The Bomb - 8 Aug 45

[Salty]

I recd this in an email on 8 Aug 2026 -- Thoughts?
Today marks the 81st anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, carried out in the final days of World War II.

On August 6 and 9, 1945, U.S. attacks claimed an estimated 246,000 to 500,000 lives, including those who died instantly and others who later suffered from injuries and radiation sickness.

Both cities were left in ruins, with the majority of victims being civilians.

The only times the United States has used nuclear weapons were in the past, but there are now concerns about the possibility of similar actions in the ongoing conflict with the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI), where the USA and ZI might consider using them.

The attack on Pearl Harbor was driven by Japan’s aimed to prevent its own downfall.

However, many researchers believe the nuclear bombings was excessive and served no real military purpose, amounting to a war crime.

Japan was already close to collapse due to a prolonged naval blockade and conventional bombings, and its surrender was more likely triggered by the USSR entering the war on August 8 than by the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The numerous telegrams suggest that the real aim of the nuclear attack was to try out the new weapons on the battlefield and to send a message of intimidation to the Soviet Union.

With the imminent downfall of Zionist Occupying Regime (ZOR) many contemplate that ZOR may use as the last resort against IRI, however as Japan tried to capsulated America use nuclear option, so doe IRI has a right to use when USA obliterated its leadership on Feb 28th.

According to SIPRI, nuclear powers worldwide are thought to have around fifteen thousand warheads of different kinds in their stockpiles, while ZOR is believed to hold hundreds of nuclear weapons.

Although ZOR has held this arsenal for decades, it has never openly confirmed or denied its existence, preferring instead to stick to the ambiguous statement that “Israel will not be the first country to introduce nuclear weapons to the Middle East.”

United States that lectures others on non-proliferation continues to shield Israel’s undeclared nuclear arsenal, enabling occupation, genocide, and regional destabilization in West Asia without accountability — a double standard Pyongyang and other resistance-aligned states have long condemned.

The ZOR nuclear warheads gained extensive media attention in 1986 when former nuclear scientist and peace activist Mordechai Vanunu shared information that captured global interest.

Soon after, he was abducted by Mossad and spent 18 years in prison on charges of espionage and treason, a conviction that only reinforced the belief that Israel has nuclear weapons.

The danger of nuclear war has not receded, instead it has entered a new phase as Ai becomes increasingly integrated into military planning and surveillance.

AI increases the risk of catastrophic mistakes, cyberattacks, and accidental escalation. The NPT urges renewed global efforts to achieve the verified elimination of nuclear weapons.

The nuclear age, combined with AI, has changed the way wars are waged and continues to pose a serious threat to humanity.

The lasting impact of nuclear weapons, the ongoing reliance on deterrence through mutually assured destruction, and the moral duty to address the risks of nuclear conflict are still pressing concerns.

The danger of catastrophic conflict remains high because advances in thermonuclear weapons, submarine-based strike capabilities, artificial intelligence, weakened arms-control agreements, and declining trust and transparency among nuclear-armed states have all increased the risk of devastation.

Hiroshima – Nagasaki Events, August 2026: From the Trinity bomb test to the Treaty on the Prohibition of nuclear weapons – no nukes!

Sunday, August 9 at 4 p.m. at Rose Garden Park, near the Peace Pole on 8th Avenue between Broad and Union in Bethlehem.

Eighty-one years after the Trinity bomb test and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, we will gather to remember, reflect, and renew our commitment to peace and justice.

 

[JonC]

I view the bombings as strategic (if not for Japan as a warning to Russia). I do not mean it was thr right thing to do, but that is how I understand the reasoning.

The weird thing is the countries who follow "no nukes" are not the countries that the world is typically concerned with.

We are currently starting a pit plutonium facility (us and Los Alamos) to make pits for nuclear weapons.

 

[atpollard]

Remind me again, how many Chinese did the Japanese army kill? How many of them were CIVILIANS?

Moral outrage is a strange thing.

 

[JonC]

Remind me again, how many Chinese did the Japanese army kill? How many of them were CIVILIANS?

Moral outrage is a strange thing.

It is a strange thing. After WW2 for some reasons war was considered to be one military against another, trying not to harm citizens, bridges, power plants, etc.

That would be fine if all parties held that standard. We could send the armies off to a desert and let them fight. Part of war does involve civilians, civilian infrastructure, etc.

