News Will terrorism be the future of warfare?

[juniorb0y007]

Every day, when i get up and listen to news, I see how people are getting killed in other countries. I also see, how other countries are focusing toward Nuc-Weaopons. I just don't get all this. For what reason, world is getting into different direction ? Ending the WW2 USA had to dropped two bombs in japan. That was only way to stop the WW2 at that time.
I am just curious about how someone will stop WW3 ? Do you all think someone will come up with NEW TYPE OF BUMB?
In my point of view, i don't think there will be a way to stop WW3.

How will WW3 end?

 

[russ_watters]

Irrelevant question: Partly because of nuclear wepons, there won't be a WW3.

 

[BobG]

There's no reason World War III would have to involve nuclear weapons. A nuclear holocaust would only be a threat if the war were between major powers (like back in the cold war).

A world war at least as significant as World War I is a realistic possibility in the Middle East where only Israel and Pakistan are likely to currently have nuclear weapons. Having only two nuclear powers means a war in a 'safe, non-nuclear' area can spring up and eventually spread to involve militaries from other continents and also include the one or two countries possessing a means to put an end to the war whenever they feel the need to.

Even if a world war in the Middle East wound up having nuclear weapons used, it would be more on the level of the World War II rather than an all out nuclear holocaust.

While possible, I do think a world war in the Middle East would be unlikely since a nearly guaranteed disruption of oil income is a fairly significant deterrent in itself. Maybe not on the level of nuclear anihilation, but strong enough that the surrounding countries tend to pull back right at the verge of jumping in.

 

[russ_watters]

There's no reason World War III would have to involve nuclear weapons. A nuclear holocaust would only be a threat if the war were between major powers (like back in the cold war).

I know I'm probably nitpicking a little, but that's kinda how I would define "world war".

A world war at least as significant as World War I is a realistic possibility in the Middle East where only Israel and Pakistan are likely to currently have nuclear weapons. Having only two nuclear powers means a war in a 'safe, non-nuclear' area can spring up and eventually spread to involve militaries from other continents and also include the one or two countries possessing a means to put an end to the war whenever they feel the need to.

Even if a world war in the Middle East wound up having nuclear weapons used, it would be more on the level of the World War II rather than an all out nuclear holocaust.

While possible, I do think a world war in the Middle East...

I'm not sure I get your categorization. "World war in the Middle East" is basically a contradiction in terms. WWI and II involved pretty much every major world power at the time. A war limited to middle-eastern countries wouldn't even come close to the amount of military might thrown around in them. Heck, if every country in the middle east went to war with Israel, it still wouldn't equal the amount of force employed in the first Gulf War, which US military policy identifies as a "large regional war".

There is a US military concept called "total war", which describes the level of commitment of the involved parties (particularly the US...). It is defined as a war effort that requires mobilization of all of the country's excess resources to aid the war effort. Ie, converting car factories into airplane factories like in WWII. A country like Pakistan has a considerable population to throw at a war effort, but it does not have anywhere near the economic power required to wage war on the scale of what the western world did in WWII.

We are not likely see major powers need to be that committed to a war anytime in the forseeable future.

 

[Bob3141592]

I hope you're right, Bob. I think a major flare up in the Middle East that incidentally threatened to cut off the oil supply would see an immediate response by the major powers, each interested in maintaining their own supply. The Saudi's and Iranians, etc would quickly become irrelevant pawns and pushed aside. China is becoming increasingly thirsty for oil, as is India, another nuclear power. Nobody wants to be out on the sidelines when the spigot is cut off. Imagine if China or Russia intervened in an Arab-Israeli war that went nuclear. If the international supply wasn't maintained, the other would feel awfully threatened, and it wouldn't be long at all before people got desperate. Bad things could happen.

Not that I think it's going to happen. But it's disturbing that the scenario isn't far less possible.

 

[vanesch]

EFor what reason, world is getting into different direction ? Ending the WW2 USA had to dropped two bombs in japan. That was only way to stop the WW2 at that time.

I think that is not correct actually. There wasn't any need to drop those bombs - if you want the details, read "the making of the atomic bomb" by Richard Rhodes (great reading in any case!). In fact, Truman decided to use it, because he wanted to win from Japan before the Russians went in, and the capitulation of Germany made it entirely possible for them to go in at any moment, and they had a huge number of troops ready to go in in the north. In other words, Truman didn't want to be confronted with having to share the victory over Japan with Stalin, and the classical fire bombing air raids on Japanese cities weren't having the hoped-for effect of demoralisation of the Japanese fast enough. Also, Truman wanted to get out some geopolitical advantage of the develloped bomb, and without a demonstration, nobody would take it seriously.

