The world almost got nuked on at least 17 occasion

[Ex-RoNiN 0]

As title! Read about it HERE!!!!

Kinda interesting that it almost always was the US that threatened the use of nuclear arms...

Makes you wonder...

[Damage Inc 0]

They can threaten but it doesn't mean that they would've used them.

[Ex-RoNiN 0]

If you bother reading that webpage, then you will see that sometimes the dropping of nuclear weapons depended on the SU un-doing something that they had done to annoy the US.

Basically, US said, "do that or we nuke you". Would you dare to doubt that? Esp. if you haven't got any nukes, like during the Iran I crisis?

[Damage Inc 0]

Well the USA is not stupid, they know that if they nuke someone they will become hated by many countries.

[nordin dk 0]

Well they already did (twice! ) , and they already are...

[Wobble 1]

havent these people ever heard of "word wrap"?

you wonder why the US is the instigator in these articles?.. and why the articles are cut up and some infor is left out?

Meet the Author:

Vladimir Pozner

official media spokesman for the Soviet Union 1976-1984

he is probably an intellegent man.. but bear in mind that his job was to be the Communist propagand machine for the Soviet media...

keep that in mind when you read these "facts"

also remember these articles are VERY edited.. lots of facts and events (important ones)are left out.. for obvious reasons by the author to skew the percieved circumstances of the events.. Im not trying to bash Vlad or anything.. but this article was not writeen by what you would call a non-biased 3rd party by any streatch of the imagination..

in the first case for instance the Soviets threatened to declare war on the US if it didnt ALLOW the soviets to TAKE BY FORCE several areas the soviets had months before agreed to split 3 ways with the US and GB.. suddenly they change their mind and decide they want HALF and the US and GB can both have 1/4. .all the US said was if they declared war on the US they risk being bombed with atomic weapons... more of a reminder than a threat.

look at munber 16.. he calls the MAD ideal (mutual insured destruction) a US threat.. despite the fact that it was the Soviets that instigated the nuclear arms build up and held the same policy the US did in the area of retailtory strike.  the soviets said they would launch on the US if the US fired and the US said the same.. yet somehow this is translated into a US only threat?

Know your author.

Well they already did (twice! )

and it saved more Japanese that it could ever have killed.. and americans too.

[Wobble 1]

oh yea.. a nice quote from the author:

We should all thank our lucky stars for Gorbachev's one-vote win. Thank fate, thank whatever deity or superstition we believe in. But the one group we should not thank is the American conservative establishment, which had the stupidity and arrogance to think it could play chicken with its Soviet counterparts and win."

yeaaaaaa... dumb americans..

[nordin dk 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">and it saved more Japanese that it could ever have killed.. and americans too<span id='postcolor'>

conjecture...

I'd prefer if you didn't put the nukings in any form of positive light, but then I guess you're free to do so.

[Ex-RoNiN 0]

yay! East vs. West propaganda clash again!

Gosh

Who CARES who is right or not...I am talking about the scary fact that we could have been wiped off the map SO MANY TIMES IN JUST 60 YEARS!! Doesn't make me look forward to the next 60 years you see

[nordin dk 0]

It creeps me out how much money is spent on warfare.

And how some people are proud of this...

[Wobble 1]

I'd prefer if you didn't put the nukings in any form of positive light, but then I guess you're free to do so.

well here are some facts:

the Japanese Emporer was seen LITERALLY as a GOD by the people. and under the Bushido(sp) code surrender was far worse than death.. and that went for civilians aswell.. they were told the americans would enslave them and eat their babies.. thats right EAT THEIR BABIES.. and they believed it.. afterall the emporer is a living god.

during the island hopping almost NO Japanese on the islands lived.. all the soldiers fought to the last man and the civilians threw themselves off cliffs or blew them selves up with grenades that they were given for just that purpose..

before the dropping of the atomic bombs the plan was obvious.. the Japanese were no surrendering so and invasion of the mainland of Japan was the next step..

every man woman and child in Japan was ordered by THEIR GOD (the emp) to either fight to the death or kill themselves....

so take the entire population of Japan.. thats about how many Japanese casualties there would have been had Japan not surrendered... and they had no intention too..

the closest thing to surrender they had was when they tried to negotiate with the soviets to surrender to the US.. but their conditions were that the US get rid of ALL its carriers and that Japan be allowed to keep all the land it had captured at the peak of its campaign.. obviousley the US would NEVER have agreed to that.

so the options were:

A: use atomic bombs and kill ~200,000 people and get a surrender.

