An interesting piece, while I think you over dramatise some aspects of your argument, I'm in agreement that the alternatives to dropping nuclear weapons would have been far worse for all concerned. Experience from the later Pacific war showed that not only would the Japanese military resist tenaciously requiring 90% and more casualties (if not total annihilation) before capitulation, but also Japanese civilian casualties could be expected to be massive. To take to larger battles during the later Pacific campaign Guam and Okinawa, military casualties in both engagements were well over 90% of troops present, Japanese civilian casualties on Okinawa were huge with estimates running up to around 50% of the total population. Add to this the casualties that the allied forces would have sustained attacking the Japanese mainland and the losses inflicted with little boy and fat man begin to fade. Nuclear weapons are indeed horrific, but an unnecessary potential death toll of millions, while not as dramatic sickens me more.