I really have problems with articles written 70+ years later about WWII making assumptions and conclusions about what one nation "had to" or "didn't have to do" to protect it's people and win the war.
Viewed through our modern lenses of morality, with almost a century of data to inform on these opinions, it seems unfair to claim "racism" when likely the real story is more muddied, and more influenced by other factors.
Thank you for saying this. I am continually surprised by some of these articles attempting to use their 20/20 hindsight to pretend they know what was the right thing to do at the time.
This same retrospective bias is constantly applied to the atomic bombings of Japan.
It's easy to make a strong humanitarian argument against events when you remove all historical context from them and substitute in your own modern context.
For example, on Sept 11th 1944, my hometown of Darmstadt (a unprotected city of little strategic importance that late in the war: it had a single north-south / east-west railroad crossing, that's it) was bombed with white phosphorus by the British. 10,000 civilians died in the first few hours. 1/3 of the city was leveled. It's not clear to me right now, but my parents told me that white phosphorus was against the geneva convention even at the time.
Some of the English pilots involved regard the fire-bombing of Germany as a war crime. Indeed, one of the reasons it wasn't a war crime is because it no-one thought a country would bomb civilians and so "don't target civilians" didn't get written into any treaties.
The change in attitude throughout the war, starting from a position of "do not bomb civilians" and ending with "fire bomb civilian populations to kill as many civilians as possible, in a probably horrible way" is covered nicely in Max Hastings' book "Bomber Command".
English Bomber Command suffered heavy losses. About 55,000 aircrew died, of a total about about 125,000 men. (That's around a 44% death rate, which is uncomfortably close to a coin-toss.)
On the other hand, Nazi Germany was pretty much "the devil" back then, and quite rightly so. Germans were bombing Britain, causing massive disruption and fear.
We'd like to hope that modern societies would refrain from war crimes even in the face of fear and irrational anger, but in the "war on terror" this has happened again, albeit on a much smaller scale.
I prefer not to pass judgement. I believe we should seek peace rather than "truth" whenever we can.
Hitler was a US backed dictator in the same way that Saddam was for decades. Eventually it got out of hand and the USA had to declare war on Nazi Germany, but Hitler still managed to do what the US wanted him to do: Inflict maximum damage on the Soviet Union and weaken Europe so that the US could take over half of the continent.
It's a mistake to judge the actions of the past by the perceptions of the present.
Should we bomb civilians? No. Was the bombing of civilians a commonplace and accepted strategy in WWII? Yes.
So who is right--our present judgment of how civilians fit into warfare or the then-judgment of how civilians fit into warfare?
That is, I think, a reasonable and important question. The article's error is to assume that it knows the answer, perhaps even not to realize that the question is there to be asked or that it haunts the whole discussion. This oversight causes the author to write with pain, confusion, and a sense of indignation and to try to convey this pain, confusion, and indignation to us. Those of us who easily agree with the author's ethical perspective will comfortably join in the drum-beating and cry-rallying. But those who recognize that different times and cultures and situations raise real and serious questions about our perception of ethics will be slower to judge the past.
I'm thankful that we live in a time when we can tread carefully in how we wage war and can work hard to avoid civilian casualties. I agree that wherever possible, civilians--even enemy civilians--should be protected from violence. Killing innocents--even enemy innocents--is wrong. But I don't assume that every time is like ours. If you want to convince me that the bombing of Tokyo (or Dresden or anywhere else) is wrong, convince me that it was wrong by the lights of the people who did it, not be the lights of people who can sit comfortably in their air conditioned offices seventy years later, tapping our opinions into softly glowing screens.
Opinion changed during the war. British bomber command started with the attitude of "don't bomb civilians". That was tricky because most major German cities had important factories and bombing was not very precise at the beginning of the war. But, still, the intent was to hit the factories and not the civilian populations.
It's only as the war progressed that some people pushed for bombing of civilians.
> If you want to convince me that the bombing of Tokyo (or Dresden or anywhere else) is wrong, convince me that it was wrong by the lights of the people who did it
Are you saying you think mass murder is okay as long as the people who did it thought it was a good idea at the time?