It reminds me of Marlon Brando's charter in Apocalypse Now (Kurtz) . Kurtz implies that we could not win the war because we were held back by this set of arbitrary rules of "civilized" warfare that the enemy clearly did not possess. We were hampered by a hypocrisy that the enemy did not possess.

 

[Jerome]

I recd this in an email on 8 Aug 2026
"[Blah blah blah]...With the imminent downfall of Zionist Occupying Regime (ZOR)...[blah blah blah]"

Salty!
the 'Zionist Occupying Regime'?
Oh brother!

 

[Foxmeister]

The email stated, "Japan was already close to collapse due to a prolonged naval blockade and conventional bombings, and its surrender was more likely triggered by the USSR entering the war on August 8 than by the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki."

Whoever wrote this didn't understand the beliefs the Japanese held. It came down death before dishonor and to protect the emperor at all costs. The refusal to surrender was codified in 1941. Do not live to bear shame of captivity. Prior to the battle of Okinawa, the Japanese told the Okinawans the Americans were the great devil and it was best to fight them and die rather than let them take the island. American soldiers saw Okinawans jumping off cliffs to kill themselves as American troops came closer to their villages. Japanese officers committed suicide rather than surrender.

It was estimated that US casualties would fall anywhere between 400,000 to 800,000 and fighting could last a year or two if we put boots on the ground. It was also estimated total casualties could total up to 4 million. This is why the atomic bombs were used.

 

[Conan]

The fact is that we are the only Nation to use Atomic (now Nuclear) shows us as the criminals, and that our ruling class are cowards enough to use them against Iran because they cannot be defeated by conventional means. In other words they have beaten us, there is nothing to do but murder them with Nukes.

Jon was right about the Atomic weapons being used against the Japanese was a demonstration of power against the Soviet Union. The Japanese did not surrender because of it. They would have surrendered to us earlier but wanted to keep their leader in power. We wanted unconditional surrender. We got that but with the emperor of Japan intact. Had we agreed to that earlier lives would have been saved. We still rule Japan as our proxies and may use them in an upcoming war with China.

 

[Conan]

I will never forget Former Secretary of State Madalen Albright saying, loosely, " the reason we don't invade North Korea is because they have Nukes. The reason we could invade Libya is because they don't. Libya had a nuclear program but voluntarily gave it up to us under negotiations for normalizations. How did that work out for the people of Libya? They were better off under Kadafi than the chaos they have now. We even destroyed their water pipes a great war crime.

 

[Jerome]

Whoever wrote this

The somebody whose message Salty posted is...Mohammed Khaku [!]

It's from Mohammed Khaku's Speak Up! Silent No more! [sic] Substack

He's Shiite Muslim: "... in 1996, I became the President of the SIJPA and embarked on building the Al-Ahad Islamic center. I am also been [sic] politically active in local election races and Interfaith dialogue serving on the board of Lehigh Valley Justice Institute, Vice chair of Lehigh Valley ACLU, Lehigh Conference of Churches, Interfaith Action committee, End Mass Incarceration, and Imamia Medics International. I believe in the cause of social justice..."

 

[John of Japan]

Remind me again, how many Chinese did the Japanese army kill? How many of them were CIVILIANS?

Moral outrage is a strange thing.

As you know I'm sure, millions of civilian Chinese were killed by the Japanese. In the so-called "Rape of Nanking," the Japanese army surrounded the city and did their best to kill every last Chinese, military or civilian. During that time there were many, many individual vicious acts by the Japanese army: murder, r@pe, torture, other viciousness. As many as 300,000 Chinese were killed. Japanese history sources often deny it ever happened, though the evidence is overwhelming.

 

[John of Japan]

The fact is that we are the only Nation to use Atomic (now Nuclear) shows us as the criminals, and that our ruling class are cowards enough to use them against Iran because they cannot be defeated by conventional means. In other words they have beaten us, there is nothing to do but murder them with Nukes.

Jon was right about the Atomic weapons being used against the Japanese was a demonstration of power against the Soviet Union. The Japanese did not surrender because of it. They would have surrendered to us earlier but wanted to keep their leader in power. We wanted unconditional surrender. We got that but with the emperor of Japan intact. Had we agreed to that earlier lives would have been saved.

