

Those who complain about the A-bombings are simply sore losers who shouldn't have picked a fight (over oil, by the way) to begin with.

Answer 8

The nuclear bombs were dropped to shorten the war with Japan that was started with the attack on Pearl Harbor, and save an estimated 100-200 thousand American soldiers' lives.
Incidentally, by forcing the Emporer to declare defeat, it saved millions of Japanese lives.
All participants in wars targeted civilians.
They won't seek out your judgement on what to do.
Re-read your history to find the terrorists, it's not American.

Answer 9

First let me say that I am neither happy nor proud of the use of atomic bombs. However I think there are some important facts that you are either unaware of or are glossing over.

1) The use of atomic bombs was authorized not as punishment for Pearl Harbor or out of vindictiveness or terrorism. It was done with the intent to REDUCE the number of casualities and significantly hasten the end of the war. The number of lives lost would have been huge had the Allied Forces had to perform a land invasion of Japan. Huge numbers of lives on both sides including vast numbers of civilians. I was an exchange student to Japan. My host mother told me about being a child during that time. She and her classmates were given bamboo spears and were being taught to fight off the Allied Forces when the invasion came. Those were children -- not soldiers. Women and children and other "civilians" would not have been safe during a land invasion. In fact, they would have been expected to fight. And how long do you think my little host mother would have lasted?

2) There were large numbers of civilians (British, Dutch, Australian, etc.) in Japanese Prisoner of War camps at the time. They were dying. I met a man who had been a child in one of those camps. He thanked God at the time and has thanked God ever since that the Atomic Bomb was used. He would have died. He is certain of this. The conditions in the camps was never good. People died in them all the time. Towards the end, the conditions got worse and worse. This gentleman I met swears to me that he would not have survived the duration of a land campaign against Japan.

3) The first atomic bomb should have been the only one ever dropped. The Japanese saw the destruction. And they chose to risk additional lives on the chance that we had only made one of those bombs. They understood that if they did not surrender and they were wrong, that we would drop another bomb. They chose to risk their own people's lives and they are therefore, at least partially responsible for the destruction of the second bomb.

Please take the time to learn the FACTS about WWII. Learn what really happened in the Pacific during that war. Base your opinions on information. Take the time to learn both sides of the story. Everyone loses in war. Decisions are difficult. Over-simplification of the events and environment and knowledge at the time does not do justice to anyone. Painting the leaders of the past as one-dimensional hate-mongers is naieve.

Answer 10

Perhaps you should read a little more about history before asking this. During WW II the U.S. was not involved until the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The nuclear attack was not in response to this. We were at war for a few years before this happened. Japan was warned of this attack before it happened. After the first bomb was dropped they were also given the opportunity to surrender but refused. This was hardly a terrorist act.

Answer 11

Not only did they attack military targets of a non-combatant they hit several civilian targets. Yes it did bring a people to surrender that most likely wouldn't have if it didn't. Many may have chosen to become insurgents even if a much later surrender had happen.

It is interesting that your other questions and answers you feel it is OK to target the civilians in Israel while in realative peace. Why do you hold others to higher standards than yourself?