In early August, 1945, the United States dropped two atomic weapons over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The explosions, firestorm, and aftereffects killed hundreds of thousands of people.

Better minds than mine can discuss what happened and why.:

All I can say, with the long arm of hindsight assisting me, is that President Truman had run out of moral choices, so he picked the least immoral choice available to him to end the war.

Did his decision to employ these weapons kill hundreds of thousands of people, a large number of them civilians? Yes, it did.

Was it an unprecedented use of horrific weapons? Yes, it was.

But when faced with the choice of killing hundreds of thousands of people or killing potentially millions of Japanese and losing at least hundreds thousands of American and allied soldiers, sailors, and airmen, the Devil’s calculus dictated that Hiroshima and Nagasaki be destroyed to demonstrate to Japanese leadership that further resistance was not only futile, but cruel.

Had Truman chosen the other path, Japan would have been starved out, firebombed, and invaded by Americans and allies. Its army in Manchuria would have been utterly destroyed by Soviet forces, and a likely Soviet invasion of northern Japan would have brought about the partition of Japan as it did in Korea.

Leadership is more than making decisions. It’s making decisions when there is no good option.

Those who look back now and cry about the decisions made after over a decade of conflict in Asia and the Pacific should try putting themselves in Truman’s shoes for a bit. Better yet, they should put themselves in the shoes of American sailors and Marines who didn’t die storming a beach on Honshu. The best thing they can do is put themselves inside the head of a Japanese teenage boy who survived the war to lead a successful life instead of dying of hunger, disease, bullet, or gas defending a doomed regime.

At 8:46 AM, on September 11, 2001, the world changed.  By the end of the day, thousands of innocent people would be dead.  Our allies and friends around the world stood with us and pledged to protect and help the United States after the attacks.  Most of all, Americans closed ranks and became more than what we were before.

Americans of all walks of life and beliefs stood together, arm in arm, to mourn the dead and hold each other up.  We saw politicians of all stripes stand on the Capitol steps and sing “God Bless America”.  For one, brief, shining moment, we were one Nation with a common thought.

In the 20 years since that terrible day, we have lost that, squandered it.  To me, that is the true tragedy of 9/11.  We showed that we are capable of finding common cause, of being Americans.  But somehow, we lost that.  We are more divided now than we were on September 10.  Where once we tried to do as much for each other as we could, now we step over each other’s bodies in a quest to be ‘right’.

Today, I look back and I mourn.  I mourn not only the lives lost that day, but also the loss of our sense of belonging, of duty, and of love for one another.

I hope, in my lifetime, for something approaching that moment when we all stood together, to return.  I only pray that it doesn’t take another tragedy to cause it.

On September 2, 1945, after the deaths of millions across the globe, the greatest conflict in human history ended.

Representatives of the Japanese government stood on the deck of the U.S.S. Missouri and signed the articles of surrender that ended World War II.  Reading the first page takes but a few moments, and the second page is just for signatures.  Japan and her government were to be subject to the Allied powers, would safeguard what remained of her industry and military, and would free all prisoners, both military and civilian.  All power was given to the Supreme Commander of Allied Forces, and whatever power the Japanese could exert on their territory sprang from him and was subject to his orders.

It’s a remarkably simple document to end a war that consumed people like lumps of coal in a furnace.  The war also consumed a lot of the compunctions that governments had about war.  For most countries, before the war, the thought of causing the mass destruction of cities and the civilians that lived in them was unthinkable.  By 1945, it was accepted strategy on all sides.  The idea of a “crime against humanity” was created in reaction to the actions taken during the war, and never since have such heinous crimes on such a massive scale been committed.

Up to that point, the horror of World War I had made humanity recoil, causing the deaths of 17 million people and wounding a further 20 million.  In contrast, the China alone had 15 to 20 million deaths, civilian and military.  In total, between 70 and 85 million people around the globe died, with millions more injured, displaced, and enslaved.

The world did not know peace for long, if at all, after 1945.  China’s Communist Revolution restarted almost as soon as the ink was dry in Tokyo harbor.  The world quickly divided itself with an Iron Curtain, and wars would soon be fought in places that most of the combatants didn’t even know existed 70 years ago.  It was only by luck and the intervention of people who had lived through the worst of the war that we have not repeated or surpassed the Second World War in the intervening years.

Man will never stop killing his fellow man, so long as this world exists.  There will always be those who will destroy out of malice or avarice, and those who will stand to when called to stop them.  It is for us, the living and the descendants of the people who fought and lived through the war, to remember that and to jealously guard the world that was bought at such a high cost.

Soon, the World War II generation will be gone, as happens to all things.  We owe it to them, and to our children, to learn their history, to hear their stories.  Tonight, I raise my glass to the men and women who fed the furnace, who walked through it, and I invite all of you to join me.

Now, therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in me as President of the United States, and Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy, I hereby authorize and direct the Secretary of War, and the Military Commanders whom he may from time to time designate, whenever he or any designated Commander deems such action necessary or desirable, to prescribe military areas in such places and of such extent as he or the appropriate Military Commander may determine, from which any or all persons may be excluded, and with respect to which, the right of any person to enter, remain in, or leave shall be subject to whatever restrictions the Secretary of War or the appropriate Military Commander may impose in his discretion. The Secretary of War is hereby authorized to provide for residents of any such area who are excluded therefrom, such transportation, food, shelter, and other accommodations as may be necessary, in the judgment of the Secretary of War or the said Military Commander, and until other arrangements are made, to accomplish the purpose of this order. The designation of military areas in any region or locality shall supersede designations of prohibited and restricted areas by the Attorney General under the Proclamations of December 7 and 8, 1941, and shall supersede the responsibility and authority of the Attorney General under the said Proclamations in respect of such prohibited and restricted areas. — Executive Order 9066, February 19, 1942.

I love my country, but every so often I come across something that I am ashamed of.  The internment of Americans who happened to be of Japanese, German, or Italian ancestry is one of those things that make me hang my head.  An American is an American, no matter where their ancestors came from or when they came here.

And remember kids, if it happened once, it can happen again.   Our liberties only survive only so long as we guard them and guarantee that they apply to all of us.

I’ve been re-listening to Mike Duncan’s “The History of Rome” podcast, and it’s interesting to see how a lot of the issues that plague modern countries and leaders happened back then, both during the Republic and the Empire. Here are a few of my thoughts:

• Keep your friends close and your enemies in a small iron box.
• If you’re going to be just and merciful, be just and merciful.  If you’re going to be bloodthirsty, be bloodthirsty.  Trying to be both will just get you shanked.
• It is better to be loved than feared, but it is better to be feared than to be murdered and thrown in a river.
• Friends and supporters that are there for you because you pay them off will make extremely difficult enemies when you can’t afford them anymore.
• There are enough problems in the world.  Don’t go poking your neighbors in the eye out of boredom.
• The children and grandchildren of very successful people should be watched with a jaundiced eye.
• Giving power to someone before they’ve established a track record that says they can handle it is a very bad thing.