Anniversary of Hiroshima bombing

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b_sinning

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Nov 22, 2004
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"Today marks 64 years since the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan by the United States at the end of World War II. Targeted for military reasons and for its terrain (flat for easier assessment of the aftermath), Hiroshima was home to approximately 250,000 people at the time of the bombing. The U.S. B-29 Superfortress bomber "Enola Gay" took off from Tinian Island very early on the morning of August 6th, carrying a single 4,000 kg (8,900 lb) uranium bomb codenamed "Little Boy". At 8:15 am, Little Boy was dropped from 9,400 m (31,000 ft) above the city, freefalling for 57 seconds while a complicated series of fuse triggers looked for a target height of 600 m (2,000 ft) above the ground. At the moment of detonation, a small explosive initiated a super-critical mass in 64 kg (141 lbs) of uranium. Of that 64 kg, only .7 kg (1.5 lbs) underwent fission, and of that mass, only 600 milligrams was converted into energy - an explosive energy that seared everything within a few miles, flattened the city below with a massive shockwave, set off a raging firestorm and bathed every living thing in deadly radiation. Nearly 70,000 people are believed to have been killed immediately, with possibly another 70,000 survivors dying of injuries and radiation exposure by 1950. "

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2009/08/hiroshima_64_years_ago.html

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It changed the world. Was it the right thing to do?
 
I understand why the US did it but I think by dropping it on civilians they proved themselves no better than the people they were fighting. Couldn't it have been dropped on an enemy occupied island or an off shore naval force?
 
Depends on how you look at it. From a military standpoint, it was wrong because we had already won. But from a scientific standpoint, we gained TONS of knowledge about the nuclear process, its effects on landscape and creatures, proper cleanup, etc.
 
b_sinning said:
I understand why the US did it but I think by dropping it on civilians they proved themselves no better than the people they were fighting. Couldn't it have been dropped on an enemy occupied island or an off shore naval force?
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Dude... do you even know what [ame="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_bombing"]Strategic bombing[/ame] is?
 
I understand Strategic bombing but still think the US should have chosen different targets. It appears that the US is a big believer of doing it by your list. I'm just glad that they haven't embarked on full scale biological warfare yet.
 
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fly said:
Depends on how you look at it. From a military standpoint, it was wrong because we had already won. But from a scientific standpoint, we gained TONS of knowledge about the nuclear process, its effects on landscape and creatures, proper cleanup, etc.
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:wtf: Does the 'knowledge' gained mean that it was right to experiment with thousands of innocent lives?
 
fly said:
Depends on how you look at it. From a military standpoint, it was wrong because we had already won. But from a scientific standpoint, we gained TONS of knowledge about the nuclear process, its effects on landscape and creatures, proper cleanup, etc.
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Japan couldve lasted years o_O We wanted to avoid a d-day type landing against an entirely hostile population.

Japan was done for after the philipenes ( cant spell ). And whoever posted the other thing about us being like them, it wasnt great humanitarian achievement but it wasnt genocide/torture etc., instead of dropping a lot of really small bombs we dropped a couple of big ones.
 
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after what they did in pearl harbor the sentiment in the US was we really didn't care if we killed civs as long as we saved US lives and got them to surrender...they were the aggressor
 
shawndavid said:
Yeah, the state of mind was that we really didn't want a prolonged Pacific theater.

By the way, the folks who brought you Band of Brothers are FINALLY almost done with the Pacific miniseries for HBO. I am so stoked.
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yup, I mentioned that in the junk drawer the other day...supposed to air starting march '10 iirc and they spent 250 mill making it
 
There was some brutal fighting in the Pacific. I wonder if it follows a group of Marines or the Navy. I've been watching some of the stories of the Big E on history channel. That is the Enterprise Aircraft carrier and the battle fleet that was with it. It was in the middle of some of the worst navy battles of the war.

I had a great uncle that was on a few of the ships that was in that fleet. He was discharged after the 3rd boat he was on sunk. He was considered unlucky by the Navy. He thought he was really lucky becuase twice he was in the water for a few days a survived.
 
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