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From: reiher@ucla-cs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: World War II
Message-ID: <5215@ucla-cs.ARPA>
Date: Sun, 5-May-85 23:58:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.5215
Posted: Sun May  5 23:58:52 1985
Date-Received: Fri, 10-May-85 03:02:12 EDT
References: <919@homxa.UUCP>
Reply-To: reiher@ucla-cs.UUCP (Peter Reiher)
Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department
Lines: 65
Summary: 

In article <919@homxa.UUCP> hood@homxa.UUCP (Ron Hood) writes:
>
>While contemplating our righteous roll in the war I suddenly
>realized that we have the honor of being the only country which has used
>an atomic bomb on peoples - not once, but twice.  Now of course it was
>only the enemy, and if we hadn't used the bombs a lot of our boys would
>have died instead, but the fact is that we blew up a lot of people - mostly
>civilians.  

Well, it isn't time for a recurrence of the debate over whether our use of
the atomic bomb in WWII was justified or not (we went through it in 
excruciating detail a few months ago).  Suffice it to say that there are some
reasonably well-informed people who believe that, as a result of the use of
the atomic bomb, fewer Japanese died than would have otherwise.  Other
knowledgeable disagreeing opinions also exist.  Regardless of this, the 
comparison between the use of concentration camps and the use of atomic weapons 
isn't really correct, as the purpose of the second was to end the war, whereas 
the first really had nothing to do with the conduct of the war.  (Except to 
partially cripple Germany's war effort.  Concentration camps were expensive.)  
A better parallel is our self-righteous anger over German bombing in England, 
when our bombings of Germany and Japan were every bit as bad; actually worse, 
especially in Japan's case.

>...We also had our own home grown concentration camps here in 
>the states for all those slanty-eyed types who were obviously here to
>spy on us (the American citizenship was part of their cover).  
>
Our treatment of the Americans of Japanese ancestry during WWII was 
reprehensible.  None the less, there's a big difference between expropriating
people's property, rounding them up, and shoving them into uncomfortable
detention camps (as we did), and the German's further step of massacring
them.  I've never heard anyone say that the American's intentionally killed
a single one of the Japanese-Americans we imprisoned.  This doesn't make it
right or make America guiltless, but it's just bogus to argue that we did the
same thing as the Germans.

>...but I was surprised how easy it is to
>absolve the US of any wrong doing in the war and yet still remember
>Germanys sins.  I guess we have two things going for us:
>
>	1) We won.  That proves that we were right and gives
>	us the opportunity to tell the story our way.
>
>	2) We had good reasons for doing what we did whereas the
>	Germans were all a bunch of savages and killed people
>	only because they wanted to (sickos!).
>
Victory is always important in determining the morality of wars, unfortunately,
but again you make the mistake of saying that since we both did bad things,
we have no right to judge the Germans (or the Japanese, for that matter).
Our excesses and crimes are trifling when compared to those of the Germans,
and our record is even pretty good against the Japanese.  One hears stories of
Germans massacring prisoners, followed by American soldiers saying "We didn't
take any prisoners for a couple weeks."  Here there is relatively little moral
difference.  (Maybe we get a little edge because we didn't do it first, but 
that's not much of a defense.)  On the other hand, nobody claims that Americans
systematically went about slaughtering people because of their religious or
ethnic backgrounds.  There was a fundamental sickness in German society which
permitted them to set up death camps.  We didn't have that sickness.  Neither
did the British, the French, or even the Japanese and the Italians.  This
sickness makes the Germans of that era worse.  
-- 
        			Peter Reiher
        			reiher@ucla-cs.arpa
        			{...ihnp4,ucbvax,sdcrdcf}!ucla-cs!reiher