(September 15, 2012 at 2:24 pm)Tiberius Wrote: I'm aware I don't have to. I'm just stating my position in this debate. Regardless of how "necessary" people seem to think it was, I view it as an act of terrorism due to the targets being cities rather than military installations. Indeed, most of the Japanese military were elsewhere, anticipating an invasion.
There is a reason why those nukes are still to this day the only nukes ever launched against a country during a war. It's because we realised how much of a mistake it was to use them. Nukes cannot be controlled; they will destroy much more than is intended, and they leave behind deadly radiation that spreads, killing more and more people who weren't even initial targets.
I find myself with a foot in both camps. My problem is not with the morality it is with expedience. The act is wrong, but in a conflict where the other party hits bellow the belt and there are no judges, umpires, or referees that can stop him what do you do? If the british had not bombed civilians, there would now probably be nobody of jewish or romany extraction in Europe. The german war machine would have been able to hold out longer, and would have been able to place more units at the front so even the bombing of the innocent has some justification.
In this light could I say Truman committed an act of immorality? For me the answer is;- I cannot convict him as I feel I have to take the circumstances into account.
In fact I think any system that convicted without looking a circumstances would of itself be immoral.
