More on Truman

I wanted to post these two responses to Andrew Sullivan's original post about the context of war crimes between now and at the end of WWII. They add a lot of background.

First an argument supporting Truman's actions:

The Japanese government and high command categorically refused to discuss realistic surrender terms (i.e., something akin to the unconditional surrender position that had been made public years earlier by the Allies and which was thought absolutely necessary to avoid revisiting the “stab in the back” myth that arose after WWI) until after both bombs were dropped.

And now another:

When torture advocates appeal to our fear of the "ticking time bomb scenario" they are apealing to the same fear that we beleive justifies our taking of life in Hiroshima or Nagasaki, that the very existence of the United States was at risk. The taking of life on this massive scale was a lesser of two evils.

These are good arguments. I think the "appealing to the same fear" as exercised after 9/11 was tainted with political opportunism as much as it was patriotism. How can one even think of that event as purely love of America when Karl Rove was involved?