Should the United States have Dropped the Atomic Bomb

Thank you for your previous arguments. I will now start my rebuttal. Firstly, you mention that dropping the bomb wasn't moral. It killed over 100,000 people, and affectively injured people in future generations. The argument though isn't whether dropping the bomb was moral. It was whether it was a smart thing for the U.S. to do. And it was. You said you disagree with my point. The atomic bomb only saved American lives. Even that is not true. For every American victory in Japan there were more Japanese killed than Americans. So for complete conquest there would have been an even larger number of casualties in total than the stat I mentioned that strictly talks about Americans deaths. Anyways even if we imagine somehow that the United States didn't drop the bomb, and they were the only ones who took casualties, but still managed to be victorious over Japan. It still would have been a good idea. Lives are lives no matter what nationality. Don't you believe that everyone's life is valid no matter what nationality they come from? Also as for your statement that says, "The radiation continued to kill and mutate generations afterwards" it is also false. It is true that radiation was responsible for killing many of the people in Hiroshima, but it is not true that it mutated generations to come. There are only two things scientifically proven that are affected in future generations by radiation. One is an increase in the likelihood that a baby will turn out to be a boy. The other is that there is a "small" increase in the chance of miscarriages and birth defects. Firstly this only lasts for a few generations. it isn't a permanent trait for all the descendants of that line. And next according to discovery.com, "Some of the first evidence linking radiation with altered sex ratios among babies emerged after atomic bombs hit Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, though the data was NOT strong enough to be convincing." Next I will address your point that Americans didn't have to take all Japanese islands if they had decided to opt for a FULL invasion. This is true I agree that Island Hopping was a faster and more strategic way to gain a conquest. But this is where I should have been more clear earlier. My statistic about predicted number of deaths from a full American conquest over Japan was a prediction of deaths WITH island hopping strategy. Previously you said that a demonstration over tokyo harbor would have been sufficient to convince Japan to surrender. yet this is not true either. Japan didn't surrender after the dropping of the first atomic bomb. We waited for them to surrender after, but they didn't. So why do you think they would have been swayed by a demonstration in their harbor? In your last argument you mentioned that the Russians to be soon joining the war were the real reason Japan surrendered, and so the bomb was pointless. Well this argument out of them all was the most incorrect. Only a few moths before the dropping of the bomb, and a few weeks later when the Russians were officially set to join Japan's government had officially declared "Ketsugo". Ketsugo was a term they used for this specific proclamation. In it they swore to kill as many of the enemy as possible and wouldn't give up until they tired the world out of the war or they were completely obliterated or facing a clear and distinct promise of obliteration. The commanded all of their citizens to take American lives even if it was at the cost of their own. Effects / evidence of this proclamation is that Japan increased kamikaze attacks by 100 % and drafted all men 15-60, and all women 17-40. Next I would like to briefly take the time to address a blatant misconduct on your part. This is a strictly evidential based debate, and I would appreciate if you would not compare me to a serial killer when it doesn't seem like a particular relevant piece of information regarding the debate. If you wanted to say that you believe dropping the atomic bomb was a serial killer-istic move because "evidence" "evidence" "evidence" that would have been fine. But you never had to say "MY" arguments sound like the view of a serial killer. I am sure you didn't mean it, but I just wanted to clear it up that it this debate is a debate and not a chance to slander someone's views. Thanks. For my next paragraph I will rebut your point that while there were death camps the United States also had Japanese internment camps. This is true in a way. We did have internment camps for Japanese-Americans during The Second World War. But there is one difference. We did not systematically kill the people in our camps like both the Japanese and their former ally Germany. You also mention that it was very similar to our systematic purging of Native Americans. This is true, but not relevant. You prove my point when you say that the systematic killing of peoples in containment camps is horrible. The difference hear is that while what America did to its native peoples was wrong it was not something related to this war. You can't say,, "Oh Americans did this awhile ago! That makes it ok for us to kill of 10's of thousands of people now in a separate war." My arguments have become long, and I will began to wrap them up. First though I am addressing two more of your statements. 1) You say that, "The Japanese thought we were bluffing, and thought we didn't have the guts to invade Japan." Well this as well apparent is blatantly false. Firstly I don't know why Japan didn't think we would originally not invade, because we had done just that previously in "The Great War". Also, WE DID INVADE. You even said it yourself, "General Douglas MacArthur enforced a policy of island hopping (in which allied forces would carve a path through Japan)". If going to Japan and fighting to take their islands in hopes of defeating them is not an invasion, I don't know what is. And what would you consider the battles of Iwo Jima and Okinawa if not battles "IN" Japan to "CAPTURE" those islands "FROM" Japan. 2) Finally, for my last argument I will address your "opinion" that America would have declared war even if Pearl harbor wasn't attacked. As you say FDR did believe a declaration of war against the Axis would have been good, and he might have been looking for a scapegoat to ignite one. That still doesn't change the fact that japan came and killed 3000 good American men and women. Against this you say that Japan needed to take a risk and fight America or they would be sent back to become a small, poor nation once again. But they knew that if the attacked American allies with close bonds with the United States that it would eventually lead to war. You also say that Japan had, "Virtually no recourses" and that leaving the war would have destroyed their economy even more. This again, IS not true. According to the History of the World by Alex Woolf, "Japan relied on plentiful supplies of oil and rubber during World War 2 which the region HAD in abundance." Thank you for reading my argument. It has been a wonderful debate thus far. Good luck!