Sen. Lindsey Graham Suggests Nuking Gaza, Calls Hiroshima ‘the Right Decision’
Sen. Lindsey Graham Suggests Nuking Gaza, Calls Hiroshima ‘the Right Decision’
I feel like the narrative surrounding the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings has changed enormously since I was a kid.
I remember learning that, while tragic, the number of lives lost in the bombing paled in comparison to the numbers of lives being lost and that would be lost in winning the war by conventional means. That it was a way to minimize further bloodshed.
I'm not super well read on the subject, but is that not true? Or, if it is true, does it not matter?
I'm mostly just trying to figure out what caused the shift.
Some disclaimers
I am a 50+ year old American
Up until 10ish years ago I had at least a better than average understanding/knowledge of WWII
My ex's grandmother's family was from Hiroshima and they had family members killed in the bombing.
All that said as tragic as they were I still think those bombs were the correct military decision at that time. I would be willing to have a rational conversation about it though.
The situation in Gaza is completely different and Lindsey Graham and the rest of the GOP are fucking ghouls.
Also, I have always thought that, as horrific and tragic as what happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were, the fact that the world was able to view the aftermath has been what has prevented a larger nuclear exchange. I don't know if the Cuban Missile Crisis would have gone the same way without everyone knowing exactly what an atomic bomb does.
Is your argument for bombing being the right decision the same (that it resulted in less bloodshed overall)? If so, how can you estimate the body count of the alternative (a prolonged conventional war, I assume)?
Back in HS, I think I was told that it was a regrettable ending and we probably went a bit overboard.
I highly recommend this video from Shaun on the matter. It’s long but you can listen to it instead of watching it and you won’t miss much. Excellent video on this subject that really put a lot of the propaganda around the bombing in a new light.
It depends whether you think killing 200,000+ civilians is a defensible act.
300,000+ if you include the bombing of Tokyo.
Nobody knows how a conventional war would have played out. To assert civilian deaths would have been higher is pure speculation and a gross attempt to justify the slaughter of noncombatants.
Though it is likely that even without nukes, the US would have still razed these cities with conventional munitions, given the events in Tokyo.
I highly recommend this video from Shaun on the matter. It’s long but you can listen to it instead of watching it and you won’t miss much. Excellent video on this subject that really put a lot of the propaganda around the bombing in a new light.
There is a book I liked about this, it is about Allied civilian bombing in WWII in general.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Among_the_Dead_Cities
It's by the philosopher A.C. Grayling, needless to say 'Responses were divided.'
My understanding is that even after Hiroshima, the Imperial Army attempted a coup to avoid surrender.
The Japanese were not stopping. The only alternative at hand was a full invasion, which would have killed many, many more.
My man, read the fucking room
Back in 2017 or so, I had a full on MAGA coworker who was ecstatic about the migrant detention centers at the border. If anything, he felt we weren't torturing them enough. One day, he dropped a line that was so heinous it still sticks with me to this day: "we used to do the same to the Japanese and no one cared about it then, so why is everyone up in arms about it now?"
All this to say I'm not at all surprised they're saying this now. They've always felt this way, and they know how despicable it is.
Fwiw, the dude was a 50-something year old Israeli immigrant. He also joked about wanting to join the military to "practice on live targets"
I hate this timeline so much
What'd you say back to him or do?
I knew better than to engage. The guy was a nutter. He got laid off shortly after that thankfully.
Bonus story about this fucker. When I adopted a dog, he told me that "in five years you won't give a shit about the dog and will only care about your boyfriend". Eight years later, my girlfriend and I co-parent the same dog like she's our daughter.
Your coworker has serious mental health issues. I hate the party but I also hate that our mental health system won't address the negative impact religion plays in forming negative views and that our laws prevent therapists and those in mental health from doing their actual jobs.
Not to defend the viewpoint, but I assume he was referring to interment camps and not nuclear bombing. That would be more analogous to the border detentions.
So… he knows that… like… Israel would be in the blast radius and Jerusalem and Tel Aviv probably affected by a shit ton of radiation….
Its literally him
You assume that these guy know much about anything except corruption, graft, and drug fueled sex orgies.
At Farmers, they know a thing or two about drug fueled sex orgies.
Nevermind all the other obvious reasons this is terrible but I'm sure Egypt would have some objections to being blasted by a nearby nuke.
Israel is rumored to have tactical nukes that are much smaller yield than the large ICBMs we hear about all the time. Super destructive force in only 1 or 2 km blast radius, which would even fit inside a small area like Gaza. Of course, in addtition to devastating Gaza, there would still be fallout and issues over Israel, and using them in this manner is definitely Not OK. However, I can believe that there are some deluded people in government (both in Israel and in the US) who would view that as acceptable.
Ghouls like him love Israel, it’s just all those… you know, those people who live there
Maybe the cunt is waiting for suitable wind direction before nuking.