As one who lived in Japan for 33 years, is fluent in the language (I've written books in Japanese), still has friends in the country, and knows the culture intimately, I disagree that they would have surrendered without the atomic bomb. The hard liners were planning to resist to the last civilian, and were training civilians to fight with sharpened bamboo poles. There was a very complex set of defense positions in place so that some military men estimated a loss of up to 1,000,000 US soldiers. (I've seen some of these myself.) Again, it is hard to deny the case of Onoda Hiroo, the Japanese soldier who hid out in the jungle on Lubang Island, refusing to believe that Japanese had surrendered, trying to keep fighting for almost 30 years after the war actually ended.

As for the Emperor Hirohito himself (I well remember the day he died and the responses of the Japanese), he was completely complicit with this. I have seen news clips of him in a full military uniform reviewing the troops. Having said that, I believe MacArthur was wise in keeping him as the figurehead of the Japanese nation. However, he did require Hirohito to deny his own deity, and tell the nation that on the radio, as well as the fact that America now was going to govern the nation temporarily (and it was temporary). He announced the Japanese loss with, "The war has not necessarily turned out to our advantage.

We still rule Japan as our proxies and may use them in an upcoming war with China.

This is a false statement which every single Japanese I know would object strongly to. They are ruled by their post-war constitution, the "Peace Constitution" or the "MacArthur Constitution," which outlawed any use of a military for offensive warfare. Thus they now have the Japan Self-Defense Force (JSDF), which doesn't even have the capacity for offensive warfare (I had a member in my church), so how would they help the US in a war against China? They have no offensive navy (carriers, battleships, or cruisers, only a helicopter carrier), but only destroyers and a few submarines. (I've seen these at the Yokosuka Naval Base.)

The fact is, the Yakuza (Japanese version of the Mafia) has more input into the actions of the Japanese government than the US government does. (I had ex-Yakuza members in my church.) Bribery is rampant.

 

[Van]

LOL, one revisionist history blurb after another. We, professing Christians, are supposed to seek truth, and guard against being derailed by falsehoods.

The OP obviously was written by those biased against the nation of Israel.

The stated reason for using the atomic bombs was to cause capitulation, as a land invasion was expected to cost more than 100,000 lives.

The estimated number of deaths from the effects of the bombs, within 4 months of the detonations, ranges from about 150,000 to about 250,000, not the inflated number used in the OP.

Here is a link to what appears to be a fairly objective account:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki

 

[John of Japan]

The email stated, "Japan was already close to collapse due to a prolonged naval blockade and conventional bombings, and its surrender was more likely triggered by the USSR entering the war on August 8 than by the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki."

Whoever wrote this didn't understand the beliefs the Japanese held. It came down death before dishonor and to protect the emperor at all costs. The refusal to surrender was codified in 1941. Do not live to bear shame of captivity. Prior to the battle of Okinawa, the Japanese told the Okinawans the Americans were the great devil and it was best to fight them and die rather than let them take the island. American soldiers saw Okinawans jumping off cliffs to kill themselves as American troops came closer to their villages. Japanese officers committed suicide rather than surrender.

It was estimated that US casualties would fall anywhere between 400,000 to 800,000 and fighting could last a year or two if we put boots on the ground. It was also estimated total casualties could total up to 4 million. This is why the atomic bombs were used.

This is well said, and all true.

I've been to Okinawa and seen the cave headquarters of the Japanese leaders, and the cliff where the civilians were told to jump from.

 

[Conan]

The email stated, "Japan was already close to collapse due to a prolonged naval blockade and conventional bombings, and its surrender was more likely triggered by the USSR entering the war on August 8 than by the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki."

Whoever wrote this didn't understand the beliefs the Japanese held. It came down death before dishonor and to protect the emperor at all costs. The refusal to surrender was codified in 1941. Do not live to bear shame of captivity. Prior to the battle of Okinawa, the Japanese told the Okinawans the Americans were the great devil and it was best to fight them and die rather than let them take the island. American soldiers saw Okinawans jumping off cliffs to kill themselves as American troops came closer to their villages. Japanese officers committed suicide rather than surrender.

It was estimated that US casualties would fall anywhere between 400,000 to 800,000 and fighting could last a year or two if we put boots on the ground. It was also estimated total casualties could total up to 4 million. This is why the atomic bombs were used.

