What I find disgusting in this whole situation is the critic's of dropping the bomb twice. How terrible the U.S. was in doing so, how this country is still groveling over it and apologizing to the world for it.
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Historically Truman himself was so repulsed by the deaths of so many women and children at Hiroshima and Nagasaki that he ordered no more atomic weapons were to be used against Japan. Oppenheimer also felt that after Hiroshima, no futher bombardment was necessary and that the Japanese should have been allowed more time to understand the depth of the destruction at Hiroshima. Nagasaki was truly not necessary.
However, my own opinion is that the Japanese were so ruthless in their treatment of millions of civilians and hundreds of thousands of POWs that the atomic bombings were justifed as a punitive mesasure and not just as a means to bring a sense of immediate urgency to the Japanese government.
Every single hour of continued conflict brought more american deaths and by that time Japan was clearly finished, they just would not capitulate.
Even without the need to invade, the bombings ended the conflict hours, days and perhaps even weeks sooner, thereby saving hundreds if not thousands of american lives. That reality alone justifies the atomic bombings, in my opinion.
No apologies necessary, Regret? absolutely. War by its very nature is deeply regrettable.
