Greatest Strategic Air Missions

"WalterM140" wrote in message
...
Hiroshima. Nothing ever even came close in effect importance or end
result.
End of story.


Gee, Art.

That just whacked a huge number of civilians.

Most of them Japanese Catholics who while loyal Japanese were often
conscientious objectors.

I am told by some Malaysian friends of Eurasian extraction that the
Nunneries, Catholic schools etc were treated with deference by the Japanese
because they had enough soldiers in their own forces concerned about this.



Wouldn't a strategic air mission have to be something like the Dam Busters
or
something?


Ploesti? Don't know if it worked but Germany's synthetic fuel industry was
only ever capable of meeting 30% of requirements. It seems that Germany's
heavy bomber program was scrapped in part due to this even after the He 177
had become reliable and it made the Whermacht more vulnerable to the
eventualy attacks on the syn fuel plants themselves.

Both the Germans and Japanese were looking for a way of surrendering
conditionaly (ie not an armistice but a surrender with occupying forces).

Because the allies wouldn't except anything but unconditional surrender the
war had to drag on and many more people on both sides had to die.

Harry Morgentau (US secreatary of state) had particularly horrendous plans
in stall for Germany that involved starving to death about 15 million of the
population that would have made the Ukranian genocides 4.5 million pall in
comparison. It was an inkling of these plans, the knowledge of the carve
up of Germany and also the fact that the Germans wanted to surrender to the
US/UK rather than the Russians (whose atrocities involved tearing women
apart by the legs in Kongisberg using trucks) as well as Hitlers no
surrender mentality that extended the war.





Or wrecking that canal (I forget the name) with Tall Boys?

Seriously, something that caused a strategic effect for economical return,
like
the Oil Campaign of 1944/45.

Walt

"The Enlightenment" wrote in message
...

"WalterM140" wrote in message
...
Hiroshima. Nothing ever even came close in effect importance or end
result.
End of story.


Gee, Art.

That just whacked a huge number of civilians.

Most of them Japanese Catholics who while loyal Japanese were often
conscientious objectors.

I am told by some Malaysian friends of Eurasian extraction that the
Nunneries, Catholic schools etc were treated with deference by the
Japanese
because they had enough soldiers in their own forces concerned about this.


Bull****

1) Most Malays are Muslim, Buddhist or Daoist

2) The Japanese brutall repressed the catholic population
of the Phillipines and had no qualms when it came to dsetroying
catholic schools , nunneries etc

3) less than 1% of Japanese were Catholic

4) The centre of the Cathlic church in Japan was
Nagasaki

5) The Cathlic church in japan collaborated quite
happily with the Japanese Government during
ww2 with churches issuing proclamations urging
their parishioners to fight on to total victory.

Keith






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Every time this subject comes up I am both amazed and appalled at the
revisionist/PC thinking based on fragmentary knowledge of the
situation existing then. The US had just been thorugh the Peleliu, Iwo
Jma, Phillipines and Okinawa campaigns and the casualties were
horrendous. Now we were going to invade the Japanese Home Islands and
we could reliably expect the fighting to be grimly intense. I strongly
recommend y'all find books on the above campaigns and read through
them and then look up the plans to invade Kyushu and then the Tokyo
beaches. Especially study the Japanese planned counteractions - they
had deduced where the landings were to take place. Not very difficult
- there's not that many choices. The Combined Japanese Air Forces had
held back 5,000 air-lanes for Kamikaze use! Note that the Services of
Supply had ordered 400,000 Purple Hearts for the two invasions. Also
note that President Truman had been in combat in WW1. ISTR he was a
field artillery battery CO - not a staff officer. He knew plenty about
battle casualties from real personal knowledge. So, with the atomic
bomb handy, would you-all have the guts (and gall) to sened your
troops into battle knowing that the casualties would be horrendous,
far greater than Iwo or Okinawa? And you would have to recycle ETO
infantry combat vets to replace the fully expected losses - guys that
had already 'seen the elephant'? Face it - the US was running low on
front line troops -
Now - would I have given the order? Damn right I would - given the
choice between killing the enemy and saving my own troops or doing a
grim trade-off of my guys for theirs - I'd nuke and re-nuke them until
they quit. They fro damn sure earned it. Unlike most of you-all I've
lost enough very close friends in combat, men I've trusted my life to.
Now stop all your maunderings until you've done some study of the
situation - as it existed back then! As for collateral damage - the
Russkies did a pretty good job on Warsaw and points west, culminating
in Berlin. Massive artillery barrages take a little longer than nuking
the places but the result was pretty much the same except the area of
destruction is larger. Walt BJ

