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JB, dumbass deflave has no idea who he agrees with, and who he doesn't. He is so miserable in his home life, with his wife being the breadwinner, and calling all the shots, that he uses this place as an outlet in which to rid himself of his frustrations. The only reason that I haven't put him ignore is that whenever I see someone locally that I think is ignorant azz, I can come here and read what he wrote, and then realize that the local person is actually pretty smart.

Because I agree with the decision to implement Sherman's March to the Sea as a part of the North's strategy I must agree with the implementation of Nazi Death Squads in WWII.

That makes a lot of sense.

Thank you so much.

The Campfire's collective intellect is firing on all cylinders today by God!

among things i didn't know while watching a program on hitler's early life.
his commanding officer in WWI was jewish.
He was never a corporal, one promotion in four years to P.F.C.
ended the war in a psych ward, ptsd basically.
he had lost his eyesight, later recovered.
some of his relatives lived in america, including one who served in the U.S. Navy.

What's the name of that one?

wish i could tell you, think it was on ahc or something like that.
i had it on in the background waiting for news from a vet on one of my dogs. Which had me occupied. station still on, it was on AHC.
says on the menu american heros channel, direct t.v. 287
https://www.ahctv.com/tv-shows/hitler/about

I saw a program on that topic a few days ago. I think it was Adolf Hitler's half brother's son.

The mother had taken the boy to England and raised him there. But the boy went back to Germany in the mid thirties hoping to ride the coat tails of his uncle's success. But the boy proved to be an embarrassment to dear Uncle Adolf.

Instead of having his nephew killed, Adolf sent him home to England. By 1941, the boy had immigrated to America. And I think it was mentioned that he was given a position in the Navy and used for propaganda purposes through the war.

They tracked down four late middle aged Hitler brothers still living in America. The program claimed that all had made a joint vow to die childless so that the family would die out.

same program i think.
the guy in the navy was a pharmicists mate i think.

further LeMay quotes;

.
"Killing Japanese didn't bother me very much at that time... I suppose if I had lost the war, I would have been tried as a war criminal....
Every soldier thinks something of the moral aspects of what he is doing. But all war is immoral and if you let that bother you,
you're not a good soldier."



As far as casualties were concerned I think there were more casualties in the first attack on Tokyo with incendiaries
than there were with the first use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. The fact that it's done instantaneously,
.maybe that's more humane than incendiary attacks, if you can call any war act humane. I don't, particularly,
so to me there wasn't much difference. A weapon is a weapon and it really doesn't make much difference how you kill a man
. If you have to kill him, well, that's the evil to start with and how you do it becomes pretty secondary. I think your choice should
be which weapon is the most efficient and most likely to get the whole mess over with as early as possible."



then the views of Admiral W. Leahy;

"It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan.
The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons."
(William D. Leahy, I Was There, pg. 441).

"in being the first to use it, we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages"
(William D. Leahy, I Was There, pg. 441).

effectively LeMay didn't consider the targeted destruction of civilians by allied war efforts as morally superior to the enemies,

and Leahy using the term 'barbarians of the Dark Ages' in his mind effectively put the Allies on par with the Nazis when it came
to the military willingness to target civilians.

no doubt their views are at odds with some of the posters on this thread.

It was the opinion of one of my college history professors (advanced US History) that the real reason for dropping the A Bombs on Japan was to show the Soviet Union that we actually had such a weapon.

That was definitively a factor. Bit the over-riding reason was the huge cost in American lives to take that place, especially after our experiences in Iwo Jima and Okinawa

Let's see what the historical think tank that is the 'Fire holds for us today.

LMAO.

And?

With the battles of the South Pacific fresh in their minds the idea of something other than an invasion probably seemed like a good idea. Also, I doubt many really understood what an atom bomb would be the way we do today.

Hearing my grandfather talk about arriving at Dachau with no idea what it was is certainly different than having the war and concentration camps all in context.

There is no way we can have the same perspective today in order to make value judgements on the decisions made then.

The reasoning behind the atom bomb drops was multi-faceted.

It would be next to impossible to have convinced anyone to NOT drop those bombs.

Which brings up again the point that what is and isn’t a war crime is almost entirely determined by who wins the war.

And?

I guess the numbers go like this. 2 bombs killed about 200,000 japs. Another estimate it would have taken about 200,000 US lives to defeat the japs.
US did lose 400,000 in WW2, so another 200,000 is a significant number. Of course additional wounded and associated price. And of course the logistic cost of ordinance.
And important at that point in time, the US citizen was not interested in the nobility of war, the reality set in. So President Truman had zero options just based on those facts.

Had we in the summer of 1945 allowed thr Japs to surrender with a guarantee of keeping the emperor, they most likely would have almost immediately. As it was, we pressed for unconditional surrender and then one of the first things MacArthur did was to allow them to keep the emperor.