On: Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic...

[defrost]

As a point of note; you're arguing from (incomplete) hindsight.

At the time it was known that

* Germany had a nuclear weapons program.

* Japan had a nuclear weapons program.

* Russia, an ally, had contacts who were key personal in the US weapons program.

* The UK MAUD group blueprinted the path to implementation and talked a reluctant USofA into development.

( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_nuclear_weapons_progr... )

[salawat → defrost]

...and yet, none of them had the bomb to drop on anyone else. Literally a case of a bomb in hand is worth infinite (unrealized) in the bush. Realpolitik runs on what you can do now.

[defrost → salawat]

Hindsight.

At the time no one was entirely sure who did and did not have a weapon - the entire US effort was premised on a race to get there before the Germans.

The nuclear scientists of the era were international and inter connected.

[salawat → defrost]

...Not hindsight. Realpolitik.

What do you not understand about the human condition?

We are energy/cost optimizers. We want to achieve resolutions of conflict as cheap, and as quickly as possible, i.e. with minimal cost.

We made a bomb. Arguably the biggest bomb there had been any indication of anyone having gotten working before.

Truman was looking at war projections of costs to invade Japan. Then he got the papers that said we could make an entire city disappear with 1 plane, and one bomb.

Do you really think it would have worked out any different for anyone else?

I say: No. It wouldn't have, because using it as soon as you got it is just human nature.