So, without the bombs, Japan would have lost in any case, but 6 months or a year later, with a massive invasion by the russians. It would indeed have cost the lives of many many US and russian soldiers, Japan would have to be shared with Stalin, and no demo of the new bomb on the international theater would have been possible.

 

[BobG]

I think that is not correct actually. There wasn't any need to drop those bombs - if you want the details, read "the making of the atomic bomb" by Richard Rhodes (great reading in any case!). In fact, Truman decided to use it, because he wanted to win from Japan before the Russians went in, and the capitulation of Germany made it entirely possible for them to go in at any moment, and they had a huge number of troops ready to go in in the north. In other words, Truman didn't want to be confronted with having to share the victory over Japan with Stalin, and the classical fire bombing air raids on Japanese cities weren't having the hoped-for effect of demoralisation of the Japanese fast enough. Also, Truman wanted to get out some geopolitical advantage of the develloped bomb, and without a demonstration, nobody would take it seriously.

So, without the bombs, Japan would have lost in any case, but 6 months or a year later, with a massive invasion by the russians. It would indeed have cost the lives of many many US and russian soldiers, Japan would have to be shared with Stalin, and no demo of the new bomb on the international theater would have been possible.

That's an interesting thought. Instead of a Korean War, we could have had a Japanese War between North Japan and South Japan. We wouldn't have a Reverend Sun Myung Moon or Tongsun Park. We might not even have Nissans and Toyotas.

 

[TVP45]

I think that is not correct actually. There wasn't any need to drop those bombs - if you want the details, read "the making of the atomic bomb" by Richard Rhodes (great reading in any case!). In fact, Truman decided to use it, because he wanted to win from Japan before the Russians went in, and the capitulation of Germany made it entirely possible for them to go in at any moment, and they had a huge number of troops ready to go in in the north. In other words, Truman didn't want to be confronted with having to share the victory over Japan with Stalin, and the classical fire bombing air raids on Japanese cities weren't having the hoped-for effect of demoralisation of the Japanese fast enough. Also, Truman wanted to get out some geopolitical advantage of the develloped bomb, and without a demonstration, nobody would take it seriously.

So, without the bombs, Japan would have lost in any case, but 6 months or a year later, with a massive invasion by the russians. It would indeed have cost the lives of many many US and russian soldiers, Japan would have to be shared with Stalin, and no demo of the new bomb on the international theater would have been possible.

A friend of mine, a jarhead, was sitting on a troopship when the bombs were dropped. He would have been in the first wave and they were told to expect 90% casulaties. A lifelong Republican, he always idolized Truman. It depends on your perspective.

 

[russ_watters]

I think vanesch's full explanation is pretty clear and accurate. That statement you object to could be reworded as "the war could still have been won without it".

 

[mheslep]

Thanks, yes on rereading the OP I see Vanesch was responding to

That was only way to stop the WW2 at that time.

and obviously the Allies had conventional means to end the war though with great cost. My above post deleted. I think the statement about Truman though is still bit over stated. Yes the Soviets were a factor. (Russians I know hate being credited with any actions of the former SU). Truman also issued the Potsdam based ultimatum for surrender, which one doesn't do if your only goal is drop the bomb and demonstrate it.

 

[DrClapeyron]

Why would there a war on scale with the wars between 1914-1927 and 1935-1945? What provoked the two previous wars?

 

[Evo]

WWI was started when the Arch Duke Francis Ferdinand was assinated in a motorcade.

WWII was due to Hitler's invasion of Poland in defiance of the Treaty of Versailles.

For more details, either find an encyclopedia or find information online.

 

[DrClapeyron]

WWI was started when the Arch Duke Francis Ferdinand was assinated in a motorcade.

That's a starting point.

WWII was due to Hitler's invasion of Poland in defiance of the Treaty of Versailles.

That's another starting point.

Economic disputes generally drive nations toward war; why then after all did the British Navy and Army follow British capitalism all over the world during the 18th and 19th century?

 

[Evo]

Economic disputes generally drive nations toward war; why then after all did the British Navy and Army follow British capitalism all over the world during the 18th and 19th century?

Uhm, perhaps because the military follow orders from the country's leader, and that British colonization was beneficial to the British?

 

[W3pcq]

I think that terrorism is the future of warfare because then there is no place to counter attack. When all countries have nukes, then terrorism will be a way of war for all nations including superpowers.

