Were we justified?

The end does not always justify the means. Sometimes, the goal we are trying to achieve is not worth the cost of achieving it. In the war, all of those cities should not have been fire-bombed. Damaging 2/3 of the country was over-kill. The atomic bombs were too much as well. We were supposed to fight the armed forces. Through all the damage we did in the major cities, we destroyed and ended so many innocent lives. Some of the effects (from radiation) are still hurting people today. I'm sure the U.S. could have woand n the war without doing as much damage. It took so long Japan to build itself back up. To get Japan to surrender quicker was not worth burning 100,000 people and entirely destroying cities. Sure they launched a major attack on Pearl Harbor, but they still attacked a military base. They didn't target areas where many civilians were known to be. There should be some civility in war. We are supposed to be fighting to stop pain suffering, not cause it ourselves. Like McNamara said, these acts were not considered war crimes since they were used to end the war, but if they hadn't worked would people be more angry? If we had lost they would have probably been seen as cruel acts that were unnecessary. Our point of view on the situation seems to justify the means.