Military Buffs I need your help.

[Atrocities]

I am looking for a copy of the speech Douglas Macarther spoke at the surrender of Japan on board the Battleship Missuri. I can not seem to find it.

Any help is much appreciated.

[Prince Xizor]

I know it's out there on the Web somewhere because I used an excerpt from it as my signiture on the GolemLabs Boards. So I must've found it somehow.

"It is my earnest hope, and indeed the hope of all mankind, that from this solemn occasion a better world shall emerge out of the blood and carnage of the past -- a world dedicated to the dignity of man and the fulfillment of his most cherished wish for freedom, tolerance and justice." - General Douglas MacArthur [surrender ceremony on the USS Missouri, Sep. 2, 1945]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

i must point out that the US nuked two japanese cities.

[Fyron]

Yes, and the alternative was for millions to die on each side during an invasion of mainland Japan, including many more civilians than died in the atomic bombings.

[Prince Xizor]

And this must be where I found it at:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/macarth...cspeech04.html

Incidentally, MacArthur was opposed to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

[Atrocities]

Originally posted by narf poit chez BOOM:
i must point out that the US nuked two japanese cities.

Yes, yes we did drop two nukes on Japan. At the time it was to end a war and save human lives. Especially the lives of Americans who where brought into the war as a result of a Japanies sneak attack upon Pear Harbor that killed over 2,000 Americans both civilan as well as military men and women.

Need I remind you Narf of the Batton death march, or about how the Japanies used chemical weapons against the Chinese and how they used captured US, Australian, and british soldiers as slave labor. Or that the Japiness would behead American service men just to see how sharp their swards were?

You can choose to believe in the revisionist rewrite of history Narf, but the bitter God forsaken truth is that people die in war, and those to bombs ended a war that had already taken Ten plus million lives.

And if we had it to do over again, I think we would have still dropped the bombs because back then it was the only way to save lives, including those of the Japanies. Was it the right thing to do? Well not if you choose to believe the utter BS that the revisionistic historieans are trying to shovel down our throats. But if you want to believe in the truth, then you know that the US took every step possible to end the war and protect lives. That for nearly a month befoe the US dropped the first bomb, leaflets were dropped telling people to leave the cities.

The US chose the two targest specifically to avoid the loss of life and do as much damage to Japans war machine as possible. They specificially rulled out many cities including their capital city.

War is not something that can be historically rewritten fifty years after the fact.

"We must go forward to preserve in peace what we won in war." - Douglas Macarthur

No truer words were ever spoken my friend. What happened to the japanies should never have to happen to another human ever again. An I pray that humans never again use nukes against each other, but we both know that eventually it will happen again. And that deeply saddens me.

But at the time we dropped those two bombs, we were at war and regardless as to how we feel about it now, and I am sure we all feel horrible about it, it was a decision made by men who are mostly dead now. A decision that did end a war and did save lives, on both sides.

[ December 11, 2003, 07:07: Message edited by: Atrocities ]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

aside from the invasion arguement, i hadn't heard most of that...but only the arguement that less lives, and less civilian lives would be lost, is important to me. i'm not suggesting that military lives are less important than military lives, but there's no children in the military. in addition, i have to wonder if the bombs had to be dropped on a city. weren't there any isolated military bases?

Canada's history education, at least while i was in school, was horribly lacking. i suppose i should find a good history book or two and add it to my mental note to reread up on physics and astronomy one of these days. any suggestions?

[Atrocities]

Hind sight is always 20/20 Narf.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

yeah? then where did 'revisionist history' come from?

and what does your comment have to do with anything anyway?

[rextorres]

That the bomb ended the war is a myth that we Americans like to tell ourselves. The US was already killing 100,000s of civilians every night from fire bombings in the capital cities so please don't give me any altruistic crap about saving innocent civilian lives.

The Japanese were actually ready to surrender - they just wanted a guarantee that Hirohito would not be tried as a war criminal. The US would not agree to this. The US, however, agreed to this condition AFTER the bomb was dropped mainly because we didn't want the Russians to know that we were out of them.

We simply dropped the bomb out of revenge as Atrocities inadvertantly and explicitly highlights AND probably more importantly to show the Russians that we were willling to use them.