Most bombing is. Firebombing of Dresden for example. The V2 bombs falling randomly on Londoners. I’m not in any way trying to handwave away your premise at all, just offer that war is hell and civilian targets are always targets to reduce the opponent’s will to fight. In historic times we’d burn the town and light the fields on fire, starving the population. WW2 firebombed cities. Even today nuclear weapons would be launched at strategic military targets, critical infrastructure, and city centers. War crime? I guess. Seems like plain old war, even if the US used the weapon that dialed it up to 11 first. (IMO nukes shouldn’t exist on any arsenal, but it’s not up to me)
“War isn’t Hell. War is war, and Hell is Hell. And of the two, war is a lot worse.”
“There are no innocent bystanders in Hell. War is chock full of them - little kids, cripples, old ladies. In fact, except for some of the brass, almost everybody involved is an innocent bystander.”
Just as an aside, due to the use of slave labour from nearby concentration camps and the horrendous conditions at the Mittelwerk factory that an estimated 12,000 people died making V1s and V2s, more than the estimated 9,000 people that died as targets.
Deserved
I wouldn’t say “deserved”, civillians don’t “deserve” dying in a destructive war waged by their government. It was just a lesser evil.
Still a war crime against civilians.
Most bombing is. Firebombing of Dresden for example. The V2 bombs falling randomly on Londoners. I’m not in any way trying to handwave away your premise at all, just offer that war is hell and civilian targets are always targets to reduce the opponent’s will to fight. In historic times we’d burn the town and light the fields on fire, starving the population. WW2 firebombed cities. Even today nuclear weapons would be launched at strategic military targets, critical infrastructure, and city centers. War crime? I guess. Seems like plain old war, even if the US used the weapon that dialed it up to 11 first. (IMO nukes shouldn’t exist on any arsenal, but it’s not up to me)
“War isn’t Hell. War is war, and Hell is Hell. And of the two, war is a lot worse.”
“There are no innocent bystanders in Hell. War is chock full of them - little kids, cripples, old ladies. In fact, except for some of the brass, almost everybody involved is an innocent bystander.”
Truth.
Just as an aside, due to the use of slave labour from nearby concentration camps and the horrendous conditions at the Mittelwerk factory that an estimated 12,000 people died making V1s and V2s, more than the estimated 9,000 people that died as targets.
That’s a grim aside.
Very unfun fact.
Ofc the state is run by criminal terrorists. It’s nothing to excuse or celebrate.
It can be a statement of fact without being either of those.
US dropped notices for days ahead of the bombing. warning of the imminent danger and horrific results of a nuclear bomb.
many didn’t believe in the warnings as they had been disillusioned by their government.
the rest is history.
edit: looks like I touched a nerve but you can’t argue facts.
https://ahf.nuclearmuseum.org/ahf/key-documents/warning-leaflets/