I gotta give these people credit. It must take a massive amount of effort to try and be this consistently on the wrong side of history. Like, at some point, it has to be deliberate...
They think they're on the right side of history. It's 100% deliberate. They never admit they are wrong about anything because the thought is completely foreign to them. Right wing boomers absolutely believe they are 100% in the right on every single issue. They can't even imagine they aren't.
The senator continued to call the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki “the right decision” by the U.S. That decision ended the war with Japan, but killed hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians between the initial blasts and the deadly radiation that followed.
“Give Israel the bombs they need to end the war they can’t afford to lose, and work with them to minimize casualties,” Graham insisted.
He didn’t directly suggest nuking Gaza, but he made multiple parallels between ending the war in Japan by using nukes and then basically says we should give bombs to Israel to finish the job without specifying what he means.
So while someone might argue black and white letter of what he said isn’t “nuke Gaza”, he’s still implying something along those lines - the quick finish and a method that can do it.
He is, in fact, saying "nuke Gaza", just in a way that allows him to deny it.
How fucking Christian of him. Jesus would be sooooo fucking proud.
I can't hardly take them or anyone that tosses the xtian mythology around. Why should we? History hasn't shown us a "god". Only shifty humans arguing over imaginary friends.
Can we stop letting them in positions of power already? They obviously aren't fit for leadership or power.
I mean, he's not wrong, he's just an asshole. By most historians accounts, Fat Man and Little Boy caused less death than an actual war with Japan would have.
They were also retaliatory strikes after a direct attack on an American base, at the tail end of a global conflict, and we just got a new toy. The bomb was basically telling Japan to fuck off with their bullshit, and it did a pretty good job of it.
That doesn't make it the right answer, per se. Glassing the strip probably would net less death and destruction than continuing the genocide or especially allowing it to escalate more. I still have a hard time calling that "the good choice"
And what happens after the glass hardens? We all gonna be honky dory or is somebody else gonna star lobbing nukes?
Um, Actually, I would hardly call it settled or that most historians agree.
https://ahf.nuclearmuseum.org/ahf/history/debate-over-bomb-annotated-bibliography/
Lindsey is part of the swamp. He's a Christian Zionist, a doomsday Christian. These types of Christians want to hasten the Day of Judgement. Pretty much they're psychopaths thanks to the Scofield Reference Bible.
Number one rule of Christian Narcissism: That rule was written for the others. It doesn't apply to me. I'm not doing anything wrong.
I agree with you 100%. In my belief, it is God who wills when Judgement Day comes. It is not the will of a human. Christians and Zionists together think they can some how bypass the will of God.
You are giving them way too much credit. Any combination of “god wants me to” with “God works in mysterious ways” and “the will of God is 100% infallibly and unerringly good” can justify pretty much any heinous act you can think of.
I bet they would be off the rails no matter of the literature choices
I can't reinforce the idea enough that they believe god is eal and that they can trick a prophecy to being fulfilled by naming a british colony "Israel".
The biblical Israel is long gone and the current Israel is obviously a different state; you can "fulfill the prophecies" the same way by naming your dog "the kingdom of Israel"
This should disqualify him from ever holding office again. I know it won't, but it should.
Couldn't ask for a better positioning of titles.
On the other hand, we should keep outing these Nazis whenever we can so that the decent part of society doesn't collectively forget who punched down and who punched up.
Also, social consequences are IMPORTANT for fighting fascism. Making them feel unwelcome at every table, every party, every workplace, EVERYWHERE is a time-tested and actually fairly effective way to fight the spread of fascist thought. It won't get rid of the most entrenched, the true believers - but it can help the knock-on effect of "hey maybe that guy has a real point".
Japan was completely blockaded, which is such a profound thing in war that it's really all you need to defeat "nuking was necessary" arguments.
And they were completely resource starved, another profoundly important detail of a war machine.
And the fanaticism + "they will die to the last man, woman, and child" is grossly misrepresented in the context of nukes.
But these details aren't relevant to how Palestinians and the situation in Gaza is portrayed. No siree.
Somebody got dumped.
this sort of homophobia isn't helping.
out of all the queer guys I'm friends with, exactly zero of them have detonated nukes in response to their boyfriends breaking up with them.
so all that's left is you bashing a piece of shit, not for being a piece of shit, but because he kinda seems gay.
kindly, respectfully, fuck off with this shit.
Better?
How's the mental illness going Lindsey? oh ok.
There's a Facebook tag group called "OP getting hammered harder than Lindsay Graham's tonsils at a truck stop" and that's what I think of when I see his name.
There’s nothing homophobic about acknowledging that two or more enthusiastically consenting adult gentleman may jackhammer upon each others’ tonsils in the privacy of their own bedroom and/or truck stop.
