Originally Posted by Air&Road

Honestly, from everything I've read over the years I don't think that very many people looked at Fat Man & Little Boy as punishment. They saved hundreds of thousands of lives on BOTH sides.

It's just a good thing that Truman and his folks kept the fact secret that they only had a couple more of them. If the Japanese had known that only one or two more were available, they might have forced the invasion. It would have been UGLY.

Of ALL the stuff I've read about the Japanese in WWII, I think what effected me most was a story that Pappy Boyington told. After the fire bombing, he and some other POW's were taken out to do clean up work. A nice, very elderly Japanese man sauntered by and Pappy had found a butt of a cigarette for which he asked the old man to light for him.

The old man, kindly and respectfully lit the butt for Pappy and a guard saw the act. The guard came and smacked the elderly gentleman down with the butt of his rifle.

It's one thing for an Army to be mistreating POW's and doing things like the Bataan death march, and that's plenty bad enough. It's quite another to brutally injure one of their own civilians, a somewhat helpless one at that.