[jpamata]

I was born in Southeast Asia, lived in China for a while, everyone I've met views it as some kind of karmic justice. It's the idea you get from school (we were living peacefully, then we got attacked and they did all these brutal crimes) and from our grandparents.

I've only seen the contrarian opinion coming from westerners. Perhaps because there's barely any media from Hollywood about the pacific theater, and if there was (eg. HBO's The Pacific), it does not show the horrors of it.

If one is more interested in an objective take on history, especially those using the argument that the Japanese were already "defeated" before the bombs came, then the book Downfall by Richard B Frank is a good book to start with for those who hold a firm anti-nuke stance.

[TMWNN]

>I was born in Southeast Asia, lived in China for a while, everyone I've met views it as some kind of karmic justice. It's the idea you get from school (we were living peacefully, then we got attacked and they did all these brutal crimes) and from our grandparents.

>I've only seen the contrarian opinion coming from westerners.

Not even Japanese believe otherwise. When John Hersey (discussed elsewhere) revisited Japan in the 1960s, the Japanese he met with were amazed by the notion that the US should apologize for the atomic bombs. They viewed it as an understandable thing to do in wartime.

[lovemenot]

I didn't live here in the 1960s, but my experience in Japan for the last many years doesn't bear this out.

Most would prefer not think about it, of course. Amongst those that sometimes do, the majority are opposed to nuclear weapons' possession and use.

In contemporary Japan it would be hard to find either a dove or a hawk or anything between who'd say bombing those two cities was justified. Hawks are more likely to say Japan was minding its own imperialistic business, just as Europeans had been doing for centuries prior. So Japan didn't deserve those bombings. Doves will be opposed to any kind of nuclear weapon and tend to showcase their compatriots' suffering in order to help prevent further proliferation and destruction.

Some Japanese Buddhists believe that their constant prayers for peace have been directly responsible for averting annihilation of the world since 1945. I'd guess that's 15% of the population.

I haven't read Hersey, but I could easily believe that in the 1960's he was told what people thought he wanted to hear. Not deceptively, but non-confrontationally.

[tanbog5]

Revenge - especially in the form of massive civilian murder - is not justice.

"If one is more interested in an objective take on history,"

There is no such thing.

[jpamata]

That's why I said karmic justice.

I think it's a close book. The book details the decision process from both sides. Japan's plans to continue the war. The way the high command coped with the first atomic bomb, etc. It does not sway you into thinking any side was justified, but it expands one's perspective to help you understand the other's side.

[askin4it]

No matter how much you don't like it, the use of that weapon was neither revenge or murder.

I personally don't see the world in terms of revenge and murder, so it's hard for me to understand how such specifically personal behaviors factor into the first Atomic attack.