Article reasoning that what ended World War II was not the atom bomb

[Ckmlb1]

mai said:

sethnintendo said:

Wow you dug up some old quotes of mine.  I don't have time to rebuke or admit wrongful thinking right now.  However, with the last quote about Stalin vs Hitler who killed more...  I still believe Stalin killed more but both were guilty of mass murder.  It is pretty depressing just reading this article when trying to find out again on my own.  

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2011/mar/10/hitler-vs-stalin-who-killed-more/?pagination=false

I was going to put a quote from that link but after reading link I believe it deserves an in depth look. 

 

You did bring up some quotes that I will have to further look into.  One can easily fall into the hands of propaganda.  I try to view WW2 without personal bias.  However, being from USA I can't dismiss the possibility of being influenced by false information regarding WW2.  I will look further into all topics you have brought up.

Americans are guilty of mass murder, hence the bombings of Japan and Dresden, which both had questionable military meaning, but I somehow never though of comparing them to Nazis or even Japanese. These are very different matters, in order of magnitude different.

In the article you're quoting I didn't mange to find a single reference, I'm using materials that are quoting NKVD records directly, e.g. Zemskov V.N. one of the few who had access to TsGAOR archive in the 1980s (State's Archive of Russian Federation as of today).

Comparing the deaths America caused in WW II air strikes versus the crimes of Stalin after the war (as in outside of a conflict) and the holocaust? That's laughable. The difference was even though the Americans bombed civilian  inhabited cities there was a war going on. On the other hand Hitler was wiping out jews in camps not because they were at war with Germany but because of his obsession with wiping out a whole people and Stalin and Mao killed millions of political rivals, critics, suspicious people and people they were paranoid about (whether or not they actually took up arms or committed an act against tbe government).