The World at War: The Bomb: Alex Salmond

[Downlander]

As the BBC 2’s repeat of the mesmerizing Thames TV’s ‘World at War’ series nears its conclusion, today, episode 24 recounts the dropping of ‘The Bomb’ which ended the Japanese war 70 years ago.

If you are not familiar with this series – you should be!

The series, hauntingly narrated by our very own Sir Lawrence Olivier, is the most acclaimed and extraordinary account of the ‘hell on earth’ that humans inflicted on each other for over 5 years, ever produced.

Conventional war!

50,000,000 million dead! 100’s of beautiful cities utterly destroyed along with their inhabitants, genocide, occupation, humiliation, evacuations involving most of the world’s most ‘sophisticated’ nations. Civilization itself almost wiped out.

Conventional war!

The reason I draw attention to this now is the upcoming general election and how to vote?

Alex Salmond only refers to nuclear bombs as ‘weapons of mass destruction’ but I like many others, consider them to be ‘weapons of mass defence’. A deterrent!

I hate the thought of killing anything - of war - of conflict - of suffering – but especially occupation and loss of freedom.

Nobody knows whether there would ever be circumstances whereby Britain would ever use its nuclear weapons – and that’s point. Nobody knows!

The horror of nuclear war, historically, is completely dwarfed by the horror of conventional war.

Off course many people will disagree with me, but I myself could not vote to unilaterally discard this ‘weapon of security’.

Mr Salmond also argues that upgrading Trident will be a waste of 100 billion pounds over the next generation.

What price would the generation of 1939 have been prepared to pay for the possibility of avoiding their forthcoming ‘apocalypse’?

 

[pastafarian]

Great post.......you summed it up very well.

You will however still be attacked by Mustafa and his ilk....

 

[El Presidente]

It's the best documentary series I've ever seen. Think I was about 9 the first time it was shown.

There was no need to drop TWO atomic bombs though, regardless of your views on their merits.

 

[Downlander]

It's the best documentary series I've ever seen. Think I was about 9 the first time it was shown.

There was no need to drop TWO atomic bombs though, regardless of your views on their merits.

Todays episodes argues that there may not of been any need to drop ONE bomb - but it is their existance that has avoided a further world war for 70 years.

I don't consider any weapon has merit. Just the likelyhood of not using them.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

While I wish it was otherwise, I cannot foresee a world where nukes don't exist, and while they do, we should have them. We may not be able to envisage now a scenario where we need them, the world changes quickly and it's impossible to predict world events.

Imagine if we gave up ours and left the EU (both mistakes IMO), nobody would need to listen to us ever again and we'd been an insignificant outcrop on the north-west of Europe, no more significant than the isle of Man.

 

[cheshunt seagull]

I think that the arguments for and against are complex. Whilst the concept of mutually assured destruction may seem to have worked with the West and Eastern bloc, where both would see the negative side of total devastation, I am less sure that this command ground exists with the religiously-inspired nut jobs we will be facing in the years ahead. Agree about the TV series; I can still remember seeing 'Genocide' in the 70s and being totally devastated by it.

 

[Scampi]

Both my father and my uncle worked on that series as sound technicians.

 

[Blue Valkyrie]

As the BBC 2’s repeat of the mesmerizing Thames TV’s ‘World at War’ series nears its conclusion, today, episode 24 recounts the dropping of ‘The Bomb’ which ended the Japanese war 70 years ago.

If you are not familiar with this series – you should be!

The series, hauntingly narrated by our very own Sir Lawrence Olivier, is the most acclaimed and extraordinary account of the ‘hell on earth’ that humans inflicted on each other for over 5 years, ever produced.

Conventional war!

50,000,000 million dead! 100’s of beautiful cities utterly destroyed along with their inhabitants, genocide, occupation, humiliation, evacuations involving most of the world’s most ‘sophisticated’ nations. Civilization itself almost wiped out.

Conventional war!

The reason I draw attention to this now is the upcoming general election and how to vote?

Alex Salmond only refers to nuclear bombs as ‘weapons of mass destruction’ but I like many others, consider them to be ‘weapons of mass defence’. A deterrent!

I hate the thought of killing anything - of war - of conflict - of suffering – but especially occupation and loss of freedom.

Nobody knows whether there would ever be circumstances whereby Britain would ever use its nuclear weapons – and that’s point. Nobody knows!

The horror of nuclear war, historically, is completely dwarfed by the horror of conventional war.

Off course many people will disagree with me, but I myself could not vote to unilaterally discard this ‘weapon of security’.

Mr Salmond also argues that upgrading Trident will be a waste of 100 billion pounds over the next generation.

What price would the generation of 1939 have been prepared to pay for the possibility of avoiding their forthcoming ‘apocalypse’?

You are right.

Russia is threatening to nuke Danish naval vessels ( not specified if this when they are at sea or in port ) for taking part in missile defence, but no threat against nuking French, UK or US vessels doing similar - I wonder if Denmark wishes it has nukes ?

 

[drew]

Caught the series late on but have been watching the last 7 or 8 episodes (although as a youngster I did see most of it first time round). The scenes of the American advance across the Pacific are truly horrific. The Japanese's willingness to die for their Emperor is akin to the the religious fanatics now. In the last episode, I think they said out of a force of 23,000, only 700 were captured alive on one particular small island. What loss would there have been on the mainland had a conventional invasion been required?

Nobody wants war, let alone a Nuclear one but sometimes there is a time when you have to make a stand. It is, as many have said, sometimes a necessary evil.