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From: roman@sigma.UUCP (Bill Roman)
Newsgroups: net.politics,net.misc,net.rumor
Subject: Lives saved by nuking Japan?!? (was Re: The Presidents...)
Message-ID: <735@sigma.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 26-May-86 12:51:50 EDT
Article-I.D.: sigma.735
Posted: Mon May 26 12:51:50 1986
Date-Received: Fri, 30-May-86 04:48:39 EDT
References: <133@petrus.UUCP> <513@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU> <709@jade.BERKELEY.EDU> <2784@pixar.pixar>
Reply-To: roman@sigma.UUCP (Bill Roman)
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Xref: watmath net.politics:16444 net.misc:9720 net.rumor:2545

In article <2784@pixar.pixar> good@pixar.UUCP writes:
>
>Truman saved millions of lives, both American and Japanese, by dropping those
>bombs.
>
>-- 
>		--Craig
>		...{ucbvax,sun}!pixar!good

I recommend an article "A postwar myth: 500,000 U.S. lives saved" in
the June/July 1986 issue of _Bulletin_of_the_Atomic_Scientists_
to anyone who believes this.  Briefly summarized, it states that the
"half a million boys on our side" that Truman is quoted as believing
he saved with the atomic bombs was an after-the-fact rationalization.
The military plans for the invasion estimated casualties on our side
at roughly an order of magnitude less.

The couple of hundred thousand who died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki
were civilians; I don't think the bombings were particularly significant
militarily.  They served more as a frightful demonstration.  I
personally find the morality of such action totally abhorrent.
-- 
Bill Roman	{ihnp4,decvax,allegra,...}!uw-beaver!tikal!sigma!roman
Summation, Inc. (206) 486-0991