Was Hitler a coward?

[Lonewulf]

Wouldn't the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings have counted as far as "slaughtering hundreds of thousands of unarmed civilians"? What about civilian bombing runs that were so prevalent in WWII?

 

[Oliver]

I must admit it was a little unfair to add Oliver to my ignore list without adding MaGZ first. Fixed now.

I wonder if Hitler's actions were comparable to putting the
Jewish interests on ignore - and in as much this could be
considered as being cowardly behavior ... mhmm ....

 

[RobRoy]

Wouldn't the Nagasaki and Hiroshima bombings have counted as far as "slaughtering hundreds of thousands of unarmed civilians"? What about civilian bombing runs that were so prevalent in WWII?

A good point. The US firebombed major Japanese cities, some were nearly taken off the map like Toyama, Fukuyama and Nara. Cities, mind you, not war-machine factories, though there was likely war-support in each of them. Robert McNamara gives a nice run-down of the cities and how the US devastated them in The Fog of War. The February 23-24 bombing of Tokyo alone caused over 100,000 civilian deaths.

The atomic attacks claimed nearly a quarter-million lives after all was said and done.

 

[Corsair 115]

What about civilian bombing runs that were so prevalent in WWII?

Define "civilian bombing run" please.

 

[RobRoy]

Define "civilian bombing run" please.

I assumed, (Lonewulf, please feel free to correct) he meant those bombing campaigns that used incendiary bombs (cluster bombs, pumpkin bombs, etc.) in heavily dense civilian locations, such as the Coventry Blitz, or the US B29 bombing campaign of Japan from 1944 through 1945. These campaigns often claimed more civilian lives than military.

 

[Lonewulf]

Define "civilian bombing run" please.

I assumed, (Lonewulf, please feel free to correct) he meant those bombing campaigns that used incendiary bombs (cluster bombs, pumpkin bombs, etc.) in heavily dense civilian locations, such as the Coventry Blitz, or the US B29 bombing campaign of Japan from 1944 through 1945. These campaigns often claimed more civilian lives than military.

Yeap.

Also:

A good point. The US firebombed major Japanese cities, some were nearly taken off the map like Toyama, Fukuyama and Nara. Cities, mind you, not war-machine factories, though there was likely war-support in each of them. Robert McNamara gives a nice run-down of the cities and how the US devastated them in The Fog of War. The February 23-24 bombing of Tokyo alone caused over 100,000 civilian deaths.

The atomic attacks claimed nearly a quarter-million lives after all was said and done.

Yeap.

Here's a question: When a city becomes a military target, then is there such a thing as a civilian target? If so, then where exactly are the civilians living?

 

[Tolls]

A good point. The US firebombed major Japanese cities, some were nearly taken off the map like Toyama, Fukuyama and Nara. Cities, mind you, not war-machine factories, though there was likely war-support in each of them. Robert McNamara gives a nice run-down of the cities and how the US devastated them in The Fog of War. The February 23-24 bombing of Tokyo alone caused over 100,000 civilian deaths.

Wasn't part of the problem that the Japanese war machine was supported by a large "cottage" industry? This would imply that the cities were "fair game" in that context, at least as much as any of the European industrial centres.

 

[Lonewulf]

Wasn't part of the problem that the Japanese war machine was supported by a large "cottage" industry? This would imply that the cities were "fair game" in that context, at least as much as any of the European industrial centres.

While it may be "fair game", surely you aren't suggesting that it wasn't the direct targeting of civilians, right?

I'm not saying whether or not it was morally wrong to target civilians, but I am saying that if you consider killing civilians to be necessary to achieving victory in one circumstance, can you really blame someone else as being a coward for doing a similar thing in another?

Not that I'm saying that bombing people is directly proportional to using death camps. I'm just wondering where the limit here is; where the "line" is, so to speak? Hitler could have been a coward for having a scapegoat and allowing his illusions to take over his mind; after all, he felt that once you got rid of undesirables, you have a much better Germany. However, you can't say that he was alone... if he was, then Germany wouldn't have gone along for the ride. He manipulated public perception, but the public perception was ripe to be manipulated.

Also, it was stated that some people were sick to their stomachs over the concentration camps, and that this made them more cowardly. However, who here could support the Nuclear Bombs used in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and be able to simultaneously stomach watching the aftermath from a few hundred feet away (assuming you aren't puking just from the radiation sickness)? I think that it would take a troubled mind or a strong constitution to be able to handle watching the people running out with radiation burns, dying as they rush to bathe themselves in contaminated water... it's certainly not something I could handle. I was disturbed enough watching a movie where they simulated that.

 

[Tolls]

While it may be "fair game", surely you aren't suggesting that it wasn't the direct targeting of civilians, right?

OK, this all comes down to what "total war" means, effectively. Once a nations production capacity (ie factories) become targets, then inevitably civilians will be hit. In the case of a semi-industrialised nation, ie Japan, you'll get even more. In other words, if you want to target the war production you will be targetting civilians.

The B29s were tasked with hitting Japanese production which, as with Germany, meant hitting the cities.