I saw a special on TV about Biowarfare. The show was mostly about a Soviet Bioengineering program aimed at creating the ultimate plagues. People now believe that the project was ended along with the S.U., but experts are still concerned about not only Russia, but China Korea etc.

Many experts put the risk of Bioterrorism above the risk of Nuclear attack, and consider it a much greater threat. A disease is easier to get into a country than a bomb. It is likely we wouldn't know who was behind such an attack, or if there even is someone behind it. This is invisible terrorism and it scares me more than any other threat facing us today.

These will be the types of problems with ending WW3. Ultimately it will be near impossible to end terrorism, especially invisible terrorism. The best bet we have at ending WW3 is to eventually unite the world not into a one world government, but into peace agreements and through gaining trust. Meanwhile overpopulation, decreases in food supply, and other issues compound the problem of world peace in the future. It seams to me that bad things in the future are going to happen and WW3 may be an ongoing invisible war that goes undetected.

 

[DrClapeyron]

There wasn't any need to drop those bombs...Truman decided to use it, because he wanted to win from Japan...Truman wanted to get out some geopolitical advantage of the develloped bomb, and without a demonstration, nobody would take it seriously.

There are at least two needs to drop the bomb in your own argument.

Can you provide a plan the allies may have used to end the war with Japan within two weeks time before dropping the bomb?

 

[Evo]

There are at least two needs to drop the bomb in your own argument.

Can you provide a plan the allies may have used to end the war with Japan within two weeks time before dropping the bomb?

If you know your history, you know that the Japanese were on the verge of surrendering.

I suggest that you do some studying.

 

[W3pcq]

They were also on the verge of having nukes. They were almost there when the war ended.

 

[DrClapeyron]

If you know your history, you know that the Japanese were on the verge of surrendering.

I suggest that you do some studying.

Correct, but no where near an unconditional surrender.

 

[vanesch]

There are at least two needs to drop the bomb in your own argument.

Can you provide a plan the allies may have used to end the war with Japan within two weeks time before dropping the bomb?

Given that the atomic bomb plan was highly secret, even to high-placed military commanders, they had of course plans, and they were in fact executing them. The main idea was to burn out about all Japanese cities, which were also the main support for the Japanese war effort, and to demoralise completely the Japanese. This was in fact working. It was in fact working so much, that orders were issued to the military NOT to damage certain cities which had to be saved to try the bomb onto: a burned-out city wouldn't show the actual damage potential of a nuke (which was unknown at the time!). In fact, some cities were not considered for nuking because they were already too much burned out by conventional fire bombing. The B29/B44 were mainly designed for this continued burning out of Japanese cities.

In the environment of the emperor, in fact, surrender was being discussed. What blocked was the - to the Japanese inacceptable - clause of "unconditional surrender", which was considered too much of an insult, but even that was being considered by the emperor: he only had a few hard-line military which didn't want to take that insult. There is btw a discussion about this single word, which some think Truman expressly put in. A symbolic "non-unconditional" surrender (which actually took place), such as leaving the emperor in place or something would have been accepted immediately by the Japanese.

So Japan was in any case totally destroyed in the summer of 1945, and the military estimated that it could hold out at most 6 months or a year. The war would have been over then. But Stalin was ready to go in earlier, and that wouldn't have suited Truman. So if the Americans wanted to claim victory alone over Japan, they had the options:
- go in with a land invasion, with very high casualty rate
- drop atomic bombs.

If the sole aim was to have Japan surrender sooner or later they could:
- just retract the word "unconditional"
- or go on bombing classically for a few more months, while the Soviets would do the cleaning up. The victory would then be Stalin's.

So yes, there were good geopolitical reasons to drop the bombs. But its aim was not, as is often claimed, to stop WWII. It would have stopped in any case.

 

[vanesch]

They were also on the verge of having nukes. They were almost there when the war ended.

This is totally wrong. The Japanese considered it, and then found out that the industrial effort would have been too big and the outcome too uncertain, and dropped the line of research.

This was in fact the big joke: the Manhattan project was set up essentially by fear that others were doing the same, and in fact, nobody did. The Germans were on a wrong track (they were in fact considering a thermal neutron chain reaction), and the Japanese realized it would have been too complicated and too uncertain, and stopped the effort.

 

[russ_watters]

So yes, there were good geopolitical reasons to drop the bombs. But its aim was not, as is often claimed, to stop WWII. It would have stopped in any case.

Well, now, on this I disagree. It would have stopped eventually, yes. But one of the reasons was to stop the war faster.

