Hiroshima+Nagasaki casualties

[Karl Anderson]

harley@argote.ch (Robert Harley) writes:

> I find it disheartening how easy it apparently is to rationalize away
> a decision to massacre vast numbers of innocents.  My take is that
> they could have given a 'demo' and, if that didn't work, then later
> bomb a (much smaller) city and, if necessary, work their way up until
> the Japanese surrendered.  But they didn't have many bombs and might
> have had to delay while more were assembled and they didn't want to.
> IMO, that would have been the 'right' thing to do nevertheless.

That's the idea of "Lucky Strike" by Kim Stanley Robinson, except it's
one of the bomber crew who purposefully misses, and the effects aren't
so much the outcome of the war but the attitude towards it and future
wars.

-- 
Karl Anderson      kra@monkey.org           http://www.monkey.org/~kra/