It literally could not have been a war crime. Even by modern standards. Total war. It ain't pretty. Wanna see war crimes in the Pacific theater? Bataan, Nanking, Korea, everyplace the IJA stepped foot. If anything, we should've been worse to them than we already were.
The citizens were not the people who committed the war crimes. The lives lost in the nuclear attacks were that of civilians. And that is, by definition, a war crime.
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Just because Japan committed war crimes, didn't give anyone else to completely obliterate two cities of that country full of civilians.
The laws surrounding war crimes of that time period Expressed that there needed to be a valid military target in order to bomb the city. I can't look up right now which one is which but 1 was a major army depot in the Southern region of Japan the other was the largest naval hub in Southern Japan. As far as legality goes the bombings were legal as far as the interpretation the law of the time was.
In total war infrastructure and the population are military assets, and are thus valid military targets.
Killing civilians is not "by definition" a war crime.
And a nation committing war crimes does allow for reprisals. Otherwise, laws of war would be worthless. A nation could just act with impunity under the assumption of imminent victory (a bit like Japan tried to), and on top of that they didn't abide by the rules or treaties in the first place, so they claim none of their protections.
But hey, we could've just blockaded and starved them until so many millions died or fell into despair that it wouldn't matter whether they surrender. Or we could have invaded and millions would have died in the operation, with at least half of the nation falling under Soviet jurisdiction.
We still treated them better than was legally required. And they didn't even agree to any legal standard.
If the Imperial Japs don't want to face the music, they shouldn't have set the tone.
The legality of use of nuclear weapons under international law wasn't specified until 1977 in the Additional Protocol I to the Geneva Convention. You can't convince me the use of the weapons wasn't legal. Morally justified or otherwise is debatable but the legality is not debatable.
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Just because Japan committed war crimes, didn't give anyone else to completely obliterate two cities of that country full of civilians.
Killing civilians is not "by definition" a war crime.
And a nation committing war crimes does allow for reprisals. Otherwise, laws of war would be worthless. A nation could just act with impunity under the assumption of imminent victory (a bit like Japan tried to), and on top of that they didn't abide by the rules or treaties in the first place, so they claim none of their protections.
But hey, we could've just blockaded and starved them until so many millions died or fell into despair that it wouldn't matter whether they surrender. Or we could have invaded and millions would have died in the operation, with at least half of the nation falling under Soviet jurisdiction.
+Says who?
-Me, the one who makes the laws.
If the Imperial Japs don't want to face the music, they shouldn't have set the tone.