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Originally Posted by theonlywhiteout
This is a bizarre sentence. You're suggesting that since the atomic bomb did the killing for Americans that they're some how morally cleansed of the action? Or are you saying that because Japan 1st attacked America the Allies could use whatever force necessary to end the war, even bombing civilians? Please elaborate.
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Simplification of war, but in the conditions of WW2 yes, and remember that the Japanese Military knew that the war was lost, but they figured if they could bleed the American's massively during a land invasion that they would be able to negotiate from a position of greater strength. Civilian deaths in their minds were just another card on the table. And in WW2, civilian deaths happened from bombing campaigns first and foremost because most of the industrial capability was embedded in the cities, and second it was hoped that the Japanese civilian base would turn against the Military and the Emperor and force them to sue for peace.
The sad truth of war is that its goals are to destroy an enemies capability to make war by destroying their industrial base, and in WW2, to put the fear of god into your enemies and their civilians.
In hindsight, maybe the best thing to do would have been to setup a maritime exclusion zone with the help of the Russians, and starve Japan into submission, and then split Japan between the U.S. and Russia, because Russia had a historical desire to destroy Japan.
But then we'd have a north and south japan now.