XPost: alt.fan.furry, rec.arts.anime.misc   
   From: bliss@sfo.com   
      
   On 08/16/2010 07:26 AM, sanjian wrote:   
   > Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor) wrote:   
   >> B Sellers wrote:   
   >>> On 08/13/2010 04:47 PM, sanjian wrote:   
   >>>> B Sellers wrote:   
   >>>>   
   >>>>> Yes well I was born in 1937 and remember the announcement   
   >>>>> of the bombing of Pearl Harbor and of the Declaration of War as   
   >>>>> well as the famous "a day that will live in infamy forever" but   
   >>>>> December the 6th was a bad day too because that is the day that   
   >>>>> Roosevelt finally got the Manhattan Project started.  I didn't   
   >>>>   
   >>>> You say it was a bad thing.  I say it was a good one.   
   >>>   
   >>>      And you have read "Barefoot Gen" sometimes called   
   >>> "Gen of Hiroshima"?   
   >>>   
   >>>      Did you know thousands of American POWs died at   
   >>> Hiroshima?   
   >>>      Did you know the delivery of the Nagasaki bomb   
   >>> was so off center it missed the targeted area and took   
   >>> out a residential area with the oldest Catholic Church   
   >>> in Japan?   
   >>>   
   >>>      Well I guess it was the Japanese Imperial Army's   
   >>> fault.  They scared us so bad, and made us so crazy-mad   
   >>> that we bombed them with the brand-new hell-on-earth bomb.   
   >>   
   >> No, it was a perfectly calmly reasoned decision, and pretty much the   
   >> only one that made sense at the time.   
   >>   
   >> If we didn't put a stop to the war fast, we were going to have to take   
   >> the Japanese islands one foot at a time. The evidence to hand gave us   
   >> good reason to believe that this would result in possibly hundreds of   
   >> thousands of our own people dead, and possibly TEN TIMES that many   
   >> Japanese.   
   >   
   >    
   >   
   > I think you've said it better than I would.  So, in the intest of time (both   
   > mine, and the readers'), I'll let this stand as my response to B Sellers.   
   > Though I'll add one bit in response to B Sellers:   
   >   
   > "Well I guess it was the Japanese Imperial Army's fault.  They scared us so   
   > bad, and made us so crazy-mad that we bombed them with the brand-new   
   > hell-on-earth bomb."   
   >   
   > Dude, did you not pay attention to that whole island-hopping campaign?  The   
   > Imperial Army wasn't exactly the Iraqi Republican Guard.  We would have won   
   > the invasion of the mainland (does that term really have any meaning when   
   > applied to Japan???), our air superiority ensured that, but there probably   
   > wouldn't be much of a Japan left afterwards.  And, frankly, I'm rather fond   
   > of Japan, so I'm kind of glad we picked the least-destructive option.   
      
   	The JIA was almost gone from Japan by the time the bombs were dropped.   
     Old women and children were being trained with bamboo spears.  So many   
   of the capable men had been sent abroad that this is what they were   
   reduced to.  Of course we had no reliable intelligence on the matter at   
   the time.   
      
   	First let me say I don't know how I conflated the number of   
   American POW in Japan with the relatively small numbers killed at   
   Hiroshima. I read a lot and sometimes I miss things.   
      
   	Second I would have chosen the interdiction of Japan so that   
   they got no external supplies.  That is why the kids in Grave of the   
   Fireflies died was because the Japanese were unable to produce enough   
   food for the population.  That would have been extended to a wider   
   area of the population.  Instead of going for Japan a entry to Korea   
   to secure that from the Soviet state might have prevented the formation   
   of North Korea and would have again cut the flow of material into   
   Japan.   
   	As for the invasion of Japan that would have been held off   
   for a while. Until they were eager to have the presence of troops   
   of any nation with food.   
   	   
   	That said I go right along with Truman whose opinion after   
   the fact was that dropping what we would now consider "toy bombs"   
   was simply murder.   
   	   
   	Remember I lived through those years as child and was very   
   happy the war had come to an end.  I did not much care for the   
   means at the time but find that use of weapons of mass destruction   
   mostly against civilian populations is reprehensible.   But in   
   WW II we did that all the time and if Germany had not been   
   beaten before the bomb was ready I am sure we would have used   
   it there.  So I guess all in all I approve of the bombings   
   but I don't have to like them.  Maybe something to do with   
   my nuclear attack triage training.   
      
   	Once it was used though through one means and another   
   it was much simpler for other nations to build their own   
   devices.  So we ended up not only having used the bomb which   
   is what we do with bombs by and large but began the Nuclear   
   Club and escalated into the Mutual Assured Destruction doctrine   
   of the Cold War years.   
      
   	We finished off the Cold War but so far Nuclear Disarmament   
   is far from a reality.  The motives of the interventions in   
   countless states from South America to the Middle East are   
   unclear but as soon as the USSR was no longer a threat we   
   had terrorists to deal with.  Now Iran a nation where our agents   
   assassinated the head of the democratically elected government   
   to install a Shah as leader is working on joining the Nuclear   
   Club and the members don't get a vote unless of course the   
   Israelis decide to do a preemptive strike.   
      
   	Grave of the Fireflies is good showing a personal tragedy   
   but Gen of Hiroshima is somewhat better at depicting the milieu of   
   wartime Japan where pacifist elements were suppressed and the   
   military took power away from the civil populace.  But you have   
   to read about Meji and the transition to Showa and early Showa   
   government changes from plutocracy to militarism to see how it   
   happened.  There is a slim very hard to handle volume on Thought   
   Control in Pre-WW II Japan that details how the category of   
   thought crimes which were based on suppression of speech and   
   action not on thought came about.   
      
   	Gen of Hiroshima/Barefoot Gen recommendation is based   
   on the manga not on any anime derivation.  Also good though   
   not as gritty is Message to Adolph by Tezuka Osamu and for   
   the Post War years, try "Goodby 1971-1972",  is a manga from   
   before the economic recovery of Japan by Yoshihiro Tatsumi   
   and is an adult manga depicting the lowest in society.   
   Yoshihiro Tatsumi has a couple of others and merges nicely with   
   his "Drifting Life" semi-autobigraphical manga.   These do not   
   use bishonen or bishojo styling in the drawing but a different   
   sort of cartoon realism.  This to offset the latest trend in   
   stuff like "Rumi Fujoshi", "Dojin Work" and even the more serious   
   "Bakuman" which has a similar plot to "Comic Party" but aimed at   
   professional success.   
      
   	I am glad too that Japan survived and that the Allies   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)