 

[vanesch]

Well, now, on this I disagree. It would have stopped eventually, yes. But one of the reasons was to stop the war faster.

Yes, I agree: about 6 months to a year.
But why did it have to stop faster ? I would think: mainly to:
1) save US soldiers (but the extend of that also depends on whether the US would decide to a land invasion or just continue burning out cities until nothing remained left).
2) win before the Soviets went in. It was my impression that THIS was the main urge.

 

[TVP45]

Correct, but no where near an unconditional surrender.

I believe it is more correct to say that a peace faction, with Suzuki in the lead, were on the verge of negotiating a peace settlement. Many of the cabinet were on the verge of killing Suzuki. Many analyses of terror bombing show that the civilian populations were greatly impacted but that the military and supporting industries and infrastructures were largely unaffected (Ploesti and Schweinfurt come easily to mind.).

It should also be noted that many historians regard WWII as the second round of WWI rather than a separate war.

 

[DrClapeyron]

There is no way the allies could have ended the war with Japan within two weeks without fighting the Japanese. The idea was to bomb Japan into submission and to have them surrender without condition. That is what happened. How else could the allies have ended the Japanese war within two weeks without fighting?

 

[mheslep]

Yes, I agree: about 6 months to a year.
But why did it have to stop faster ? I would think: mainly to:
1) save US soldiers (but the extend of that also depends on whether the US would decide to a land invasion or just continue burning out cities until nothing remained left).

A lot of US soldiers. And don't forget the 100k POWs that were there and almost certainly would have been executed regardless of who invaded the home islands.

2) win before the Soviets went in. It was my impression that THIS was the main urge.

I think the 6 months claim is highly debatable. Given: No surrender after the 1st bomb. No surrender after the 2nd bomb until conventional bombing was actually restarted. The Japanese defense of the islands, especially Iwo and Okanawa in particular where the military literally fought to the last man or swam out into the ocean, and civilians committed mass suicide. With this in mind its more than plausible that Japanese leadership would have believed it could hold out indefinitely under any conventional air attack and bleed ground invaders long enough to obtain a conditional surrender that would have left the bushido code intact and the emperor still in real control; perhaps just disarming and enduring some war crimes trials. Now, given that Japan to this day has difficulty confronting the actions of its imperial predecessor, IMO a conditional surrender as described would have been a disaster.

 

[Andre]

Perhaps that the orginal intend of this thread was not so much about nuclear weapons but about the people. After all, bombs are merely tools, the intend of war is in the people. How to get war out of them? Isn't that ending WW-III? Especially urgent since humanity will be busy enough to face the challenge of sustaining the society and the environment.

 

[TVP45]

I suspect that, if we are so unlucky as to bumble our way into a world war, the question of stopping it will be moot. We will be near extinction or perhaps reduced to a few hundred thousand hapless souls eking out a bare subsistence.

 

[DaveC426913]

All I know is I'm going to continue putting half my armies on Kamchatka and taking Middle East to get a card.

 

[vanesch]

There is no way the allies could have ended the war with Japan within two weeks without fighting the Japanese. The idea was to bomb Japan into submission and to have them surrender without condition. That is what happened. How else could the allies have ended the Japanese war within two weeks without fighting?

The question is: why did one need to stop it in 2 weeks now ? It had been going on for a few years up to that point! And why just not let the Soviets do it ? Stalin was on the verge of going in. So even if the Americans would have retracted Japan would eventually have fallen, but to Stalin, not to the US.

Mind you, I'm not saying "bad bad Truman who dropped the bomb". I think that it shortened indeed drastically the war, and that in the overall balance, especially on the allied side, it diminished strongly the number of casualties. I'm just claiming that the reason to do so was not that it was ultimately the only way to *stop the fighting* in the pacific and to get some peace agreement with Japan so that it wouldn't represent a military thread anymore (= "ending the war") in a foreseeable period (6 months - 1 year). Because this would have come in any case, also without the bomb, at the expense of more US casualties, maybe a year more of fighting, and especially, at the price of Stalin being the conqueror of Japan (who, believe me, would have imposed HIS view upon Japan).

I'm saying that the reasons were especially geopolitical: limiting US casualties, and MOSTLY, winning before Stalin got the opportunity to get in. I had the impression that that was Truman's most important argument.

According to Herbert Feis (quote from "the making of the atomic bomb") about Truman:
"As a result of his experience with the Russians during the first week of the Conference (Potsdam), he had come to the conclusion that it would be regrettable if the Soviet Union entered the Pacific war and he was affraid that if Stalin were made fully aware of the power of the new weapon, he might order the Soviet Army to plunge forward at once">

 

[DrClapeyron]

The question is: why did one need to stop it in 2 weeks now ? It had been going on for a few years up to that point!