I'm sorry, but that is at best an incredibly simplistic view. Russia got a lot of military supplies from the west, and Germany spent a huge portion of its air capacity on britan. If the allies hadn't taken north Africa and the mideast back, Germany would not have run out of oil either.
- How can "racism" explain US bombing of Japan when the exact same tactics were used against Germany?
- The piece has two links supposedly documenting Japanese piece overtures. One goes to no such discussion. (The other gives a brief summary of the Trohan article.) Sloppy.
- The question of who spoke for the Japanese government was very real, and made suspect overtures from "high Japanese officials".
- "Victory for the Allies was guaranteed by the start of the year" is a remarkable statement. There was little doubt that the Allies would win, but the timing and cost of that victory were very much in question.
What happened in Tokyo, Nagasaki, Hiroshima was truly terrible. Arguments that it was unnecessary, and willfully unnecessary, would have to be much stronger than this.
Dan Carlin covered the firebombing of Tokyo in one of the Hardcore History podcasts. It was a fascinating listen, but I can't remember which episode it was.
Just stared listening to Hardcore History, and that was the first one I listened to. He talks about the bombings of London, and the bombings that the Allies carried out as well.
What frightens me is that we don't seem to have come far enough as a society since those times. Benjamin Barber and Noam Chomsky have done a pretty good job of exposing current-day American exceptionalism. This article points out that the attitudes which made such atrocities possible still exists today. Chomsky's essay "We Own the World"[1] is another good read - it's uncharacteristically short and accessible. Alas, "a prophet is without honour in his home town".
As someone who has actually studied world war 2, and am right in the middle of the phenominal "hell to pay” study which documents the actual American plans for invasion of the home islands in light of revision criticism that the bombings where only there to keep the soviets out, this article is highly intellectually dishonest.
Lets start with what the author does get right. It was a time of racism and brutality. The eastern Europe front was a war of genocide - and both sides won. The only American theater even remotely like the sheer savagry of the East was the pacific theater.
However, the mechanisms of firebombing did not originate as some sort of evil white man plot (tm). In fact, it occured in Europe first by accident. It was predicted before the war, and the idea that "the bombers would always get through" and destroy cities was burned into the imaginations and strategies of all of the worlds powers before World War II. Japan counted on the vast distance between San Fransisco and Tokyo to protect them from the horrors that they had unleashed on China, the Philippians and countless other peoples in the Southeastern Pacific. They were wrong.
The US in Japan, just like the Japanese in Asia, and the Europeans had moved to strategic bombing to attempt to remove the will to fight from the population, so a invasion would not be necessary, or at least, as easy as possible.
The author assumes that Japanese saw the sheer causalities coming out of the pacific, and concluded that they were defeated The opposite was actually true. The high casualties (and more notably, the high casualties imposed on the Allies) where encouraging the military. As Hattori Takushiro - The Complete History of the Greater East Asia War noted:
"The Okninawa operation achieved it's objective, which was more important then the aforementioned figures of war results. This strenuous fighting provided us with valuable time to complete the general preparation for the homeland decisive operation and to delay the enemy's attack. Moreover, the brave resistance of soldiers an civilians struck the enemy with horror, and made him cautious about attacking the homeland."
At this time - the Minister of War in Japan recorded this:
“[Diplomacy will have a better chance] after the United States has sustained heavy losses. We cannot pretend to claim that victory is certain, but it is far too early to say that the war is lost. That we will inflict severe losses on the enemy when he invades Japan is certain, and it is by no means impossible that we may be able to reverse the situation in our favor, pulling victory out of defeat”. (General Anami Korechita).
Interestingly enough the thing that could convince them otherwise was what the author is attacking - wholesale destruction of Japan’s ability to make war. This was because Japan had attempted de-centralized their economy to protect it - putting workshops into backyards. This effort was never (as the author claimed) canceled. Japan never had the industrial power to pull off this migration in the first place.