I think it’s also not homophobia, and perhaps even being an ally, to point out when the people constantly trying to demonize the LGBT+ community are being hypocritical about it. And it’s not because they are gay or bi, it’s because it reveals how twisted their motivations are.
In case you're wondering, these religious freaks believe that they can force Jesus to return by instigating WW3. So long as Israel is involved, they consider that to be fulfilling prophecy; and the nuclear, the better. I'm sure some of them even consider Trump to be the actual Antichrist, while as usual, most of them think it's whoever the Democrats have in office.
its also stupid because old country of Israel is gone and making a new colony and calling Israel also isn't fulfilling a prophecy - its cosplaying. Might as well call your dog "Israel" and say it fulfills the prophecy
Well, if they continue this way, we all may get to know Jesus together pretty soon
It's not clear how low these people will truly go. The bottom fell out long ago and we are going to see these guys get a lot worse. There are no boundaries to guide them. They will continue to reach no lows time and time again. It's infinite.
I don't understand why Republicans are so strongly on Israel's side at this point. I think almost everyone was on Israel's side on Oct 7th but since then there have been over 35,000 Palestinian deaths, including women and children, and their infrastructure has been obliterated. Israeli losses since Oct 7th only come to 260 soldiers.
Why would anyone suggest nuking Gaza? Oct 7th was terrible but it wasn't perpetrated by the millions of people in Gaza. It was perpetrated by the terrorist group that rules Gaza and, at this point, it seems they aren't much of a threat.
The only reasons I could see for nuking Gaza are:
They literally believe every single man, woman, and child in Gaza is part of Hamas, and therefore a terrorist.
They have no capability for empathy and can’t imagine a world in which a citizen of a foreign nation can disagree with the ruling party, despite about half the country he is part of ruling disagreeing with him.
They are also financially motivated to unconditionally back Israel because of lobbying, or corruption, whatever you prefer to call it.
Part of it is due to fundamentalist evangelical Christians, who believe that Israel needs to firmly own the region in order to bring about the apocalypse. See: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/politics/wp/2018/05/14/half-of-evangelicals-support-israel-because-they-believe-it-is-important-for-fulfilling-end-times-prophecy/
This is the same reason that Trump moved the US embassy to Jerusalem, and former Australian prime minister, a devout evangelical Christian, tried to.
I don’t understand why Republicans are so strongly on Israel’s side at this point. I think almost everyone was on Israel’s side on Oct 7th but since then there have been over 35,000 Palestinian deaths, including women and children, and their infrastructure has been obliterated. Israeli losses since Oct 7th only come to 260 soldiers.
Because it's turned from a real issue with it's real horrors and complexities into a partisan/cultural wedge issue.
Why would anyone suggest nuking Gaza? Oct 7th was terrible but it wasn’t perpetrated by the millions of people in Gaza. It was perpetrated by the terrorist group that rules Gaza and, at this point, it seems they aren’t much of a threat.
Might be important to note that it's still an ongoing thing, with civilians still captive or missing. So talking about it in the past tense might be missing an important reason for Israel's extreme behavior.
And this guy is considering sane compared to Trump.
But yes please don't for Biden so that we see what nuclear genocide looks like I guess?
Good thing he brought that up, so we all can debate again how awfully bad is to use a nuke, and to nuke civilian targets.
the policy makers of the united states of America
I've been saying we should nuke South Carolina for years.
Would this be before or after Israel is able to control the direction the wind blows?
Didn’t you get those powers at your bar mitzvah? It’s supposed to be right after we get the codes for the space lasers.
I didn’t get a bar mitzvah, personally, so I’m a shitty Jew who doesn’t have those powers.
I sort of got a bar mitzvah, but the asshole Israeli who was supposed to teach me Hebrew sucked at it and I never learned. So I read my passage with a crib sheet that told me how to pronounce everything. My cousin, who was the rabbi officiating, took me aside and said, "they may not know what you're doing out there today, but GOD KNOWS!" My dad and I had a good laugh about that for years.
I only did the whole thing for my grandparents' sake.
Imagine wanting to glass nearly a million kids.
Why is the answer always more murder?
You go girl.
i mean to be fair, nuking japan was definitely one of the options. Japan during that time was smoking some good fucking shit
absolutely not
Say it a little louder for all the dipshits trying to argue that a trump presidency would be better for Gaza than Biden is.
If Trump wins I'm going to be too preoccupied with the climate disaster and end of American democracy (in that order) to give a single fuck about what happens in Gaza, Ukraine, or anywhere else.
Reverse order for me, the climate distaste I worry about with a Republican dictatorship is a nuclear winter. But that might be growing up during the Cold War talking.
All according to the plan...
Considering nuking Gaza could easily lead to everyone nuking everyone else, you might change your priorities a bit.
Why aren't the "But Biden!" people in this thread? It's so very strange they seem to be absent (no, it really isn't).