Category Archives: Commentary

Hiroshima and Nagasaki

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I have often considered the arguments for and against President Harry Truman’s decision to authorize the use of atomic bombs on the two Japanese cities. There is no doubt the decision resulted in a horrible outcome for countless innocent people (not an uncommon outcome in World War II). Tens of thousands of Japanese of all ages were killed in the two atomic-blasts. There are arguments that the Japanese were just about ready to surrender anyway, but there is no doubt they surrendered soon after the two bombs were detonated.

My opinions have been mostly shaped by considering the American and other Allied soldiers in troop ships staging for the invasion of Japan. Those soldiers did not focus on the horror of people being incinerated in Japanese cities or dying of radiation sickness. They instead celebrated that they would no longer have to participate in an invasion that would result in the death or dismemberment of invading soldiers, perhaps including them personally, and millions of Japanese.

My interest in the subject was rekindled by reading and reviewing the book “Unbroken:  A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption” by Laura Hillenbrand. The book was selected by the Northern Colorado Common Read (NCCR) for this year. The book is the story of Louis Zamperini. He finished seventh in the 5000 meters at the Berlin Olympics and soon was a bombardier in planes on raids over Japanese targets in the Pacific. He was one of three men who survived a plane crash into the ocean, and he and another man survived for 47 days on a rubber raft before being captured by the Japanese. He suffered brutal conditions and treatment for years.

The book documents numerous instances where the Japanese applied a “kill-all” policy that “…held that camp commanders could not, under any circumstances, allow Allied forces to recapture POWs. If Allied advances made this a possibility, POWs were to be executed.” “An order was issued to all POW camp commanders that “…decisive measures must be taken without returning a single POW.” A clarification said that all POWs at risk of being taken by Allied forces should be “…destroyed individually or in groups…with mass bombings, poisonous smoke, drowning, decapitation (or by whatever method needed to) not to allow the escape of a single one, to annihilate them all, and not leave any traces.” The book gives several examples of how the “kill-all” policy was used by the Japanese when Allied forces threatened an area where there were Allied prisoners. (See the “kill-all” order listing of instances where the policy was used by the Japanese on page 464 in the Index of the book.)

Much has been written that the decision to drop the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki saved many thousands of Allied soldiers and countless millions of Japanese civilians. An article titled “How the Atomic Bomb Saved 4,000,000 Lives describes declassified documents that were plans for the invasion code named “Operation Downfall.” The invasion was to be in two parts. Operation Olympic would send fourteen divisions to  invade Kyushu and Operation Coronet would send twenty-two divisions would invade the main island after massive bombardment. It is interesting that some of the comments about the article (some of course dispute the need to drop the bombs) say that it grossly underestimates the number of casualties.

The book “Unbroken” focuses on the many thousands of Allied prisoners who were to be murdered a few days after the bombs were dropped. The bombs (and the devastation preceding them from fire bombings with conventional weapons) assured the Japanese surrender and forestalled the mass murders of prisoners.

Prisoners freed from the POW camps on trains that passed what had been the city of Hiroshima were astonished at the level of destruction. “Virtually every POW believed the destruction of this city had saved them from execution.” One prisoner who had been on the Bataan Death March observed, in part, “…there was nothing. Nothing! It was beautiful. I realized this was what had ended the war. It meant we didn’t have to go hungry any longer, or go without medical treatment. I was so insensitive anyone else’s human needs and suffering. I know it’s not right to say it was beautiful, because it really wasn’t. But I believed the end probably justified the means.”

I ask all who vilify President Truman’s decision what they would have wanted him to do if they had been a prisoner of the Japanese and facing the “kill-all” policy when the bombs were dropped. Is that an unfair question? I don’t think so.

