Obama turns pastor hate controversy into race speech

Just to add to the discussion, forgive another reprint -

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showpost.php?p=5068034&postcount=17

There is ample evidence for either side of the atomic bomb/allied land invasion scenarios. Another reprint:

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showpost.php?p=4330499&postcount=12

Macarthur was quite convinced that the bomb was not only unnecessary, but counter-productive, ultimately, in the long run and kind of peace achieved.

 

So we did ask to get into the war? Did we cause it too? Was Hitler's Germany really a puppet government set up by the US? I wouldn't doubt it, after all we're responsible for everything that is wrong with the world, right?

Churchill was begging FDR to get into before the attack. FDR kept stalling because the country didn't want to get into the war. We should probably should have gotten into it before the Pearl Harbor attack but that attack forced us to.

And even if you're a conspiracy theorists that believes higher ups in our government knew that attacks were going to take place, it still doesn't make sense that they would not alert someone so that the base could be defended. After all, once the Japanese started the attack that was enough to get us into the war, sinking our ships and causing maximum damage wouldn't of made our entry into the war any more certain, it just damaged our ability to fight it.

 

You need to read some books. The US was expected to take 1 million causalties in invading Japan.

 

In the battle of Okinawa, U.S. losses were over 72,000 casualties, of whom 12,513 were killed or missing—over twice the number of casualties as at Iwo Jima and Guadalcanal combined. Several thousand servicemen who died indirectly (from wounds and other causes) at a later date are not included in the total. U.S. forces suffered their highest ever casualty rate for combat stress reaction during the entire battle, at 48% (compared to 30% in the Korean War).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Okinawa

2,000 kamikaze planes launched attacks during the Battle of Okinawa and the Japanese had 10,000 kamikaze planes in reserve to defend Japan.

Japanese major warships in fighting order were six aircraft carriers, four cruisers, and one battleship. The navy still had quite a large number of minor warships. They could "sustain a force of twenty operational destroyers and perhaps forty submarines for a few days at sea."

The IJN also had about 100 Kōryū-class midget submarines, 250 smaller Kairyū-class midget submarines, and 1,000 Kaiten manned torpedoes. The Imperial Japanese Army had 800 Shin'yō suicide boats.

By August 1945, the Japanese Army had the equivalent of 65 divisions in the homeland

A study done for Secretary of War Henry Stimson's staff by William Shockley estimated that conquering Japan would cost 1.7 to 4 million American casualties, including 400,000 to 800,000 fatalities, and five to ten million Japanese fatalities. The key assumption was large-scale participation by civilians in the defense of Japan.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

 

This just isn't supported, at least not without some considerable questions that come from the history of the time. Although it is true there remained a few "hotheads" in the Japanese army officer corps, Japan had little left to wage war.

Japanese naval power was obliterated, as was Japan's air force. We overran Japanese skies with impunity, and had complete control of her home seas.

Particularly after the defeat of Germany (but preceding even that), the Japanese had made several inquiries into a peace, that were rejected on the grounds that Japan sought a peace "with conditions," and the allies would accept nothing short of unconditional surrender.

There is substantial evidence - from intercepted diplomatic messages through to documents revealed after the war - that the main condition the Japanese sought was the retention of the Emperor; specifically, that the Japanese were willing to accept a peace on the basis of the 1941 Atlantic Charter. Beyond the very clear understanding on the part of Japan that it recognized itself as a defeated nation, that it desperately sought the end of hostilities, and sought the brokerage of the Soviet Union as a go-between with the western allies, messages intercepted said the only sticking point was:

(Prime Minister Togo to Ambassador Sato, in Moscow).

We nixed any conditions, reaffirmed the Potsdam Declaration, and dropped two bombs.

Yet here's the clicker: we acceded to the condition the Japanese had requested in the first place, namely, the retention of the Emperor.

The Japanese were seeking to end the war, on terms acceptable to the western allies, with the exception of the toppling (and likely criminalization) of the Emperor. We nuked Japan, entered an age where such mass destruction must necessarily be seen as a viable means to make war, and yet - we allowed the Emperor to remain. Does this make sense?

Dwight D. Eisenhower, from his memoirs:

Many others, at top levels, thought it was a huge and unnecessary mistake - Macarthur, I mentioned, along with Chief of Staff (Admiral) Leahy, Admiral King (US Chief of Naval Ops); others.

I reaffirm we dropped the bomb before the Soviets made good on their commitment to drop the neutrality pact with Japan and enter the war on the allied side. They did honor the allied commitment - on time. We pre-empted their contribution by dropping the bombs beforehand. I am quite convinced we did it not win the war, but to demonstrate to the Soviet Union we meant business.

And I think it is a blight on our history we obliterated much of the Japanese citizenry to show such a thing. It only initiated another, darker turn in world history, and we will live with it forever more.

 

Wisdom, Bogart's posting of what happened on Okinawa is a conflation of events and time.

One forgets that the bloody victory at Okinawa itself irrevocably altered the Japanese ability to continue. A major fleet anchorage and backdoor air staging grounds - priceless victory, and again - look to the plethora of overtures to peace made by Japan that were not only rejected, but were not disclosed until after the war; the "condition" intrinsic to these peace suits was the Japanese wish to retain the Emperor; which we did anyway. This simply cannot be ignored, if one wishes to make a credible, inclusive view of the real picture at the end of the war.

Moreover, again:

-air, naval power - gone. We had free reign of Japanese skies, and free reign over her home seas and shipping lanes. You will recall Curtis LeMay and Hap Arnold - two firebrand air officers responsible for a hellish and effective air campaign against Japan, and no friend to Japanese interests.