I'm not saying whether or not it was morally wrong to target civilians, but I am saying that if you consider killing civilians to be necessary to achieving victory in one circumstance, can you really blame someone else as being a coward for doing a similar thing in another?

I'm in the "calling Hitler a coward is silly" camp, by the way. At least, the bulk of the arguments given here don't really hold up in my view.

Not that I'm saying that bombing people is directly proportional to using death camps. I'm just wondering where the limit here is; where the "line" is, so to speak? Hitler could have been a coward for having a scapegoat and allowing his illusions to take over his mind; after all, he felt that once you got rid of undesirables, you have a much better Germany. However, you can't say that he was alone... if he was, then Germany wouldn't have gone along for the ride. He manipulated public perception, but the public perception was ripe to be manipulated.

Again, I don't think the Western Allies targetted civilians (with the possible exception of Berlin in 1940). All the missions were aimed at militarily valuable targets. I could be wrong, but I really don't remember one.

This is, therefore, not simply a case of a "line" to cross...they really are very different things.

Also, it was stated that some people were sick to their stomachs over the concentration camps, and that this made them more cowardly. However, who here could support the Nuclear Bombs used in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and be able to simultaneously stomach watching the aftermath from a few hundred feet away (assuming you aren't puking just from the radiation sickness)? I think that it would take a troubled mind or a strong constitution to be able to handle watching the people running out with radiation burns, dying as they rush to bathe themselves in contaminated water... it's certainly not something I could handle. I was disturbed enough watching a movie where they simulated that.

I'm not too sure where this paragraph fits in...sorry. My brain's not functioning too well today...

 

[Lonewulf]

OK, this all comes down to what "total war" means, effectively. Once a nations production capacity (ie factories) become targets, then inevitably civilians will be hit. In the case of a semi-industrialised nation, ie Japan, you'll get even more. In other words, if you want to target the war production you will be targetting civilians.

Right. Which is still targeting civilians, naturally.

The B29s were tasked with hitting Japanese production which, as with Germany, meant hitting the cities.

I'm in the "calling Hitler a coward is silly" camp, by the way. At least, the bulk of the arguments given here don't really hold up in my view.

Right. So we agree, more or less.

Again, I don't think the Western Allies targetted civilians (with the possible exception of Berlin in 1940). All the missions were aimed at militarily valuable targets. I could be wrong, but I really don't remember one.

Including Nagasaki and Hiroshima?

Again, when you call a city a valuable military target and thus not a civilian target, what is a civilian target?

This is, therefore, not simply a case of a "line" to cross...they really are very different things.

I'm not sure I agree. You're still targeting civilian targets with intent of causing the enemy to break. Though that's the same as genocide, I'd admit.

I'm not too sure where this paragraph fits in...sorry. My brain's not functioning too well today...

Over the whole "whether or not Hitler is a coward" thing, more than anything else.

 

[Tolls]

Right. Which is still targeting civilians, naturally.


Right. So we agree, more or less.


Including Nagasaki and Hiroshima?

Hiroshima wasn't, unless you really push it. Nagasaki was. Hiroshima got hit because the other target (whose name eludes me at the moment) was under cloud and, frankly, there wasn't much left to bomb by that point.

Again, when you call a city a valuable military target and thus not a civilian target, what is a civilian target?

Ah, well, that's when war gets messy. Or should I say, that's when you realise that war is never going to be "nice". It never has been. Once you take the step that, for example, blockade is a reasonable tactic (ie depriving a nation of resources through trade routes) you're not all that far away from depriving a nation of industry by direct action. And from there...

I'm not sure I agree. You're still targeting civilian targets with intent of causing the enemy to break. Though that's the same as genocide, I'd admit.

You're targetting industrial capacity...the ability to make war. If that could be done without hitting civilians then all well and good, but reality isn't like that. Put it this way, are people working in a tank factory part of a nations "war machine"...how about people in the ball bearing factory? How about the major rail junction in a city? Bombing any of these will result in civilian casualties (even with todays "smart" weaponry, and rather more with massed bombers).

I can see the argument that there's a step to "terror" bombing, but to genocide? Nope, can't hold with that.

 

[Ian Osborne]

Hiroshima wasn't, unless you really push it. Nagasaki was. Hiroshima got hit because the other target (whose name eludes me at the moment) was under cloud and, frankly, there wasn't much left to bomb by that point.

Are you sure you haven't got that the wrong way around? Hiroshima was the first bombing mission's primary target, but the second mission couldn't hit Kokura because it was under cloud, so they struck the second target, Nagasaki.

 

[Tolls]

Are you sure you haven't got that the wrong way around? Hiroshima was the first bombing mission's primary target, but the second mission couldn't hit Kokura because it was under cloud, so they struck the second target, Nagasaki.

Ah...see?
Told you my brain wasn't working!


Looking at it again, and a bit Googling and Wikiing, I was wrong about Hiroshima's lack of industry at the time...I seem to have confused it with Kyoto, which was an early target idea.

I knew Nagasaki was an industrial centre (as much as anywhere in Japan) and port, though...

Though, I will agree that "shock and awe" was part of the idea behind the atomic bombings.