The Author also makes a huge mistake in buying the myth that Japan was destroyed prior to the firebombing of Tokyo, and in fact, prior to the the atomic bombings. Japan had it’s fleet wiped out at the Battle of Leyte Gulf, and moved completely to Kamikaze attacks. These Kamikaze attacks severely damaged more then 400 ships, and killed around 5000 sailors. Where it not for the absolutely insane logistics structure the Americans and built, and the floating pearl harbor in Ulithi Atoll, the American fleet would have had to retreat. (Same source -Hell to pay by D.M Giangreco). The Japanese had also used this time to pull the Kwangtung army out of China, and into position to defend (correctly) anticipated attacks and Kyushu. As a side note - if that invasion had occurred it would have been a disaster for the US. The US badly underestimated the troops there, the beaches where known, and the Japanese had ten times the fuel, and twice the fighters anticipated. They had the US figured out.
The Japanese estimated that the two invasions would cost 20 million Japanese lives, and that Americans estimated could cost 10 million Japanese casualties (how many deaths versus injuries where unclear). 20 million is the Japanese number.
American estimates from Intelligence, Army and Navy, as well as independent analysis by former president Hoover pegged the American deaths greater then 1mm.
The firebombing of Tokyo and the nuclear bombs must be viewed in this light.
On the diplomacy side, the author again simply ignores facts. Wikipedia has a decent overview of what really occurred with the Japanese overtures:
Satō advised Tōgō that in reality, "unconditional surrender or terms closely equivalent thereto" was all that Japan could expect. Moreover, in response to Molotov's requests for specific proposals, Satō suggested that Tōgō's messages were not "clear about the views of the Government and the Military with regard to the termination of the war," thus questioning whether Tōgō's initiative was supported by the key elements of Japan's power structure.[47]
On July 17, Tōgō responded:
Although the directing powers, and the government as well, are convinced that our war strength still can deliver considerable blows to the enemy, we are unable to feel absolutely secure peace of mind ... Please bear particularly in mind, however, that we are not seeking the Russians' mediation for anything like an unconditional surrender.[48]
In reply, Satō clarified:
It goes without saying that in my earlier message calling for unconditional surrender or closely equivalent terms, I made an exception of the question of preserving [the imperial family].[49]
On July 21, speaking in the name of the cabinet, Tōgō repeated:
With regard to unconditional surrender we are unable to consent to it under any circumstances whatever.
As the author notes - the Allies read this in real-time. Also Tōgō was in fact in the peace party at this point. Even after this firebombing, other Japanese cities being destroyed, the imminent arrival of the Soviets into the War, and the atomic bombings, the peace party and the militarists still deadlocked. It took the emperor finally speaking up to end the war, and even that was almost derailed by a coup attempt. Japan was not ready to accept any sort of unconditional surrender.
More the point, America and Europe had just finished a brutal war in Europe. The point of view then was that the war occurred because Germany had no truly been defeated in World War I. All where concerned with not seeing another world war. Marshall talked about this at length after the war.
The assertion that the United States wanted Soviets out of the war is easily disproven. The Soviets in fact where out of the war at this point. The US was pleading with the Soviets to get involved. There were hawks that were concerned (rightfully, as it turns out) that the Soviets would try to grab as much of Asia as they could, similar to what they would do to Asia, but anyone who thinks that the US wasn’t focused on Japan, is being just as racist by dismissing what the Japanese actually where at this point in history.
Finally, the point that the author pours scorn on - that the Japanese were so poor they were now building planes out of wood - ignores that the Japanese had actually stumbled onto a amazing surprise. Wood planes where invisible to radar. That made them perfect for attacking the US fleet, where Radar had made common attacks impossible.
If people really want to understand this - take a look at Dan Carlins’ “Logical Insanity” podcast. Trying to judge this time, by present standard - to say nothing about left-wing trolls - is nonsensical.
Viewed through our modern lenses of morality, with almost a century of data to inform on these opinions, it seems unfair to claim "racism" when likely the real story is more muddied, and more influenced by other factors.