5 million dead and 25 cities gassed.

[NightskyeB4Dawn]

The Army made estimates that if these bombs had not been dropped, Japan might have ended up totally depopulated because they were going with a total war strategy, and the Allies could have lost millions of troops.  It was estimated that the beach landings would have been faced with 2:1 odds, if not worse.  They were training schookids to use spears, for crying out loud.  

It's estimated that the war would not have ended until 1948, at the earliest.   Russia would have invaded the home islands; we could have had all the problems with East Germany in Japan, let alone Japan dealing with their "Rapists R Us" MO (Germany).   Russian might have taken all of Korea.   Dropping those bombs was a horrible but necessary decision.

What scares me is that it sounds like there is no hope of a future without total devastation of the planet.

If the the atomic bomb was dropped to avoid an undesirable outcome due to the unwillingness of a country to give in to defeat, I see no way in Hell the US would ever be taken in military conflict, without all out nuclear war. What do they call it? Total Mutual Annihilation.

It makes being taken over from within look pretty good and an alternative to glowing in the dark or covering the planet with ashes.

I used to think there just were not enough crazy people in power to allow that to happen. I am not as confident anymore.

We have to change the new theme song from "We Are All In This Together " to "We Are All Going To Die Together".

Forgive my poor humor. I still believe the good folk will not be taken in by those that have evil plans to destroy us or make us destroy each other. Unfortunately, it will not come easy and it won't be without a fight. It is like a fellow Rogue said, we are going to have to take out some trash.