they spend a lot of time stuck together... but hopefully they'll go forth and prosper... 

no argument there....   link...    

Talk about a pita.

Irreversibly nuts. Plain and (extremely) simple.

nah... Fuzzy the Vulcan comes to us.... 

SEA SHEPHERD LAWSUIT 'COULD END WHALING'           

....very bloody softly....  

was a nice memorial service the other morning, for the 70th.... we ain't gonna 'forget' anytime soon...    

that was the general idea  

you've obviously not read a lot of the descriptions of the type of war the Japanese waged... without even having the honour to... declare war..

they were brutal and sadistic.... there are always horrors in war.... but the Japanese somehow specialised...  this was an enemy who ordered nurses to wade into the sea and machine-gunned them from behind... leaving one survivor fortunately to tell what happened...

I don't think many people realise just how close the Japanese came to invading Australia.....30 miles...our guys in New Guinea fought amazingly to hold that ground... my uncle was in intelligence in NG... the stories..though he'd never talk much... I suppose you get that way when you watch your mates beheaded in front of you...  

My mother's first husband was the youngest Group Captain in the RAAF, a very talented pilot...a natural... he led bombing raids over Timor....on a break back in Sydney before he left to go back... he said to her... hear those aircraft engines high above Sydney.... they are Japanese recon flights... he then put a pistol in her hand and said.... if they ever land here that she was to shoot my sister and herself.... he had seen what the Japanese did first hand.... and said that you would never want to live under them....the general public really don't realise, how close we came...

he died this day in 1945...after entertaining Lord Mountbatten at dinner the night before, in Labuan, Borneo...just before coming home for Christmas & permanently.....leaving her pregnant with my brother... he was permanent Air Force, his number being, 77...he would have gone onto a great career... 

you'll not find sympathy in Australia for the Japanese... as I'm sure you're glad you're not speaking German... we're glad we're not speaking Japanese...  I'm sorry the bombs weren't dropped earlier... As is usual in wars....civilians suffer....I would dispute their suffering was any more than the years of sadistic abuse and murder in their death marches/camps......and it saved many lives, bringing the war to a halt....they were, remember...the perpetrators...

we do however, all have learn to live with each other now.... new generations.... I am in an area where there are alot of young Japanese families sent out by corporations for a time... we have a Japanese school not far away... and a Japanese supermarket....  frequent young Japanese neighbours who seem to become a little quieter around ANZAC Day week, when we show a heap of war documentaries.... the young ones have no idea what went on... they are not taught... more's the pity...I think it comes as quite a shock to them when they sit down and watch a documentary on Sandakan...and Changi....and the Burma Railway...  etc etc etc etc etc...

sorry for the way off topic StevenAus..

My uncle "survived" Changi.  He was an officer.  He marched alone on ANZAC .... because no-one else came home.

I have a good understanding of what sort of enemy the Japanese were. I hold my stance. And honour has very little to do with war.

The Death Marches were avenged by Australian troops during the Beaufort Episode. Your troops sank to their level. Maybe the suffering the Australians and allies had to go through in Japanese POW camps and such was just as bad as that inflicted upon the people of Nagasaki and Hiroshima, but I'm willing to bet it wasn't in the same numbers.

Your seeming inability to feel sympathy for what was done to the victims of the bombings, and that you condemn the Japanese for their atrocities, while supporting the atrocities committed in Nagasaki and Hiroshima disturbs me.  Despite knowing about The Blitz, I still feel sympathy for the German people who lost their lives in Dresden, Hamburg and other German cities. Indeed I feel sympathy for all who have had to suffer war, both then and now, due to what are inevitably bullshit reasons.

You can say that dropping the bombs saved lives. You can also say that America joining the war when first asked would have saved lives. Both are moot points.

Japan, to this day, has no nuclear weapons. It has considered them for various reasons, but still has none. When you consider that they have suffered the multitude of effects of nuclear weaponry being dropped on them, it's not hard to understand why.