Just War or War Crime: Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombing - Case Study Example

Just War of War Crime?

The Case of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombing (1945)

In August 1945 towards the end of World War II, the U.S. government invaded Japan and its territory, Manchuria. Japan had earlier been warned to surrender war and stop its intended attacks or it would suffer destruction. When Japan showed no signs of surrender, the U.S. bombed two of its cities, Nagasaki and Hiroshima. The war ended soon after the bombing, with Japan surrendering on the 15th of August 1945 (History.com Staff, 2009). Several debates have been tabled, discussing the moral legitimacy of the atomic bombing. Those who support the bombing argue that this bombing brought to an abrupt end, the Pacific War and thus, saved several lives. All the participants of the Second World War were saved after the war was brought to an end. The U.S. government is also said to have done that in a bid to protect its military. If any other military action was taken against Japan, then more military men would be lost in the war. The U.S. therefore did not only stop the war but it reduced further killings of its people.

Bombing Nagasaki and Hiroshima was partly the reason why the Second World War came to an end. War weapons which were being produced in Japan were largely produced in these cities. With the cities destroyed, war weapons were no longer easily available and therefore, the war had to come to an end. The bombing also threatened other countries which were involved in the war to withdraw (Mason, 2014).

Those who argue against the bombing argue that it led to loss of several lives which would not have been lost if other military methods were used to coerce Japan into surrendering. The non-discriminative attack on innocent citizens was also unethical and unnecessary. There are others who argue that the ultimate reason why Japan surrendered might not have been the bombing, and therefore, discrediting the U.S. for claiming that it ended the war through the atomic bombing. As a counter-argument, they claim that the Manchuria invasion by the Soviet Union might have led to Japan’s surrender (Mason, 2014). However, when we consider the reasoning behind the bombing, new find that the U.S. government was justified to some degree to bomb Japan. The president has issue a press release asking Japan to peacefully surrender or face abrupt destruction. Japan had a lot of time to surrender but took the threat for granted.

Afghanistan War (2001)

The war against Afghanistan began in October 2001, a few weeks after the 9/11 attack on the U.S. President Bush and his government believed that military action was the only way terrorism in the U.S. could be dealt with. Before the war broke, the U.S. government had warned the Taliban regime to surrender Osama Bin Laden, the leader of Al-Qaeda group, failure to which, a military operation would be launched. When Afghanistan failed to surrender him, the U.S. attacked and gained control over the country’s major cities. Before the war came to an end, the Taliban Regime was thrown out of power and an interim government formed by prominent Afghans who received a lot of support from international governments (Held, & Ulrichsen, 2011).

To justify the war against Afghanistan, the U.S. government claimed that Afghanistan was one of the countries that supported terrorism. In a 2002 speech, Bush bundled countries like Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, and North Korea together, branding them as “Axis of Evil” (Held, & Ulrichsen, 2011). These countries were accused of facilitating terrorist activities through production of weapons of mass destruction and failure to control the access to such weapons.

After the war on Afghanistan was over and the Taliban Regime was thrown out of power, it was realized that the war had no significant effect on the Al-Qaeda group because it kept terrorizing people in different countries including the UK and North Africa (Held, & Ulrichsen, 2011). The fact that no significant impact was made on terrorism by attacking Afghanistan makes the whole attack illegitimate and morally wrong. It seems there were no sufficient reasons why the U.S. would go on and attack Afghanistan. Although the Taliban regime was also hostile and attacked back, the U.S. government cannot be justified for launching an attack on Afghanistan. Several people lost their lives in the war, but nothing more than replacing the existent Taliban regime with the kind of democracy the U.S. considered perfect. Most people however described this war as “just war” (Roberts, 2005), and the U.S. received a lot of international support for attacking Afghanistan. When the war ended and Taliban had been retired, several refugees returned to Afghanistan and settled there. The U.S. took pride in the return of refugees, claiming that under the new democracy, Afghans could now have peace and develop their country. A 2012 post in News-Basics explains that the U.S. Government’s main agenda was to westernize Afghanistan by replacing the existent government with a new government which was more westernized and whose policies leaned more on the western way of doing things (News-Basics, 2011).

Iraq War (2003)

The 2003 U.S. war against Iraq presents a very different context from that of Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s case. The Iraq war has is rooted in the U.S. anti-terrorism policy, which was quite tough on terrorists. The U.S. government believed that Iraq government was funding, training and harboring the Al-Qaeda group which was known for terrorizing people in different countries in the world. The U.S. therefore planned an attack on Iraq for its supposed association with Al-Qaeda. The “war on terror” policy which US had developed to fight against terrorist placed a lot of emphasis on open war, where any terrorist group involved in international terrorist activities was dealt with by war. Iraq had earlier been reported to have had connections with the terrorist groups which facilitated the Arab-Israel war but it had no reported connections to the Al-Qaeda (Mansoor, 2009).