Please see through the propaganda. Jon's view is correct. The Japanese were militarily defeated. They had no air force left. We destroyed all military targets in Japan. They were cut off from their resources in China and all of the far east . They offered to surrender with their Emperor still in charge we said unconditional surrender. They unconditionally surrendered with their Emperor intact. We should have chosen that decision 6 months earlier. MacArthur said he estimated 40-60,000 American deaths and was ordered not to say that . Don't take my word for it, look at the Japanese surrender documents. They talk of the great disaster of the Soviet Union entering the conflict and them loosing their resources in Manchuria and Russian tanks possibly driving down the Korea peninsula. And, by the way, the Americans have a new bomb and have destroyed 2 of our cities.

Of course most all Japanese cities had been destroyed conventionally anyway.

 

[John of Japan]

Please see through the propaganda.

Propaganda??? Did you miss the fact that I lived there for 33 years and speak and read the language fluently??? I've read many books about the nation in both Japanese and English. I've talked to dozens of Japanese personally about the war. Most agree that the A-bomb stopped the war.

Jon's view is correct. The Japanese were militarily defeated. They had no air force left. We destroyed all military targets in Japan. They were cut off from their resources in China and all of the far east . They offered to surrender with their Emperor still in charge we said unconditional surrender. They unconditionally surrendered with their Emperor intact. We should have chosen that decision 6 months earlier. MacArthur said he estimated 40-60,000 American deaths and was ordered not to say that . Don't take my word for it, look at the Japanese surrender documents. They talk of the great disaster of the Soviet Union entering the conflict and them loosing their resources in Manchuria and Russian tanks possibly driving down the Korea peninsula. And, by the way, the Americans have a new bomb and have destroyed 2 of our cities.

The decision to surrender only occurred after the atomic bombs were dropped. Are you familiar with the famous response of the Japanese government rejecting the Potsdam Declaration, which mandated unconditional surrender? It used the term mokusatsu (黙殺). Do you have any idea of the meaning of that term? Or the content of the Potsdam Declaration?

Of course most all Japanese cities had been destroyed conventionally anyway.

This did not matter to the Japanese psyche. Do you know any native Japanese? Have you read any of their books? Have you read The Japanese by former ambassador Edwin O. Reischauer? Have you read The Chrysanthemum and the Sword by Ruth Benedict? These are very basic books. If you haven't read these, you have little or no knowledge of the Japanese mind set.

 

[John of Japan]

Let me explain what was going on before the A-bombs and the Japanese surrender. First of all, on the warmongering side were the State Shinto advocates. This was the doctrinal source of the war, a belief that Japan was destined to rule all of Asia. This included military members willing to commit assassination to keep the war going, believing the Shinto gods would still help. Then there were a few leaders who were in favor of surrender.

This is the situation when the Allies presented the Japanese with the Potsdam Declaration, which was a demand that Japan surrender unconditionally. Here is a description of that: https://www.britannica.com/topic/Potsdam-Declaration. There was no room in the PD for the Japanese to surrender with conditions.

The answer given by the Japanese government contained the word mokusatsu (黙殺). There are those who say well, it just meant "We're thinking about it." However, all agree that the word can mean "refusal." See a dictionary definition here: 黙殺 - Jisho.org. The semantic content of that word is very powerful, consisting of two Chinese characters: the first one being 黙, "silence." (The verb form is damaru, 黙る, to stop talking.) The second character is the one for "kill," korosu, 殺 (verb form 殺す, to kill). So again, the word has a very strong semantic content. If the Japanese had meant simply "Wait while we think about it," they would have used different language. But the truth is, the Potsdam Declaration demanded unconditional surrender immediately, so any answer from the Japanese other than "We surrender immediately" would invite very harsh response by the Allies.

On the American side, it was very plain that the hard-liners were in charge, and surrender would not happen without further American attacks. The A-bomb was chosen to avoid an invasion of Honshu (本州), the main Japanese Island, which would have cost 100's of 1000s of American lives.

Another element that must be discussed is the bomb damage that had already occurred. In the great firebombing of Tokyo on March 9–10, 1945 (Operation Meetinghouse), over 100,000 Japanese civilians were killed. This is actually comparable to the deaths in Hiroshima and Nagasaki from the A-bombs, with the difference being simply the number of bombs. If the US had not used the A-bomb, we would have killed just as many Japanese with other kinds of bombs.