In the words of Curtis LeMay:

In a memo from General Kenney (Commander of the Air Forces, Southwest Pacific) Hap Arnold (Commander of the Army Air Forces):

-and a naval blockade was in place. The nation depended on external resources to stay alive, and would have been choked out, had the Japanese wished to continue (though clearly, they did not; the Emperor, and his direct councillors, sought an immediate end).

-The Soviet Union was about to enter into the war, on the allied side. We didn't wait.

It just doesn't make sense. America's economic power - one of the principal reasons Bogart, rightly, argues for America's importance in the Western war - was unparalleled. A combined blockade and air firestorm could have been continued or intensified at will, without loss to America in blood or money. Yet we opted for the bomb. I have to stand by my original theory, that we did it as a demonstration effect to the Soviet Union, more than anything else.

There are many, many other pieces of actual history that belie the commonly held notions. In part, our skewed perceptions were due to the nature of wartime propaganda - the Japanese, as a race, were vilified as subhuman, bloodthirsty monsters (and they did no better - Tojo's crew saw to it that Americans, Europeans, generally, were seen to be rapacious child-eaters perniciously ranging over land "primordially endowed" with asian - read, Japanese - suzerainty).

 

No, Japan was not an angel - as I said. But that has nothing to do with where Japan was at the end of the war. Again:

It is also important to distinguish the horrible crimes of what have been called the "Hotheads" - the young army officer corps that came to power under Tojo's rise - from Japan herself. Just as Hitler wasn't "Germany," or genetically-endowed "Germaness," Tojo and his crew weren't Japan, "primordially determined."

 

Are you somehow saying Japan, as a nation, is to be vilified forevermore as a result of its history in WWII, while Germany, being "different," is not?

Germany's policies - not limited to Jews, but against Poles, gypsies, political opponents, homosexuals, etc. - were carried out in every conquered land. The history of German reprisals against entire civilian populations is well documented - see the massacres of Tulle and Oradour, for just a couple.

Again, these were regimes that are now gone. I simply don't understand your point.

And, again, we are discussing two things. Whether the bomb was necessary is distinguished from the nature of the Japanese people.

 

I completely agree with this post.

 

There were Japanese troops that did not surrender until the 1980s and years after WW2 they were pitched battles will Japanese troops still holding out. Imagine if Japan had actually been invaded.

End March - early April 1947 Peleliu Island - Band of Japanese lead by Ei Yamaguchi
A band of 33 Japanese soldiers, commanded by Lt. Ei Yamaguchi renews fighting on the island by attacking a Marine patrol with hand grenades. At that time, only 150 Marines were stationed on the island, with 35 dependents. Reinforcement were called in to hunt down the hideouts. American patrols with a Japanese Admiral sent to convince the troops that the war was indeed over finally convinced the holdouts to come out peacefully. The band emerged from the jungle in two groups in late April, lead by Ei Yamaguchi who turned over his sword and unit's battle flags.

Late 1948 China
An estimated 10-20,000 well equipped Japanese troops were trapped in the mountains of Manchuria and did not surrender until late in 1948.

January 1972 Guam
Shoichi Yokoi, was found along the Talofofo River. He brought back his army-issue rifle and said "I am sorry I did not serve his majesty to my satisfaction." "We Japanese soldiers were told to prefer death to the disgrace of getting captured alive,"

http://www.wanpela.com/holdouts/list.html

 

Did you read (and understand) the material I posted?

False. The BBC has exposed this in a documentary.

Btw, you are aware that Prescott Bush, amongst others helped fuel Hitler economically, right?

It doesn't take a conspiracy theorist friend. The evidence is there. The BBC did a documentary on it.

These are uncomfortable facts you are not shown in movies, or are not taught in the superficial public education system. You have to dig up scholarly works, where they have sourced the documentation of the time. Speeches, newspaper and magazine clipping, deeds and receipts to get a more complete picture.

Now the question is, someone has challenged what you know. Will you,

1) Investigate further

2) Cover your ears and close your eyes

3) Shout down and discredit anyone with a contrary opinion?

I was just doing some research for a new business I am starting by reading up at AlterNet on their mission statement, here is an interesting excerpt about the average citizen...

http://www.alternet.org/about/

Now think about that. 80% of Fox viewers totally do not understand the facts as they pertain to our most significant war in 30 years, and likely our most expensive war ever. Still even 23% of NPR/PBS viewers had the same wrong headed views.

Btw, all of these people are McCain voters.

So the ball is in your court. You can be like my friend Will.Spencer, and flirt with the truth until it gets scary at which point you deny and avoid it, or you can risk turning your world upside down and challenging what you have heard or been taught, and testing it's accuracy.

 

Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know the that the state-run BBC had done a documentary to disprove what I said. It must be true if the BBC says so.

point? Even if it's true it's the actions of one American is it not? Like I said, if you want to look for all the needles in the hay stack in order to prove how awful we are, you will always be able to do it.

Then I saw a documentary( I can't remember the name of it or much details) that showed the opposite of what the BBC documentary apparently showed. Should I automatically assume that because a documentary is produced by the British government that it trumps everything else simply because it's not American and therefore not evil and deceptive?

The rest of your post is not even germane to our conversation.

 

If you refuse to even expose yourself to their case, let alone consider and research it, then this conversation is over. Willful ignorance is where I'm going to draw the line from now on.

 

It goes both ways.