csc@watmath.UUCP (Computer Sci Club) (01/19/84)
I fail to see why people continue to treat Hiroshima and Nagasaki as
if they were special cases. The practice of indescriminate bombing of
civilian populations was widespread in WWII, the participants varying more
in their technical proficience than in their attitude. The bombing of
Hiroshima (or of Nagasaki; the Japanese had not surrendered and professed the
opinion that the Americans had only had one bomb) was no more or less "right"
than the bombing of London by the Germans, Berlin by the Allies, or the
attempted bombing of the west coast of North America by the Japanese. In fact
the fire bombings of Dresden and Tokyo were comparable in effect to the
Hiroshima bomb.
One can of course make a case (a very strong case) against indescriminate
bombing, but does success or lack thereof have any bearing on the morality
of such actions?
William Hughes