As Paul Harvey used to say, "That is the rest of the story."

 

[Conan]

Propaganda??? Did you miss the fact that I lived there for 33 years and speak and read the language fluently??? I've read many books about the nation in both Japanese and English. I've talked to dozens of Japanese personally about the war.


The decision to surrender only occurred after the atomic bombs were dropped. Are you familiar with the famous response of the Japanese government rejecting the Potsdam Declaration, which mandated unconditional surrender? It used the term mokusatsu (黙殺). Do you have any idea of the meaning of that term? Or the content of the Potsdam Declaration?

This did not matter to the Japanese psyche. Do you know any native Japanese? Have you read any of their books? Have you read The Japanese by former ambassador Edwin O. Reischauer? Have you read The Chrysanthemum and the Sword by Ruth Benedict? These are very basic books. If you haven't read these, you have little or no knowledge of the Japanese mind set.

I was not responding to your post John. I was responding to another poster. I appreciate your expertise on anything and especially Japan. I appreciated your post, and was especially delighted to hear the Japanese people themselves would not support war with China.

That the Japanese soldiers would fight to the death just like the Germans is no surprise. But we disagree that they surrendered only because we dropped the Atomic Bombs on 2 of their cities . I firmly believe it was the Soviets entering the war in the east taking their resources in Manchuria and their fear of Soviets driving to their borders through Korea. They were then all of a sudden fighting the only 2 superpowers on the planet. It was unnecessary in my opinion that we needed to attack 2 civilian cities but we did it to intimidate the Communist. I could be wrong but many share the opinion.

 

[Salty]

The somebody whose message Salty posted is...Mohammed Khaku [!]

It's from Mohammed Khaku's Speak Up! Silent No more! [sic] Substack

Thank you!

 

[John of Japan]

I was not responding to your post John. I was responding to another poster. I appreciate your expertise on anything and especially Japan.

Thank you for the kind words. I simply saw the post and simply did not notice that it was not to me! Regardless, I stand by all that I wrote, even if it was not written to me.

I appreciated your post, and was especially delighted to hear the Japanese people themselves would not support war with China.

The average modern Japanese in the neighborhoods opposes any kind of offensive war. There are rightists who would seek Japanese hegemony, but they are only about 5%. Down in Tokyo you can sometimes hear martial music blasting out, and when you look you see vans of rightists with warlike signs and the Japanese WW2 flag--which by the way still flies over Japanese Self-Defense naval ships.

That the Japanese soldiers would fight to the death just like the Germans is no surprise. But we disagree that they surrendered only because we dropped the Atomic Bombs on 2 of their cities . I firmly believe it was the Soviets entering the war in the east taking their resources in Manchuria and their fear of Soviets driving to their borders through Korea. They were then all of a sudden fighting the only 2 superpowers on the planet. It was unnecessary in my opinion that we needed to attack 2 civilian cities but we did it to intimidate the Communist. I could be wrong but many share the opinion.

There was a Soviet factor, it is true. But neither you nor Jon have taken into account the Potsdam Declaration nor the majority Japanese propensity for continuing the war at that time--a sort of Manifest Destiny doctrine of State Shinto.

 

[Foxmeister]

Please see through the propaganda. Jon's view is correct. The Japanese were militarily defeated. They had no air force left. We destroyed all military targets in Japan. They were cut off from their resources in China and all of the far east . They offered to surrender with their Emperor still in charge we said unconditional surrender. They unconditionally surrendered with their Emperor intact. We should have chosen that decision 6 months earlier. MacArthur said he estimated 40-60,000 American deaths and was ordered not to say that . Don't take my word for it, look at the Japanese surrender documents. They talk of the great disaster of the Soviet Union entering the conflict and them loosing their resources in Manchuria and Russian tanks possibly driving down the Korea peninsula. And, by the way, the Americans have a new bomb and have destroyed 2 of our cities.

Of course most all Japanese cities had been destroyed conventionally anyway.

I think you're all over the place. First of all, go back and read again what I posted. There was no way Japan was going to surrender before the atomic bombs were dropped. They were dropped because the Truman administration believed the assessments he was provided concerning an invasion of Japan. The bombs were dropped because an invasion would lead to unacceptable numbers of casualties.