As always, I’m willing to listen to voices of reason to tell me what I’ve missed. However, you will have much to overcome if you disagree with me. The horror created by the atomic bombs detonating over Hiroshima and Nagasaki meant that many thousands of soldiers did not have to die or suffer terrible wounds in the invasion of Japan. Allied soldiers also did not have to kill Japanese civilians, including women and children, who were being prepared for the invasion armed with sharpened sticks. Tough choice, but I go with what Truman decided.

Drones versus Water Boarding

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President Obama has won reelection, so it seems appropriate to revisit the politically sensitive question about the treatment of “terrorist prisoners.” First and foremost, it seems the policy of refusing to use the term “terrorism” resulted in the Obama administration putting out false information about what happened in Libya. I’ve read that there was an official policy issued to the State Department after Mr. Obama’s first election that they were not allowed to use the words “terrorism” or “terrorist.” Perhaps that’s why the term “spontaneous riot” was used in the misleading reports. I speculate the desire to not have a national security scandal just before the election also had something to do with it.

What changes to national security policies will we see now that Mr. Obama is safely re-elected? Perhaps we will now what he had in mind when he was recorded telling the Russians he would “have more flexibility” after the election. I’m also wondering whether the policy of targeting terrorists (perhaps he calls them “rioters”) with drones will be continued. It is reported that he meets with a select group of military, national security, intelligence, and political advisors each Tuesday morning to review a list of enemies called the “kill list.” He is then said to personally decide who is to be killed by a drone. The CIA probably operates the drone, because federal law would require public reporting and congressional approval if the military is involved. Drone strikes have killed people in Pakistan and Yemen. Of course people who have misfortune to be near the targeted person are also killed. Continue reading →

Second Anniversary for Rocky Flats Facts Web Site

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It has been two years since this web site was launched. Maintaining the site has required significant technology research and application, and I credit Keith Motyl for keeping the site up to date. My contribution has been generating the content, and all the reading and writing has been a good retirement project. I must think it is worthwhile, since I’ve added another web site.  FarmerIsland was launched to promote the book “Angry Pigs Organized Against Gerbils: The Farmer Island War.” The book was written based on the ideas of four grandchildren (listed as Creative Staff and Illustrators). Adults have been very complimentary and a third grade teacher who read the book to her class reports that the children enjoyed the “delightful book.”

There has been one major irritant. SiteBuilder has not provided us with a way to control comments that I call “graffiti.” The blog allows me to decide whether a comment is pertinent, and I can allow it to be posted or reject it as spam. The review and expression links on SiteBuilder do not give that option, and we have attracted hundreds or thousands of comments that seem to be directed at marketing luxury products and other items that have no connection with the content. We struggle with the daunting task of deleting all of this “graffiti” while leaving the legitimate comments that provide value. Continue reading →

Presidential Election and Aftermath

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It is 9:14 P.M. Mountain Standard Time on election day November 6, 2012 as I begin typing, and the announcement just came that Ohio will cast its electoral votes for President Obama. That virtually guarantees that President Obama has won reelection. What next?

I expect that Republicans will be quite critical of themselves and Mitt Romney’s campaign strategy. They will ask why he did not mention Libya in the foreign policy debate when there was ample evidence that the Obama administration bungled the security for the consulate by responding to requests for additional security by reducing the number of security agents. They then covered up the terrorist attack that resulted in the death of the ambassador and three other Americans by repeatedly claiming the attack resulted from a spontaneous demonstration. The only reason to cover up the truth was that the facts would be embarrassing to the administration. The focus was protecting President Obama’s chances for reelection, and the facts of what resulted in the four dead Americans might have been “problematic.”  The cover story succeeded because Mr. Romney did not make it an issue.

