Talk:Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

Edit request on 1 December 2011

The photo of the crew of the Enola Gay is not an accurate one. I have much better ones I would be willing to share. I am personally acquainted with the crew - the tail-gunner George Robert "Bob" Caron is my uncle. The only crew member still alive, who can vouch for me and what I know is Theodore "Dutch" Van Kirk. WesternLady (talk) 18:37, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

I tweaked the current image's caption to correctly tell the reader that it shows Paul Tibbets and five ground crew. The guy looking down is Theodore Van Kirk who was in the flight crew.

If you want to share your image you are welcome to do so. I can give you pointers on the process if you are unfamiliar. If you have digitized the photo and it is stored on your computer, the place to start is here at the Wikimedia Commons upload page. Binksternet (talk) 19:15, 1 December 2011 (UTC)

Category Requests

(irrelevant of the ethical debate, and regardless of the fact that the Empire of Japan's rapidly diminishing power projection radius the bombings were the definitive event, (and this is in noooo way an endorsement of the decision to drop the bobs). The neutral, historical fact is: the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the definitive singular event that marks both the abrupt end of Japan as a historical, multinational geo-political Empire and it's beginning as modern single constitutional nation-state and an "Empire" only in the loosest semantic and ceremonial sense.

108.107.116.15 (talk) 13:13, 13 December 2011 (UTC)Moi

Or maybe I am just off the mark on this one?

The article is filled with trivia, thus hiding the main fact

The main fact that this was a crime against humanity, not to mention a warcrime. This very true fact is not once written in the entire several page article which primary focuses on the history of the bombing and reason for it... Another clear proof that Wikipedia is controlled by Americans. SomeGuy1122 (talk) 09:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

What edits do you suggest be made? Nick-D (talk) 09:41, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree with you. Someone should add link to United States War Crimes in see also section or somewhere. It may be reverted soon though.143.167.244.100 (talk) 22:24, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

What body has ruled it a war crime? Wikipedia requires reliable sources. (Hohum ^@) 22:32, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

The article quite clearly already states that the japanese courts consider it a war crime. As do plenty of scholars. There is not even a section discussing this when it is an important issue concerning modern wmd law and nuclear issues. This article is suspiciously sanitised. 87.194.26.132 (talk) 04:08, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

At some point all discussion about war crimes was bumped to Debate_over_the_atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#The_bombings_as_war_crimes, even if its just a sentence this section should be linked from here, and preferably a better summary of the debate article written up. 87.194.26.132 (talk) 04:13, 17 January 2012 (UTC)

It's not sanitized at all. There is at least one section on it with a link to the longer article. The difficulty is that correctly representing the major sides in the debate (and it is a debate — there is no consensus on it) with any depth constitutes a very long article in its own right. It's not perfect as is, but I think the assertion that it is sanitized or trying to hide anything is not fair. It is trying to be neutral. --Mr.98 (talk) 22:40, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

There is a court decision in Japan, referenced in the article, that ruled that the bombings were a war crime. The court accepted that Hiroshima and Nagasaki were valid military targets, as were all the soldiers and factory workers in them. It then went on to invoke the Hague Convention's ban on bombarding undefended cities. Although the cities were in fact defended by aircraft, troops and antiaircraft guns; but the court felt that the damage was the same as if the cities were undefended, and therefore violated the prohibition on bombarding undefended cities. Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:31, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

"War crime" and "terrorist" are labels that are difficult, if not impossible, to make stick on Wikipedia. For example, go over to Irish Republican Army and do a text search for "terror". Nope, not there. "One man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter". Sōran Bushi (talk) 15:25, 30 January 2012 (UTC)

Historical facts

I came to the page looking for this specific information, which could only be found in the "Little Boy" entry: "The Hiroshima bombing was the second artificial nuclear explosion in history, after the Trinity test, and the first uranium-based detonation". I wanted to check there was only one test before, on American soil, and then they deployed the two bombs right away like that.

I suggest this to be added in the first paragraph, after the related information of the explosions being the first in war, etc. Also, please include the fact that Nagasaki was #3. - 187.20.68.95 (talk) 08:32, 10 January 2012 (UTC)

The article does discuss the Trinity test, and it does discuss the fissile material used in all three explosions (see Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Manhattan_Project) . I'm not sure I see the compelling need to have it spelled out in bar-room trivia style in the intro — to me those sort of "firsts" and "thirds" and etc. are best done in the articles about the specific bombs, not the overview article. I think there's enough trivia in it as it is. --Mr.98 (talk) 22:36, 29 January 2012 (UTC)

The dates

They should put side to side dates for each of them — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.9.29.121 (talk) 01:23, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

problems with refs/cites

• Nothing in the reference section for the Bagby cite.
• The walker quote: "The fundamental issue that has divided scholars..." has two problems: first, I searched but can't find it. Second, there's no matching reference for the cite to "Walker 2008, p. 334 "
• I don't if this last is a problem or a deliberate stylistic choice: several reference appear in full form in the Notes section, the references section, and the Further reading section all at the same time (or one and another). To me it looks like a mishmash of cite styles that creates a bit of extra load time that might be avoidable... but I could be wrong. Ling.Nut3 (talk) 06:43, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
  • what has happened is that I have been going through the article fixing up the references, but I haven't finished yet. So there are a number of anomalies. The article has had a mishmash of styles all along; I have been putting them in a consistent form. Hawkeye7 (talk) 08:15, 4 February 2012 (UTC)
    • Sounds good. I'll look for examples of you working on refs to see the format you prefer, so that I won't undo what you've done...If you could identify/add (or delete) Bagby, that would be good. Ling.Nut3 (talk) 08:28, 4 February 2012 (UTC)

Typo

There is a typo under the section titled "Depiction, public response and censorship". In the sentence immediately following citation 121 & 122 there is this. "The total of Template:Conv of footage filmed by ..." I'm not sure where Template:Conv points, but it should be cleaned up or the link reset.

Thanks! 69.178.85.107 (talk) 13:13, 5 February 2012 (UTC)Sean S., February 5th, 2012

Y Done Fixed! Thank you for pointing that out. Binksternet (talk) 16:18, 5 February 2012 (UTC)

Reaction to the Bombing

There should be a section on the reaction on the bombing by each country. Canada opposed the bombing because the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor took care not to target civilians. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 186.109.2.24 (talk) 18:21, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

This is largely false. 'Canada' did not oppose the bombings, in fact the Canadian government had no official position on the bombings at all. They were aware of the program as it progressed, as most of the Urnaium was canadian. Upon the attack on Hiroshima, PM Mackenzie King expressed a deep satisfaction and pleasure at the Canadian role in the development of the Bomb. Furthermore, to compare this to the Japanese 'care' during the Pearl harbour, where single engine fighters carring small bombs and Torpedoes (with little or no capacity to attack civilian targets in any meaningful way) attacked an enemy fleet to cripple their offensive capability (it was hoped) is absurd. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 192.41.140.2 (talk) 12:16, 23 February 2012 (UTC)