Szilard had no problem supporting the effort when the target was the Germans, who expressly were targeting Jews; once Germany was defeated, he apparently was thinking of anyone else. Including Japanese lives saved by the quickest possible termination of the war, avoidance of Russian occupation of part of Japan, etc etc. He also conveniently ignored the massive, atomic-scale causalities then occurring of more ‘conventional’ bombing of Japanese cities. The Japanese were not going to surrender; even famed director Akira Kurosawa, in his autobiography, talked about how he & his wife were like all other Japanese in automatically- & unquestionably- accepting of the “Death of the 100 million” as it was called nationally; essentially, acceptance of a national ritual seppuku per se. Even the atomic bomb didn’t bring the cabinet to decide on surrender; but it DID shock the Emperor into his unprecedented decision to do so. & even that was almost un-done at the last minute by the Japanese military. - Dave Huntsman
Szilard had no problem supporting the effort when the target was the Germans, who expressly were targeting Jews; once Germany was defeated, he apparently was thinking of anyone else. Including Japanese lives saved by the quickest possible termination of the war, avoidance of Russian occupation of part of Japan, etc etc. He also conveniently ignored the massive, atomic-scale causalities then occurring of more ‘conventional’ bombing of Japanese cities. The Japanese were not going to surrender; even famed director Akira Kurosawa, in his autobiography, talked about how he & his wife were like all other Japanese in automatically- & unquestionably- accepting of the “Death of the 100 million” as it was called nationally; essentially, acceptance of a national ritual seppuku per se. Even the atomic bomb didn’t bring the cabinet to decide on surrender; but it DID shock the Emperor into his unprecedented decision to do so. & even that was almost un-done at the last minute by the Japanese military. - Dave Huntsman
Thank you. Question does your 2020 book cover the details of the so-called demonstration shot? Whar were the demonstration options? Thanks again.