What's your point of view in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb?

[bazmeistergen]

Videogirl said:

bazmeistergen said:

There is an argument that Stimson had been on holiday to Kyoto and thus removed it from that point of view... which I think is great.

It was actually Professor Edwin O. Reischauer who said Stimson had known and admired Kyoto ever since his honeymoon to explain his objection to General Leslie Groves decision to bomb Kyoto.

Actually the committee in charge to choose the targets, agreed that the initial use of the weapon should be sufficiently spectacular for its importance to be internationally recognized and Kyoto, as an intellectual center of Japan, had a population "better able to appreciate the significance of the weapon." That's precisely why Stimson objected and cited his belief that the targeting decision “should be governed by the historical position that the United States would occupy after the war" and felt very strongly that "anything that would tend in any way to damage this position would be unfortunate”.

Honeymoon, yes, I remember now. Classic stuff.

You study/studied history by any chance?