The 70th Anniversary of Japan's Surrender

While I take no joy in the death and destruction caused by the use of atomic weapons at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I place the blame on the Japanese themselves. After the U.S. cut off oil, steel and other exports to Japan in response to Japanese genocide and aggression in China, Mongolia and other places, Japan felt they were justified in the attack of American forces at Pearl Harbour. Japan fought a brutal war and even when they should have accepted defeat they were teaching the elderly, women and children tactics which might have proven deadly to Allied forces were there a need to invade mainland Japan. Should America have accepted even more deaths in a war they did not start? Should the Japanese public have been forced into mass suicides as were caused by Japanese Government propaganda prior to the invasion of Okinawa and other islands? The use of atomic weapons put an end, once and for all, to a war America did not want in the first place and more than likely saved countless Japanese lives by doing so.

Today Japan is one of America’s greatest allies and as a nation has become the greatest peace-loving democracy on the earth. I have lived in Japan and I enjoy Japanese culture and greatly admire and respect the Japanese people. Today the U.S. and Japan stand as equals in the defense of Asia to growing threats to freedom and as providers of humanitarian assistance. The Japan of today is not the Japan of 1941 and today’s citizens should not feel shame, guilt or hatred for the sins of their ancestors but neither should they forget history or Japan’s role in it. Americans should endeavour to understand the pain Japan feels at the instantaneous destruction of two of her cities and the lasting effects of the weapons used but should not judge their users without fully understanding the situation and their motives.