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In it, McNamara, ex US Sec of Defence, claims that US leaders would have been tried for war crimes for what they did in Japan, had the US lost the war.
He's refering primarily to the B29 campaign against the Japanese cities - and not the dropping of the atomic bombs. People tend to remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki and forget that large areas of Japan's cities were razed by conventional bombing against which they eventually had very little defence.
I think it's poignant that the people involved in such a campaign do reflect on their actions.
But not evidently enough to stop the secret carpet bombing of Cambodia under Nixon. Operation Menu - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
He's refering primarily to the B29 campaign against the Japanese cities - and not the dropping of the atomic bombs. People tend to remember Hiroshima and Nagasaki and forget that large areas of Japan's cities were razed by conventional bombing against which they eventually had very little defence.
I think it's poignant that the people involved in such a campaign do reflect on their actions.
I also think it's very poignant that the Japanese have tended not to pose such questions of themselves with regard to some of their questionable acts in China and SE Asia. I don't think had they been victors that they would have allowed any question of the proportionality or morality of their actions.
And while we are on the razing of cities Bombing of Dresden in World War II - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
In the end it always comes down to the motivation behind such actions.
Moral?
I think there is one. And it's the one that people totally miss. And it's simple in principle: Know when to surrender.
many claim it was the lack of coal that hit first, not lack of weapons, and that was largely because of the loss of territory and not the efforts of Harris. Although many continue to argue the accuracy of this last point.
I disagree.
But was it not oil that was the issue - and in particularly the attacks by USAAF and RAF on the fuel conversion plants generating synthetic oil products from coal that were effective. There was a sustained and effective effort against these facilities that had a growing impact through 1944.
Not only did it deplete production and severely restrict military supplies but it also drew in huge amounts of labour and resource to build, repair, and rebuild facilities.
It's kind of fashionable to knock strategic bombing and in particular Bomber Command's efforts - I think that many people drastically underestimate just what the RAF achieved. The Russians were nowhere near as effective on the ground (or industially) as the historical fashionistas believe - and were much much more dependent on USAAF and RAF strategic campaigns than they will ever admit.
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