 

[Lonewulf]

Hiroshima wasn't, unless you really push it. Nagasaki was. Hiroshima got hit because the other target (whose name eludes me at the moment) was under cloud and, frankly, there wasn't much left to bomb by that point.

Wait. You're saying that Hiroshima was an accident? It was a miss?

Wikipedia doesn't seem to agree.

The committee felt Kyoto, as an intellectual center of Japan, had a population "better able to appreciate the significance of the weapon." Hiroshima was chosen because of its large size, its being "an important army depot" and the potential that the bomb would cause greater destruction because the city was surrounded by hills which would have a "focusing effect".[6]

Source is from http://www.dannen.com/decision/targets.html

It seems like that they were targeting Hiroshima, and thought that the focusing effect would cause more damage... to what, exactly?

Ah, well, that's when war gets messy. Or should I say, that's when you realise that war is never going to be "nice". It never has been. Once you take the step that, for example, blockade is a reasonable tactic (ie depriving a nation of resources through trade routes) you're not all that far away from depriving a nation of industry by direct action. And from there...

I fully recognize that. But that doesn't make the targeting of civilians anything other than the targeting of civilians.

You're targetting industrial capacity...the ability to make war. If that could be done without hitting civilians then all well and good, but reality isn't like that. Put it this way, are people working in a tank factory part of a nations "war machine"...how about people in the ball bearing factory? How about the major rail junction in a city? Bombing any of these will result in civilian casualties (even with todays "smart" weaponry, and rather more with massed bombers).

But when you directly attack apartment buildings, it seems that you're doing a lot more than simply attacking production for war machines. You're doing a lot more than attacking a factory when you use an atomic weapon.

Pretending like you're not attacking civilian targets really seems to be a way to just try to get out of the issue...

You're not saying that attacking civilian targets is wrong, you're saying that there are times when it's justified. And I would agree with that, but not easily. In short, the benefits would have to far outweigh the costs.

I can see the argument that there's a step to "terror" bombing, but to genocide? Nope, can't hold with that.

Yeah, I'd agree with that.

But my question is, can anyone here order the distant killing of innocent targets? If they aren't innocent, how would you define "innocent"?

Remember, the argument originally was that the distant ordering of the killing of innocents was what led to claims of cowardice.

 

[RobRoy]

Remember, the argument originally was that the distant ordering of the killing of innocents was what led to claims of cowardice.

Are the orders a symptom of cowardice, or a result of it?

 

[Lonewulf]

Are the orders a symptom of cowardice, or a result of it?

Uh...

What, exactly, is the difference of a symptom caused by cowardice, and something that results from cowardice? The two would be equal.

 

[RobRoy]

Uh...

What, exactly, is the difference of a symptom caused by cowardice, and something that results from cowardice? The two would be equal.

Nopers. Results are directly relatable, a symptom is not. For example, if I have a fever, that is one symptom of a cold, but it could also be dehydration, drug use, influenza, etc. It would take other symptoms to come to a conclusion.

So, in this case, if we claim that the ordered distant attacks on innocents are the direct result of cowardice, then all such similar orders are also the result of cowardice. On the other hand, if they are simply a symptom of cowardice, then there could also be other sources or other symptoms. We couldn't draw a one-to-one conclusion based on the attacks. So we couldn't point at this one peice of evidence and say, "Eureka, he's a coward!"

 

[Lonewulf]

Well, okay, that's fair enough really. Essentially, there could potentially be other qualities that could make up for it.

Since it's all subjective IMO, I can't really argue with that.

 

[RobRoy]

Well, okay, that's fair enough really. Essentially, there could potentially be other qualities that could make up for it.

Right. Agreed. It wasn't really an argument so much as an observation. If it's a result, then great, we can prove Hitler was a coward . . . but we also prove that any number of generals, kings, queens, captains, war-leaders, etc. are also cowards. If it's a symptom, then it proves nothing without additional "cowardly symptoms" to go along with it.

And, as you say, it's completely subjective. There's no way to prove the result/symptom question, which sorta renders the whole argument moot.

 

[Corsair 115]

Again, when you call a city a valuable military target and thus not a civilian target, what is a civilian target?

Therein lies the problem. You're looking for clear, black-and-white separations between civilian and military, and in the case of a war between industrialized nation-states, such clear separations really don't exist. It's all a large grey area.

There's an fighter factory surrounded by a residential area. The fighters built there are shooting down your aircraft and strafing your ground troops. If you hit it by day, you should have better accuracy, but there's still a good chance of bombs hitting the surrounding residential areas. And if cloud covers the target, now you have to bomb by radar and accuracy will be low at best. If you attack at night, chances for an accurate raid are low, and you pretty much have to devastate a large area to have hope of doing at least some damage to the factory. However, the losses suffered by your bomber crews should be lower than attacking in daylight.

What do you do? Go in the daytime and risk higher, perhaps unsustainable losses, or go at night? Do you not hit the target due to the risk of causalties in the residential areas? Or is the military benefit gained by disrupting the production of fighters worth the civilian casualties that might be caused?

There are no easy answers. Each choice has a measure of unpleasantness attached to it.