On a societal note, I find it distressing that we have reelected a president whose campaign was almost exclusively based on advocating that people who earn more should be taxed at higher rates. His campaign worked despite the flaw that it won’t work. Wealthy people already pay most of the taxes, and even if you take all of their money it won’t solve the budget deficit. The only way to control the deficit is to staunch the government thirst for more and more spending while getting out of the way of economic development. Economic development is the key. Romney’s approach would have encouraged entrepreneurs to develop businesses, the business would pay taxes, the employees would pay taxes, and the government would have more income. The majority of voters went with the guy who promised to raise taxes on people other than themselves. Continue reading →

Dueling Presidential Candidate Gaffes

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With less than a week until we learn who will be elected president it seems the time is right for a mention of gaffes by the two candidates. It wouldn’t be a duel if the subject referred to Joe Biden and Paul Ryan, since Mr. Biden would win on the numbers of gaffes by an overwhelming margin.

Mitt Romney stirred understandable criticism when he foolishly mentioned that he need not campaign to the 47 percent of Americans who are “dependent on government” and consider themselves “victims.” He later said that he understood that he wasn’t going to get the vote of people who expected that the government’s job is to redistribute wealth, and that “I’m not going to get them.” He added “I do believe we should have enough jobs and take-home pay to allow people to pay taxes. I think people would like to be paying taxes.”

Mr. Obama presented a different opinion in an appearance at Loyola University in 1998 when he was an Illinois state senator. The admittedly 14 year-old video has Mr. Obama saying, “The trick is figuring out how do we structure government systems that pool resources and hence facilitate some [wealth] redistribution — because I actually believe in redistribution, at least at a certain level to make sure that everybody’s got a shot.” Continue reading →

Joe Biden, Territorial Tax, and Social Security

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I often refer to Vice President Joseph Robinette “Joe” Biden, Jr. as the accidental comedian because of the strange things he says. He says them with such force and vigor that people often are swayed by the emotion conveyed and perhaps don’t notice the absurdity of what was said. During his convention speech he said (with great vigor) that “Governor Romney believes in this global economy it doesn’t matter where American companies invest and put their money or where they create jobs. He then went on to say that Romney was proposing “…a territorial tax, which the experts have looked at, and they acknowledge that it will create 800,000 new jobs—all of them overseas, all of them.” Joe, or his speech writers, apparently did not know that the business leaders on President Obama’s Export Council and his Council on Jobs and Competitiveness have said that the tax system Joe accused as originating with Mr. Romney would be a good idea for the U.S economy.

Those comments by Joe during his speech created a flurry of astonished articles, but it isn’t even my favorite recent “Joeism.” During the Vice Presidential debate he accused Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney of wanting to privatize Social Security and inquired where people’s retirement programs be if that idea had been accepted when George W. Bush proposed it. I did a posting in February in which I analyzed what would have happened to a worker who voluntarily put the suggested one third of their Social Security “contributions” into a S & P 500 index (which was called “privatization by Joe and others) on a dollar averaging basis. It would have been really worrisome to watch the value of the account plummet with the stock market in 2008, but the money being invested during that time would have bought more shares.

The calculations I made were based on a person earning $50,000 a year with $3100 being withheld for Social Security and matched by the employer. One third of the monthly total would have resulted in about $170 dollars a month going into the private account. There would have been about $8300 invested since the beginning of 2005, and the value would have dropped to  $5700 at the worst of the market collapse. However, the investors that took advantage of the lower market value and continued to invest would be pleased with the results. They would have invested about $15,700 by now, and, with the improved stock market, the account would be worth about $17,600.

No one knows what the stock market is going to do in the future, but history has shown it to be a good place to create value for investments. The individual with the private account would have the advantage of being able to use the money however they wished upon retirement instead of having the government calculate how much money they would receive each month. They also could designate the person or persons of their own choice to be beneficiaries who would receive the full remaining value. Social Security payments stop immediately after the death of the person.

All of that may or may not be of interest, but let’s get back to Joe. When he asked where we would be if Social Security had been “privatized,” he apparently didn’t know that the individuals who had voluntarily began the investment process would have more money. What is even more astonishing is that he apparently hasn’t noticed that the stock market has improved since Mr. Obama and he took office. Wouldn’t that be something to brag about?