Episode 225: ហេតុអ្វីអាមេរិកទំលាក់គ្រាប់បែកនុយក្លែអ៊ែទៅលេីជប៉ុន

by Khmer Circle: 

It's a cliche, but a cliche that nevertheless holds true: victors and not vanquished write history.

Ms Kanitha is an excellent observer of world events, but she is being rather naive in this case. The 'reasons' and justifications for the unprecedented American decision to drop two nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki are best described as mainstream American war-time history narrative written by American historians and in justification of American war-time policy decisions. It's also true that whenever war breaks out, truth is the first casualty.

"The Japanese did not know the meaning of surrender"; "Japanese culture" is rather different from other nations' cultures, especially, its emphasis on such things as 'honour', 'dying for the emperor' and fighting to the last man etc. rather than accepting inevitable defeat or a ceasefire... And so US president Harry S Truman had had a hard time forcing himself to reach the decision that he did to bring home to the Japanese people and their peculiar and irrational national culture and mindset the inevitable? 

What would Adolf Hitler and his Nazi party have had to say about all the atrocities and miseries their actions and decisions had brought to all of Europe and beyond had they emerged from the war as victors? Their "final solution" on "the Jewish question" a necessary decision to save mankind from Jewish world domination conspiracy? They were - as a 'race' - rather peculiar anyway, always finding ways to thrive in commerce and life no matter the circumstances yet at the same time standing out as black sheep of their host community, never truly accepting of or integrating into the mainstream culture? Some parallel there with the Japanese? 

By the way, Hiroshima was not "a small village" at all at the time of the bombing, but was home to 280,000-290,000 civilians which is a lot more populated than most of the provincial cities of Cambodia. 

Some will point out that there were better ways by which to force the Japanese to give up and end the war to save human lives on both sides such as dropping the bombs on isolated, unpopulated locations such as uninhabited islands and let that act as a warning at least before deciding what measures to take next? 

From what is known about the effects and impacts of the bombings there are still physical and psychological scars decades and generations after the atrocities committed against those two Japanese cities; babies born with biological defects and deformities, survivors living with unimaginable pain and nightmares, being among the first that comes to mind.

It's a lot easier to write about or account for past events in history and to place our measure or value upon them as detached observers, but just for a moment try and imagine oneself as a prisoner and inmate at the incarceration centre of Toul Sleng or S-21; a world and place of real horror and cruelty beyond human endurance; the bodies being shredded to pieces by the impact of multiple hand grenades tossed into a tightly gathered crowd of mostly minors, women and civilians on 30 March 1997 at the order of the man who has since lived to proclaim himself as the Father of Peace and a "patriot" who "loves the people". 

There was in this humane context, at least, a 'reason' to the passing of nuclear secrets to the then Soviet Union by the scientists involved. If this had not happened and the Russians or other non-Caucasian peoples had been the victims of the American nuclear aggression later on after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Americans and their historians would also have their justification narratives to frame the events to their ideological flavours and tunes.

🔺🔺🔺