"WaltBJ" wrote in message
om...
Massive artillery barrages take a little longer than nuking
the places but the result was pretty much the same except the area of
destruction is larger. Walt BJ

Do not forget the far larger losses from the ongoing firebombing of Tokyo
that could have continued until there was nothing left to firebomb.

Jack G.

Hear, Hear. I came to the same conculusion in my MA thesis when I researched
the planned invasion (DOWNFALL). While U.S. and Allied casualties would have
been high (at least some 75,000 for Kyushu in OLYMPIC and 2x that for the
Kanto in CORONET), Japanese losses both military and civilian would have
been much, much worse than those of the Allies. Add to that the probable
U.S./Allied use of gas, and Marshall asking if the A-bomb could be used in
a tactical role in the preinvasion bombardment of the beaches in Kyushu,
and that adds up the butcher's bill very quickly. Be glad 15 Kt on Hiroshima
and 20 Kt on Nagasaki were used-it ended the war within a week of the Nagasaki
strike.


(WaltBJ) wrote:
Every time this subject comes up I am both amazed
and appalled at the
revisionist/PC thinking based on fragmentary
knowledge of the
situation existing then. The US had just been
thorugh the Peleliu, Iwo
Jma, Phillipines and Okinawa campaigns and the
casualties were
horrendous. Now we were going to invade the
Japanese Home Islands and
we could reliably expect the fighting to be
grimly intense. I strongly
recommend y'all find books on the above campaigns
and read through
them and then look up the plans to invade Kyushu
and then the Tokyo
beaches. Especially study the Japanese planned
counteractions - they
had deduced where the landings were to take
place. Not very difficult
- there's not that many choices. The Combined
Japanese Air Forces had
held back 5,000 air-lanes for Kamikaze use!
Note that the Services of
Supply had ordered 400,000 Purple Hearts for
the two invasions. Also
note that President Truman had been in combat
in WW1. ISTR he was a
field artillery battery CO - not a staff officer.
He knew plenty about
battle casualties from real personal knowledge.
So, with the atomic
bomb handy, would you-all have the guts (and
gall) to sened your
troops into battle knowing that the casualties
would be horrendous,
far greater than Iwo or Okinawa? And you would
have to recycle ETO
infantry combat vets to replace the fully expected
losses - guys that
had already 'seen the elephant'? Face it - the
US was running low on
front line troops -
Now - would I have given the order? Damn right
I would - given the
choice between killing the enemy and saving
my own troops or doing a
grim trade-off of my guys for theirs - I'd nuke
and re-nuke them until
they quit. They fro damn sure earned it. Unlike
most of you-all I've
lost enough very close friends in combat, men
I've trusted my life to.
Now stop all your maunderings until you've done
some study of the
situation - as it existed back then! As for
collateral damage - the
Russkies did a pretty good job on Warsaw and
points west, culminating
in Berlin. Massive artillery barrages take a
little longer than nuking
the places but the result was pretty much the
same except the area of
destruction is larger. Walt BJ


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Subject: Greatest Strategic Air Missions
From: (WaltBJ)
Date: 8/23/04 9:18 PM Pacific Daylight Time
Message-id:

