The sub was U-234

Here's a link to a book on the topic.

http://www.amazon.com/Germanys-Last-Mission-Japan-Failed/dp/1557508119

The boat carried a dismantled Messerschmitt jet, plans for the V-2 rocket, as well as the Uranium and some other toys. Since it was captured in May of 1945, and provided evidence that the Japanese were also interested in the capabilities of Uranium, I have no sympathy with those who criticize Truman for his decision to bomb Hiroshima.

We now know that the Japanese did not have the resources to use the Uranium, (at least the Home Islands didn't, only the Chinese know what the Japanese were doing in Manchuria) but Truman could not know how close they might have been. It's certain that if they had got a bomb working, they would have used it on the US.

Do you sympathize with...

...those who object to the destruction of Nagasaki? Given that the Americans had proven their atomic capability days before, and they just wanted to show the Soviets their new toy? Or do you figure the nuking of a second city is no biggie?

Dumbass.

What fantasy land do you live in?

Even at the height of their power the Japanese were barely capable of reaching the US mainland with randomly released weather balloons carrying a couple of pounds of high explosive. What makes you think that, at a time when their air force was all but destroyed they would have been capable of delivering an atom bomb even if they had been able to invent and then build one?

I've visited both Hiroshima and Nagasaki and whilst I still agree that Truman made the right decision I don't think your 'they had it coming to them' attitude does you any credit though. Presumably you think the thousands of children who died slow deaths - often lingering for years - were somehow at fault?

If the real reason for dropping the bomb had been to 'punish' the villains in Japan then the target would have been Tokyo, not Hiroshima or Nagasaki.

Truman was right.

Whilst I agree with the basic emotion of response Truman was proven right. Even after the first bomb records foudn after the war showed that the Japanese government (including Hirohito) were preparing to fight on. They'd reserved thousands of planes (3,000 I believe is the number) solely to use as Kamikazes to attack the Americans when they tried to invade the home-islands. They'd also armed thousands and thousands of civilians, including school children, with bamboo spears in order to 'resist' the invasion. Indeed it was a group of schoolgirls based in a bunker at Hiroshima castle, where they were working as radio operators for the Army area HQ, that were the first to report the attack.

The second bomb changed that and caused Hirohito to act.

Overall the two bombs saved a lot more lives, American and Japanese, than they destroyed. It was clearly the lesser of two evils: which is saying a lot about an atom bomb.

@poor Coco

The "dumbass" was surely Hirohito for not surrendering after the Hiroshima bomb, despite the clear warnings given.

Lots of POWs & Chinese are still sorry the Allies only had two bombs available...

Title

"I have no sympathy with those who criticize Truman for his decision to bomb Hiroshima."

I take it that you also have no sympathy with people who criticize the bombing of Dresden and the effect it had on the people there either.

The atomic bombs killed 140,000 people in Hiroshima and destroyed 90% of the city, killed 80,000 in Nagasaki and destroyed 45% of the city. The relative low level of damage in Nagasaki was due to the fact that the city is built in a "Y" shaped valley and that the bomb missed its aiming point and the potion of the city in one of the legs of the Y was protected form the nuclear blast. By comparison an air raid on Tokyo on the March 9/10 1945 destroyed 25% of Tokyo and killed 100,000. So it would seem that conventional bombing was just as destructive.

Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not bombed by conventional bombs so that the full affects of the nuclear weapons could be assessed.

This gives validity to the theory that the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki may have been as much abount nuclear diplomacy and the projection of 'merkin power and that the primary purpose of the bombing was to intimidate the Soviet Union.

Chemical Warfare

Despite the Germans having invented nerve gas, it was never used during WW2. One theory holds that this is because the designs were pre-war, and hence patented and in the public domain, the Nazis assumed the allies knew about it and feared retaliation in kind if they ever did use it.

You are confused.

"the Americans refused to employ von Braun or to use any of his work in the Apollo programmer?"

You mean the von Braun who was director of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center? The guy who was Chief Architect of the Saturn V? That von Braun? You are seriously confused.

You're initial comment...

...demonstrates the usual misunderstanding of Hitler and the Nazis. People often make comments like 'if only Hitler hadn't invaded Russia', 'killing the Jews was a wasteful thing to do', 'Kicking all those brilliant scientists out of Germany hurt their economy'.

All true statements.

But for Hitler and the Nazis the whole point was to wipe out the Jews and to invade Russia. Everything else was subordinated to that. The war, the economy, scientific research, everything else even, ultimately, the good of the German people, was secondary: the means to that end.

@Edward Kenworthy

"You're initial comment... "

Eh? I think your taking something I typed out of context ... fortunately, that matches well with you're apparent lack of a grasp of history. And English. C-, must do better.

Paul Dirac

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20126905.500-strange-tales-about-paul-dirac.html

I like the man even more after reading that.