You must do what you need to do. The United States was justified in dropping the atomic bombs on Japan. What would our country be if we would have held back and not used the technology we had developed? No one knows, because the United States dropped the atomic bombs, which accomplished the ultimate goal in war; victory. Work Cited: Hersey, John.
His nuclear deterrent foreign policy played a very large role in the Cold War, and is still effective today. Nuclear deterrent means if a country launches nuclear weapons against the United States, The United States would retaliate with its own nuclear strike (“Dwight D. Eisenhower” 304). In the end there would be no real winner, just total destruction. Eisenhower demonstrated this when he said “I would say a preventive war, if the words mean anything, is to wage some sort of quick police action in order that you might avoid a terrific cataclysm of destruction later.” (“Dwight D Eisenhower” 136). Knowing this, other countries will try to avoid total destruction instead of starting a nuclear war.
In other words, the moral issues to not use nuclear warfare fails to meet the argument for dropping the bomb and changes the subject from the immediate decision to the long-term consequences of the decision (Truman Library). But even if one grants the point about fear of annihilation, it is not clear that the world has fundamentally changed nor that the whole world is always in danger of nations from time immemorial. For example, ancient Rome sacked Carthage, plowed it under and salted the earth (Sherrow 72). Medieval and modern religious wars have annihilated millions. More recently, there was Hitler's genocidal six-million-death final solution to the Jewish problem, and the Communists' ten of millions of mass murders continue to this day.
To what extent was the nuclear arms race a stabilising factor in the cold war between 1949 and 1963? The nuclear arms race was very much a stabilising factor in the cold war, nuclear weapons were never used in an aggressive way. It was more the fear of each country using nuclear weapons against one another that aided the stabilisation of the cold war. It allowed the cold war to continue to be dormant and lives were not lost as a result of a catastrophic explosion. And with the cold war the likelihood would have been that once one side had launched a nuclear bomb, the other would and the cold war would have turned into a world- wide disaster.
And so at that moment, USA became the most powerful nation on earth. One thing most people don’t realise about the atomic bomb is the actual destruction it made. The US did not know the amount of damage the bomb was going to create, or the effects it would have on the people effected by the radiation, it was an inhuman act of cruelty. Yuko nakamura, a survivor of the atomic bomb tells us what she could see after the blast… “I was only 13 at the time; the atomic bomb turned
A strategy was already devised to defeat Japan "without reliance upon the atomic bomb, which had not yet been tested in New Mexico." (Document A) From a report of a Scientific Panel, a moderate consensus was stated that "the opportunity of saving American lives by immediate military use, and believe that such use will improve the international prospects, in that they are more concerned with the prevention of war than with the elimination of this special weapon," helped bring support for the cause to use the bomb to end the war quickly. (Document G) But the United States seemed not to be concerned so much with the defeat of the Japanese which as General H. H. Arnold, Commander of the American Army Air Force stated: "atomic bomb or no atomic bomb, the Japanese were already on the verge of collapse," (Document B), but instead with Soviet involvement in the war. The United States and Britain felt threatened by Russia. They knew that Russia was bitter from their loss of territory and dignity after Japan defeated them in 1904.
Moreover, other countries claimed the right of nuclear weapons to defend their citizens. Consequently, the tragic bombings became the example of an arm’s race instead of peace. Furthermore, since Japan was already on the brink of collapse the bombing was unnecessary, and peace talks would have taken place within a decent time frame (even after the cancelled Hawaii summit). The millions of deaths calculated by Operation Downfall [the codename for the Allied plan for the invasion of Japan near the end of the Second World War, which was abandoned when Japan surrendered following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki] actually show that only desperation and honour stood between Japan and unconditional
How does the information on the laws and customs of war in article xxv relate to the case? The article states that the attack of towns, villages or habitations which are not defended, is prohibited. The dropping of the atomic bomb caused towns and villages that were heavily populated with civilians to be demolished. 3. Seeing as there are rules pertaining to humanity during war, was dropping the atomic bomb humanitarian?
During the Cold War, there was a massive increase nuclear weapons manufactured. This disposed a danger because a small conflict could have escalated into a full-scale nuclear war. This possibility forced the two powers to co-exist is a forced friendship. Instead of fighting each other directly, indirect confrontation was chosen instead, and on several occasions. There are several reasons as to why they never met each other directly on the battlefield.
Bush's administration sought and received permission from Congress to design a new class of nuclear weapons: "mini-nukes," relatively low-yield tactical nuclear weapons for use against underground bunkers and other small battlefield targets. Advocates of these new weapons point to the uniquely powerful, compact "punch" that can be delivered by a nuclear weapon; critics argue that even a small nuclear weapon may cause many civilian casualties, and, more important, that actual use of a nuclear weapon of any size would break the taboo on such use that has held since the end of World War II, making the use of larger, more destructive nuclear weapons more likely in future