Every time this subject comes up I am both amazed and appalled at the
revisionist/PC thinking based on fragmentary knowledge of the
situation existing then. The US had just been thorugh the Peleliu, Iwo
Jma, Phillipines and Okinawa campaigns and the casualties were
horrendous. Now we were going to invade the Japanese Home Islands and
we could reliably expect the fighting to be grimly intense. I strongly
recommend y'all find books on the above campaigns and read through
them and then look up the plans to invade Kyushu and then the Tokyo
beaches. Especially study the Japanese planned counteractions - they
had deduced where the landings were to take place. Not very difficult
- there's not that many choices. The Combined Japanese Air Forces had
held back 5,000 air-lanes for Kamikaze use! Note that the Services of
Supply had ordered 400,000 Purple Hearts for the two invasions. Also
note that President Truman had been in combat in WW1. ISTR he was a
field artillery battery CO - not a staff officer. He knew plenty about
battle casualties from real personal knowledge. So, with the atomic
bomb handy, would you-all have the guts (and gall) to sened your
troops into battle knowing that the casualties would be horrendous,
far greater than Iwo or Okinawa? And you would have to recycle ETO
infantry combat vets to replace the fully expected losses - guys that
had already 'seen the elephant'? Face it - the US was running low on
front line troops -
Now - would I have given the order? Damn right I would - given the
choice between killing the enemy and saving my own troops or doing a
grim trade-off of my guys for theirs - I'd nuke and re-nuke them until
they quit. They fro damn sure earned it. Unlike most of you-all I've
lost enough very close friends in combat, men I've trusted my life to.
Now stop all your maunderings until you've done some study of the
situation - as it existed back then! As for collateral damage - the
Russkies did a pretty good job on Warsaw and points west, culminating
in Berlin. Massive artillery barrages take a little longer than nuking
the places but the result was pretty much the same except the area of
destruction is larger. Walt BJ








Not much to add to that..Well said Walt.

"WaltBJ" wrote in message
om...
Every time this subject comes up I am both amazed and appalled at the
revisionist/PC thinking based on fragmentary knowledge of the
situation existing then. The US had just been thorugh the Peleliu, Iwo
Jma, Phillipines and Okinawa campaigns and the casualties were
horrendous. Now we were going to invade the Japanese Home Islands and
we could reliably expect the fighting to be grimly intense. I strongly
recommend y'all find books on the above campaigns and read through
them and then look up the plans to invade Kyushu and then the Tokyo
beaches. Especially study the Japanese planned counteractions - they
had deduced where the landings were to take place. Not very difficult
- there's not that many choices. The Combined Japanese Air Forces had
held back 5,000 air-lanes for Kamikaze use! Note that the Services of
Supply had ordered 400,000 Purple Hearts for the two invasions. Also
note that President Truman had been in combat in WW1. ISTR he was a
field artillery battery CO - not a staff officer. He knew plenty about
battle casualties from real personal knowledge. So, with the atomic
bomb handy, would you-all have the guts (and gall) to sened your
troops into battle knowing that the casualties would be horrendous,
far greater than Iwo or Okinawa? And you would have to recycle ETO
infantry combat vets to replace the fully expected losses - guys that
had already 'seen the elephant'? Face it - the US was running low on
front line troops -
Now - would I have given the order? Damn right I would - given the
choice between killing the enemy and saving my own troops or doing a
grim trade-off of my guys for theirs - I'd nuke and re-nuke them until
they quit. They fro damn sure earned it. Unlike most of you-all I've
lost enough very close friends in combat, men I've trusted my life to.
Now stop all your maunderings until you've done some study of the
situation - as it existed back then! As for collateral damage - the
Russkies did a pretty good job on Warsaw and points west, culminating
in Berlin. Massive artillery barrages take a little longer than nuking
the places but the result was pretty much the same except the area of
destruction is larger. Walt BJ


Great post in "politically correct" today world. We can't judge wartime
happenings on basis what we think is nice or not nice today. From the wars
in Bible antagonistic sides had done ALL they can to put enemy down. It is
wrong and sad - but it is just true. Any of fighting sides in ww2 had used
nukes for sure if they had one. And president or field commander who sents
million or more of his soldiers to death for reason he just don't wants to
use full potential of weaponry available would end up in court. For sure
things are different in Iraq or Vietnam or Afganistan - but those are more
police operations, not real war when life and fate of both side is on vague.