>>10303
>References, at least from the U.S. Department of Energy, do use "Scientific Advisors" in all committees without referencing who are they each time, same with Military Advisors. The way it is written implies they are the same so perhaps a mistake was made in their papers.
What I mean is that the Interim Committee was a higher-level one with people like Oppenheimer and Stimson, discussing overall use of the bomb. The target recommendations came from a lower-level committee, with people like von Neumann (the previously-mentioned Christian convert). I may actually have been wrong about whether Oppenheimer was "on" the committee; I see sources omit him but I also see him mentioned in relevant documents, and it's not clear whether he and Groves were actually on that committee, or whether they were named on those documents because they were in charge of the project and the committee presented its conclusions to them, without their involvement in reaching those conclusions.
>some people, namely Stimson, named in Kyoto but didn't mind dusting Nagasaki
Kyoto is objectively more culturally and historically important than Nagasaki. It doesn't matter how much significance you place on the Christian minority, that's just a fact, and in the arithmetic of what to bomb and what to avoid, Kyoto would have been a greater loss. Truman's words in his diary lay that out: "Even if the Japs are savages, ruthless, merciless, and fanatic, we [...] cannot drop this terrible bomb on the old Capitol or the new."
Also, one of the factors that was mentioned to recommend Kyoto in the first place, which was its status as an intellectual centre, seems more like an argument against it; yes, having academics witness the blast and be able to accurately report on it to leadership could be useful, but only if they don't die themselves because they just got nuked. Better to keep them alive, and have them able to recognize and confirm what happened from the aftermath instead.
>although purportedly according to sources it was replaced by said city despite being "the backup" of another.
That is to say, they had a list of target cities, from which they'd select a primary target and then choose another from the list as a backup. Given that, it makes sense that the late substitute (Nagasaki) would have ended up as a backup, while the primary target would be one they'd considered a good candidate the whole time.
>Even when justifying the first bombing it seems the second one was a hard sell in all aspects.
Oh, I agree entirely, it's a hard sell. But while they were "divided" there was certainly a significant faction that still favoured going on.
I just think that the motivation you ascribe to it is extremely dubious. Even if there was prejudicial motivation, rather than genuine belief in it being necessary, I'd assume anti-Nip views like Truman's above would have been more widespread among the decision-makers and more of a contributing factor than opposing a particular minority within them.
>the official footage
I can't tell enough about the scale, geography, and city limits from that to judge much. but it does look to me like the bomb was dropped at the point farthest from the cloud cover (aside from a few minor wisps) while still being in the city. Given that it was still a very novel weapon and it was, to an extent, a practical test as well as a military use, I really don't think it's a stretch to suggest that if clouds obscured the main drop site they would drop it in the clearest area of the city they could, for the sake of observation. Again though, it's hard to judge.
>to be fair americans were pretty ace at getting particular places bombed at night
I have no idea of the credibility but I've seen it mentioned that radar-guided night raids on Nagasaki in particular were difficult. I'm not sure if it was the geography, the architecture which I've read was relatively old fashioned (and I do know that wood-and-paper construction is less radar-reflective than more modern building materials, since that is also mentioned for aircraft, such as the RAF's Mosquito), or something else.
As an aside, if true that would be not only an explanation for the aiming issue, but also the choice of Nagasaki as a backup target at all. Since, again, the bombs were partly practical tests, the Air Force had been instructed to avoid conventional bombing raids on the candidate cities, so that the damage from the nuclear bombs could be more accurately observed. If it's true that night raids on Nagasaki were difficult, then it stands to reason that it was relatively intact, and thus a suitable test-bed (note that Hiroshima was also relatively intact, even before it was off-limits). And of course it would mean that striking the military targets in the city would be of more importance, if they were harder to hit with night raids.
>and full explicit intent of a psychological bombing operation against the country's morale
Attacking the Christian minority in particular would not be an exceptional blow to the non-Christian majority's morale.
I really do not think Christianity had anything at all to do with it, and I don't think it's a conclusion that could ever be reasonably reached from the evidence, as opposed to starting out assuming it's true and then looking for proof otherwise. There's just nothing here that stands out to me as abnormal. The coincidences that led to the outcome we got don't look like anything but coincidences, and I don't see any way there could have been some sort of secret scheme where Nagasaki was the "real" target without the obvious problem of "why not just come up with reasons to recommend it as the real target, and avoid needing a cover-up?". When you consider the backup thing suspicious I can't even tell what you're really suggesting or who was supposedly involved, other than the vague "Jews being around".
>which is frankly a fancy way of saying terrorism
You're not wrong. That's exactly what "strategic bombing" is. I won't deny it's rather ridiculous to debate the specific reasons for dropping a nuke that killed 100,000 people, while in the same thread we're also treating as unjustifiable the killing of 0.5% that number by bombing the hospital.