Best answer right there. A quick end was presented to a long war.

winning before Stalin got the opportunity to get in. I had the impression that that was Truman's most important argument.

And why would you say that is?

 

[Stingray]

I think the 6 months claim is highly debatable. Given: No surrender after the 1st bomb. No surrender after the 2nd bomb until conventional bombing was actually restarted.

There was very little time between the two bombs. The Imperial Court (or whatever it was called) was actually in session discussing surrender when someone rushed into tell them that Nagasaki had just been destroyed. The bombs weren't the only things they were worried about, either. The Soviet army was massing for an invasion at that point, and had already captured Japanese territory in Manchuria.

Also, outright offerings of peace had been made multiple times by the Japanese government before this time. The channels used were unusual and somewhat unofficial, but the offers were there. The only stipulation was always that the emperor would remain in power. That was a sticking point we didn't want to give them despite allowing it in the end. In any case, Japan was militarily powerless by the end of the war. Their naval and air capabilities had been almost completely destroyed. They had no offensive capability left.

So the case for the atomic bombs was not as clear-cut as most people seem to think. Still, there is a lot of truth to the standard story. The Japanese government at the time could not be thought of as one entity. There was a significant group that never wanted to give up. They tried to stage a rebellion when the emperor announced that it was over. Luckily, that failed.

 

[mheslep]

Agreed except for:

I think that it shortened indeed drastically the war, and that in the overall balance, especially on the allied side, it diminished strongly the number of casualties.

I think it more likely that, especially on the Japanese side, it diminished the number casualties. Its ghoulish math but the Japanese dead vs US dead on Okinawa, etc bear this out.

 

[mheslep]

...The only stipulation was always that the emperor would remain in power. That was a sticking point we didn't want to give them despite allowing it in the end...

Not quite. Power is the right word regards what they wanted for the emperor and they didn't get it. The surrender insured the the emperor had zero power; he was only allowed to remain as figure head and avoided the hangman's noose.

 

[Stingray]

Not quite. Power is the right word regards what they wanted for the emperor and they didn't get it. The surrender insured the the emperor had zero power; he was only allowed to remain as figure head and avoided the hangman's noose.

I partially agree, but the emperor was mostly a figurehead before the war ended too. He was essentially forbidden by custom to give any direct orders, and very rarely said anything at all in an official setting. Japanese etiquette is a very strange thing to me, but that's the gist I've gotten from reading about it. Anyway, the one thing that did change after the war was that the people were told he was not a god.

 

[W3pcq]

No doubt dropping the bomb on large cities full of civilians was an act of pure evil. They could have dropped a warning bomb somewhere near, then one bomb on a city if that didn't work.

I think that the idea was not just to end the war, but to make an extra bold statement to the entire world. The message was that we now had the power to do this, and nbot afraid to do so, so don't f with us. The more damage and horror of the stronger the statement.

 

[TVP45]

There are good arguments about why the bomb should not have been used, but there are a couple reasons why it was almost unavoidable.

The investment of money, manpower, and resources in the Manhattan Project was so huge that it might not have been politically possible to simply "turn it off".

Truman simply did not understand the enormity of an atomic explosion. He was relatively uneducated and had no scientific training at all. His military experience was WWI.

There is no reason to believe the Japanese Army was ready to surrender or even to stand down. The vast majority of troops had not been engaged by Allied forces. Getting top military brass to go out somewhere to watch a demonstration would have been difficult.

The Kamikaze attacks made support of an invasion problematic.

There was only one proven bomb and one unproven bomb. Production of another bomb would have taken months, had the original been used for a demo.

I quite agree that the use of the atomic bombs was unbelievably horrible. As were the terror bombings of Dresden and Tokyo. Yet, I remain skeptical that there was any real alternative.

 

[TheStatutoryApe]

I think that terrorism is the future of warfare because then there is no place to counter attack. When all countries have nukes, then terrorism will be a way of war for all nations including superpowers.

It's already been done. Technology and Intel have gotten to the point that such things are extremely hard to hide anymore, and I doubt that there was much question about who was behind these things in the past either.

On a side note, you might like a book called 'The Cool War' Frederik Pohl.

winning before Stalin got the opportunity to get in. I had the impression that that was Truman's most important argument.

And why would you say that is?

Possibly because the Cold War had more or less already started. The Russians had already been caught spying on us, including nuke research facilities.