B: be forced to literally wipe out an entire country with conventional wespons..

in reality the atimic bombs were a godsend for the Japanese.. there is a good chance Japan as a country wouldent exist today if it had not surrenderd.

[second_draw 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Wobble @ Mar. 01 2002,01:23)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">...in reality the atimic bombs were a godsend   for the Japanese..  there is a good chance Japan as a country wouldent exist today if it had not surrenderd.<span id='postcolor'>

I agree with wobble on this. Also that countries helped japan after the war that today japan thrives and that is seems for japan the war never existed (but it did happen, let us not forget this).

[110 0]

Let's also not forget that the Japanese were also experimenting with Biological weapons on the Chinese. The Bio weapons project was also to be used as a weapon against the allies, particularly the US. The Japs even launched a test flight onto US soil via a balloon. The US wanted the Jap Bio research at the end of the war and exhanged charges of war crime for what the japs had invented. Today there is a museum about this in Japan. I saw this a couple of years ago on either the Histroy channel or A&E.

110

[Bonfire 0]

had the atomic bombs not been dropped on Japan, the war would have been over in a month or two, US planes and bombers were freely patrolling the skys of Japan....the bombs were, to the US, a global "flexing" of their military muscle.

Some of you may or may not have heard of the "Doomsday clock" , the site is here  it charts how close the world was to nuclear war...all though in more modern times it has been redefined to chart how close the use of nuclear/thermonuclear weapons....alot of Russia/US "relations" brought the Clock forward.

[Wreck-It 0]

Stay away from me, Fowley!

[nordin dk 0]

Whether or not it shortened the war, I still have reservations. I can't seem to connect any sort of positive concept with the nuclear bomb...

[WhoCares 0]

Somebody called me? Ah, Ronin, I see. Well, here I am.

Just this morning in the radio new they said, that the US has published a tape with Nixxon and Kissinger talking about nuking Vietnam. Nixxon planned to use nukes and Kissinger said something like 'Well, that's a little bit too much.'

Thank godness, there was a smart european in the US-government back then

Kissinger

(let the flame begin)

[christophercles 0]

Whats with this "were not already foward stuff"? im oddly attracted to it.

[Hilandor 1]

someone could maybe help me here

wasnt the two bombs dropped on nagasaki and hiroshima NOT nuclear but just atom bombs or hydrogen bomb or summit.

Not sure but im sure somene here will know

i was under the beleive that an actual nuclear bomb has never been fired.???

[FallenPaladin 0]

I think these bombs were atom bombs. At this time a new weapon, today that bombs design is really out of date.

For a specialist

Of course I`m no specialist

[christophercles 0]

they where plutonium nuclear bombs. "Atom bomb" is actually an incorrect term, every bomb is an "atom bomb".

[Wobble 1]

they were by today's standards low yield nuclear bombs..

and in every conflict the use of nuclear weapons is discussed.. of course its always quickley dismissed.. but its always discussed.

[Oligo 1]

The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasagi were fission bombs whereas most powerful modern day nukes are fusion bombs. Boths types of nukes are still nukes.

Fission bombs are based on chain reactions, which break up heavy element nuclei, like fissible uranium or plutonium. Fusion bombs are based on chain reactions, which fuse light element nuclei, like hydrogen isotopes. Because of laws of nature, fusing small nuclei or breaking up big nuclei yields a huge amount of energy. Fusions, however, is even more powerful and harder to initiate. Thats why you often need a fission bomb booster charge to start fusion chain reaction.

So A-bomb (atomic bomb) means all types of nukes, but H-bomb (hydrogen bomb) means just the fusion ones.

Ironically fusion bombs give less hazardous fallout, but more pure bang for the buck.

Anyway, the use of nukes should never be even discussed, as long as we are all sitting on this one planet with the fragile ecosystem keeping us alive.

[Shabadu 0]

What I find amusing is the fact that the recent anthrax attack came from within the US biodefence network and now they are pumping money into biodefence.

[nordin dk 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (christophercles @ Mar. 01 2002,11:27)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Whats with this "were not already foward stuff"? im oddly attracted to it.<span id='postcolor'>

Of course you are...