Did the Japanese deserve the Atomic Bomb?

Also, if the US invaded I think they would have taken out their revenge on all of Japan just as the Soviets did when they captured Berlin. Women would be raped (if they weren't already shot from combat) and maybe used as sex slaves.
Yep, that's exactly what the Americans did when they fully occupied Japan two weeks later.

 

Also, if the US invaded I think they would have taken out their revenge on all of Japan just as the Soviets did when they captured Berlin. Women would be raped (if they weren't already shot from combat) and maybe used as sex slaves.

Yep, that's exactly what the Americans did when they fully occupied Japan two weeks later.

And as they did when they overran western Germany in the spring of 1945. It was just one big orgy. Good call there, Peter.

 

So I wrote to answer him.

Considering the OP's last visit to the forum was in Feb. 2004, the likelihood of him reading your reply looks somewhat remote

 

I got a question? If the US wanted to end the war in the pacific quickly to save lives (which I think the bomb did if you don't believe they were trying to sue for peace ). Why then did they not take the same approach to bombing city's to kill people in Germany?

Was there not more people killed in Dresden think what Bomber command at the 8th could have done to population in Germany. Speer said him self anther few more Dresden and German would of had to surrender?

 

I thought they did.
See the mess they made of Tokyo.
Bombing of Tokyo - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Tokyo Fire Raids, 1945

I don't think Tokyo is in Germany lol

The US seem not to mind bombing to kill the Japs but did mind doing it to the Germans.

 

eh?
I thought you asked why didnt they do to Japanese cities to what they did to German ones?

I though I was asking why the us bombed the hell out of civy targets in Japan but not in Germany. Anyway that should clarify it.

 

I just always though that they went for targets like ball bearing factories and synthetic oil plants and left the terror stuff (killing whole towns) to us.

 

as you mentioned Dresden did you not know the USAAF went in after the RAF & dropped even more bombs on the city?

Nope I did not that's very interesting. I think i am going to go and revisit some fairly old books about the USAAF and mayday read some new ones.

 

I'm no aerial bod, but that 'Pickle-barrel' accuracy of hitting specific targets never really existed, did it? Most fliers would see that at the time as a mask, or would they?

Back to the Nukes, I suppose accuracy didn't really matter much there...
A passing thought, and not exactly related to the main question here, but do any of you aerial types know what sort of escort Tibbets, Sweeney, and their chaps went out with? Never really occurred to me before, as perhaps the 'cultural' image is of Enola Gay & Bockscar going in alone in a clear blue sky - presumably we're talking s-loads of other aircraft in the area at the time?

The Enola Gay was accompanied by two other B-29s, Necessary Evil which was used to carry scientific observers, and as a camera plane to photograph the explosion and effects of the bomb and The Great Artiste, instrumented for blast measurement. One of those accompanying pilots may also have carried out the Nagasaki mission.

 

a) Regarding accuracy, all USAAF bombs hit the ground (except those that hit water)

b) Actually the A-bomb raids were performed by IIRC by three planes only in order to pass as recconnaissance flights and not provoke defences.

--- added ---

It seems I arrived a bit late

 

KOKURA'S LUCK ! Nagasaki was not the preferred target that was Kokura - the weather sealed Nagasaki fate and the targets switched from Kokura:

While the two weather planes, Up an' Atom and Laggin' Dragon, were reporting favorable conditions over both Kokura and Nagasaki, Bock's Car was the scene of a heart-stopping discovery: the red arming light on the black box connected to Fat Man was lit, indicating that the firing circuit had closed. A half hour later weaponeer Captain Frederick L. Ashworth and his assistant 2nd Lieutenant Phillip M. Barnes had isolated the failed switch that had caused the malfunction and corrected the problem.
Bock's Car and The Great Artiste rendezvoused at Yakushima and waited for Hopkins's plane. Bock, aboard The Great Artiste, caught a glimpse of it, but Sweeney never saw the plane and circled the area for forty minutes, wasting yet more precious fuel, before finally taking off for Kokura.
Sweeney and his crew were under orders to only bomb visually. When they got to Kokura they found the haze and smoke obscuring the city as well as the large ammunition arsenal that was the reason for targeting the city. They made three unsuccessful passes, wasting more fuel, while anti-aircraft fire zeroed in on them and Japanese fighter planes began to climb toward them. The B-29s broke off and headed for Nagasaki. The phrase Kokura's Luck was coined in Japan to describe escaping a terrible occurrence without being aware of the danger.

 

..Speer said him self anther few more Dresden and German would of had to surrender?

I thought he said that of Hamburg? It was virtually over by the time of Dresden.

 

Cheers Wills.
Never knew that.
Can anyone recommend a good book about the dropping of the bombs ?
Wills post has got me intrigued to know more.
Whirlwind: The Air War Against Japan, 1942-1945: Amazon.ca: Barrett Tillman: Books is a good recent history of the US bombing campaign against Japan that covers the atomic bombing extensively.
Making of the Atomic Bomb: Amazon.ca: Richard Rhodes: Books won the Pulitzer Prize and covers the making of the bomb, the politics behind the decisions made and the dropping of it. Can be a little dry and might have more of the scientific background than you're looking for.