I feel like you're playing both sides of the argument at times, or are you just playing devil's advocate?
No, I just have complicated feelings/beliefs about things. Often when presented with an argument, I try to address the argument as presented even if certain axioms of the argument I disagree with. Other times, I try to spell why I believe some of the axioms are false or questionable. This is because it's sometimes enough to address others arguments within their own belief systems. Sometimes, I feel it necessary to spell out why I don't agree with others beliefs. Having said all that, I wouldn't say I've never played devil's advocate; I just don't tend to.
Nothing in this country is a matter of "how much we care." Most tough decisions are split down the middle in public opinion, or else they prob wouldn't be considered 'tough.' In a true democracy nothing can happen until there is a majority opinion, and another reason for the creation of the UN.
Often providing food and military aid goes a long way in fighting a war. In WW1 and WW2, the US did that for a very long time before devoting actual troops to the conflicts. Perhaps that was more to do with war profiteering than actually caring; I don't really know.
While, we don't have a true democracy. We have a representative democracy, of which frequently is not representative of the will of the people. As Douglas Adam put it, we vote for the lizard people and he we hate them. So, I don't necessarily trust democracy. Still, perhaps I'd trust more an actual vote by the people for war over what the norm has been. Oh, and the UN is not remotely a democracy. China, Russia, France, the UK, and the US all have veto power over most things. This is by design precisely to form consensus, not to support majority opinion.
The UN did not sit back and let Russia go ahead and just take over Georgia like they prob wanted to, in the Russia/Georgia conflict. Same thing would be the case if China were doing that. Like if tomorrow they decided to invade Japan, you don't think the UN would defend Japan as one of our allies? If they did not then it would certainly be the end of the world as we know it.
I was speaking of Crimea. You do raise the point, though, that many members of the UN would defend Japan or many other nations--I think, specifically the US would intervene given our explicit protection arrangement and that's not something I think China is willing to risk. How would we feel, though, if China were to take over a few African countries in all but name? Would we look the other way mostly? Maybe some token sanctions? China isn't there yet, but I wouldn't put it past them.
Germany was working on the bomb and had some of the world's best scientists. Not a matter of if but when they would have had it. Granted, opinion is split on how close they actually were to having it, but idk how can you say its not a what if?
Because of this--it's a long read but spells out the many, many ways Germany was not on the road to an Atomic Bomb. There's also the fact that (1) the US started later and still got there first which rather proves how non-devoted Germany was to the task and (2) the US specifically lured in a lot of "the world's best scientists" because apparently a non-warzone, economically well-off country with substantial funds to see the program through is a lot more compelling than Nazism.
There is always a better solution than bombing an innocent population. Since I'm not a war general from the 1940s I wont pretend to try and come up with a great example for that b/c its pointless, but I do believe there is always a better solution than that, if you look for it.
Maybe there is. I've never actually heard any specific arguments made, though, on what specific military target(s) should have been nuked. Until I hear at least that and some rational on the why, I stand by the position that if nukes were necessary the used ones were "good" ones. Like most things, not being a 1940s war general for example, I don't know if nukes were necessary. :/
I get that, and I'm sure that's why they did it; but they also could have easily dropped one, and then accept surrender, OR if no surrender then drop the 2nd..
AFAIK, that's what they did. They demanded unconditional surrender, waited, and then dropped the second one. One could argue they should have waited longer--they only waited three days. The second bomb was dropped the day after the Soviet Union joined the war against Japan, and perhaps that would have been enough if given a few more days. Still, it took six more days after the second bomb (with behind the scenes negotiations) for Japan to officially surrender.
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