The fact that Iraq had weak connections, if any, with the Al-Qaeda group was known to the US government before the bombing but the government still went on to declare war. According to Roberts (2005), the reasoning behind the war was not justifiable. The claim that it was motivated by the need to stop terrorism could not even be supported and to cover up for the atrocities, the US government claimed the war was motivated by Iraq’s failure to honor the UN security resolutions. The UN Security Council had earlier issued resolutions on issues to do with weapons and all countries were expected to comply in order to curb terrorism. Iraq had however not acted fully on UN’s advice. Their non-compliance did not however warrant the use of force according to a report by a UN official, Blix. George Bush and Tony Blair did went ahead to launch military operations in Iraq knowing well that they did not have the legitimacy to do so.

Comparisons.

Comparing the Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s bombing with the Afghanistan war and Iraq war, you find that there are some similarities and some differences. Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s bombing is favorably comparable with the Afghanistan war since the U.S. government had legitimate seeming reasons to attack the two countries. Japan’s bombing was motivated by the fact that Japan was threatening to attack some states of the U.S. Even with the warnings that had been given to Japan to withdraw, it refused and became adamant in pursuing its planned attacks on the U.S. The attack also yielded some positive results since the brought to an abrupt end the pacific war. It is however not clear what brought the war to an end between the bombing and the attack on Manchuria.

Similarly, the Afghanistan war was began after the U.S had been attacked by an Afghanistan based terrorist group. The Government warned Afghanistan to surrender Al-Qaeda’s leader but that did not happen. The Afghanistan war, just like the Japan’s bombing, had some positive effects since it brought democracy to Afghanistan and allowed refugees to return to their home country. Following these positive impacts, Japan’s bombing and the Afghanistan war can be referred to as “just war”. However, when we consider the alternatives that could have been taken to avoid losing as many lives as were lost then, we can also say that those attacks were “war crimes”.

When we compare the Iraq war with the Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s bombing, we find that the Iraq war cannot be justified on any grounds. The U.S. government just planned an attack on Iraq on claims that it was harboring terrorist groups. There was no much information to show that Iraq was actually affiliated in any way with the Al-Qaeda group but the U.S. Government still went ahead and attacked Iraq.

Applicable Moral/ Ethical Theories.

Utilitarianism

Utilitarianism ethics holds that whether an action is good or bad depends on the ultimate result. Those who support utilitarianism also support the notion that ‘the end justifies the means’. If an action produces a good result that benefits the action doer or any other stakeholder, then the action can be sanitized by such a result (Gray, 2010).

If we use utilitarianism to judge whether the Hiroshima and Nagasaki’s bombing was justifiable or not, we consider the ultimate results of the bombing. It is believed that the bombing ended the pacific war and saved several lives. If the war would have continued, then an undetermined number would have lost their lives. Whether this number would be larger than that of those who died in the bombing would depend on the duration the war would take. The U.S. government can therefore be justified for bombing the two cities since it saved its military men from death as well as its citizens from the planned attacks from Japan. The end of the pacific war also stirred the ultimate end of World War II.

When we apply the same ethical theory on the war against Afghanistan, we find that even if this war was motivated by the need to achieve a good end: to end terrorism, this end was not achieved by the end of the war. The U.S. government tried to justify its attack of Afghanistan and even lobbied other governments to support its action by claiming that Afghanistan was harboring the Al-Qaeda group. The war did not however result to anything near what the U.S. government sought to accomplish. So many people died in the war and others lost their properties and the only thing positive result that was achieved was the change of government and resettlement of refugees. Osama Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda’s leader was never captured during that war as it was anticipated by the U.S. government nor was the group stopped from continuing with its terrorist activities. According to utilitarianism, this war cannot be justified and it should be considered a war crime since it did not achieve the maximum utility it sought to achieve.

The war against Iraq too can be described as a war crime if utilitarianism is used to judge its legitimacy. Nothing of value was gained from the war but several people ended up losing their lives. The claim that Iraq was harboring Al-Qaeda was unfounded: There was no enough evidence to prove that and even the UN had cleared Iraq of such allegation after an investigation.

Categorical Imperative

This ethical theory requires one to do what they feel that can be rational if applied by anyone. That is, an action can be justifiable if any other rational being would do the same thing in the same situation. In application of this theory, we consider what motivated an action (Gray, 2010). In the U.S. government’s case, the bombing of the two Japanese cities can only be justified if the motivation to attack is justifiable. The U.S. government sought to protect its citizens from the attacks from Japan and for this reason, such an attack would be justifiable. Any other government would act in defense if its citizens were threatened. The Afghanistan war can also be justified by the fact that the U.S had just suffered an attack from Al-Qaeda and Afghanistan was not doing anything to help get rid of the group. What cannot be justified by this theory is the attack on Iraq. It was not founded on any solid grounds and the U.S. government did not seem to have a legitimate reason to attack the country. No other rational government would launch an attack on a country that posed no threat to it.