From: utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!poli-sci Newsgroups: fa.poli-sci Title: Poli-Sci Digest V2 #140 Article-I.D.: ucbvax.7541 Posted: Fri Jun 4 18:20:29 1982 Received: Sat Jun 5 04:54:58 1982 >From JoSH@RUTGERS Fri Jun 4 18:17:42 1982 Poli-Sci Digest Sat 5 Jun 82 Volume 2 Number 140 Contents: FoIA info $1000000000 A-Bombs MBA's De Facto Laws (2 msgs) Nuns Disagree with Bishops Libertarian (?) Paradise ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 3 Jun 82 09:58:18 EDT (Thu) From: Steve BellovinSubject: Book on Freedom of Information Act The ACLU publishes a booklet on the subject; contact a local affiliate for ordering info. I haven't seen it, though, so I can't comment on its intelligibility. ------------------------------ Date: 2 June 1982 2257-EDT (Wednesday) From: Hank Walker at CMU-10A Subject: how to earn a billion Ever hear of a geometric progression? Ken Olsen is president and founder of DEC. His stock is worth about $250M, and this came about in 25 years. Did he steal it? Lie, cheat, etc to get it? No, he earned it. ------------------------------ Date: Wed Jun 2 20:40:17 1982 From: decvax!utzoo!henry at Berkeley atomic bombs on Japan The various flames on this subject have all ignored one key issue: the Japanese view of the situation. It may well be true that the American decision to use the bomb was motivated by political considerations such as one-upmanship with respect to the Soviets. It is a mistake to assume that the bombs therefore did not accomplish anything useful. It is true that Japan was in bad shape in the summer of 1945. Submarine warfare had imposed an effective blockade. Food was short. What navy Japan had left was helpless in port for lack of fuel. USAAF firebombing raids were systematically devastating the cities (causing, by the way, far more death and destruction than the atomic attacks ever did). Japan was suffering very badly indeed. But it is a serious mistake to assume that the Japanese viewed the situation the same way the US did. (It seems to be a standard mistake of Western countries to assume that everybody else thinks the same way they do.) Oh, it is entirely possible that the average "man in the street" thought the situation was hopeless and surrender inevitable. It is not in fact clear that this was the case, but it's not important. Because the man in the street had NO SAY in the matter. None. Zero. The political power in Japan in 1945 basically rested with the armed forces. The Cabinet and other related bodies had major representation from the Army and the Navy. There were still civilians in key positions, including the Prime Minister, but their situation was increasingly precarious. The armed forces had enough men in the inner circles of the government that they could, at any time, (a) force the equivalent of a Vote of Non-Confidence, and (b) win such a vote, thus toppling the government. Given the political realities of the situation, the new government (Cabinet, etc.) formed after such an event would inevitably have been totally controlled by the armed forces, and in particular the Army's General Anami would almost certainly have become Prime Minister. What did the Army think about the idea of surrender? Well, most of them had been trained in the precepts of Bushido, in which surrender was the ultimate form of disgrace, such that it was literally better to die fighting than to surrender. This is why the Allies did not get many Japanese prisoners, why the reconquest of some miserable little pieces of rock in the Pacific was so difficult, and incidentally was also a large part of the reason why the Japanese treated Allied POW's so savagely -- by their standards, men who surrendered were craven cowards, barely human degenerates. The Army's view of surrender in summer 1945 was, basically, total and unconditional opposition. To even voice such thoughts was to betray that one was a "Badoglio" (Badoglio was the man who negotiated Italy's surrender to the Allies), both a coward and a traitor. If one was too highly placed and had been too intimately involved with the war for such an accusation to ring true, one had obviously been corrupted, seduced by the Badoglios. The Army was determined to fight to the last man, not because they thought they could win but because there was NO other honorable course of action open to them. The Prime Minister and most of the civilian higher-ups were in favor of surrender, but they dared not force a confrontation. It took direct intervention by the Emperor himself -- unprecedented and technically illegal, since the Emperor was in law essentially a figurehead -- to break the impasse. And despite his intervention being, LITERALLY, the Word Of God to the Japanese of that time, he had to intervene TWICE in the Cabinet and then PERSONALLY broadcast the orders -- the first time most Japanese had ever heard the voice of their emperor/god. And at that, if he'd simply ordered a surrender, he'd have been ignored, on the grounds that he had been tricked by the Badoglios. Such an attempt would probably have triggered a military coup; this was being seriously considered earlier (no, this would not have been a revolt against the Emperor: it would have been against the Badoglios who were misleading him). At that, there WAS an attempted military coup after the decision was made to surrender; it failed for lack of support by senior officers. (What has all this to do with atomic bombs? I thought you'd never ask. I'm just coming to that.) The reason the Emperor was able, in his broadcast, to convince the Army to go along with him was that he offered an escape from the moral dilemma of surrender-is-disgrace. Basically, he argued that the atomic bomb was something utterly new under the sun, so totally different from anything that had come before that the old rules could not be expected to apply. The new weapon was so terrible that Japan had no alternative but to "bear the unbearable" and surrender. The situation was quite literally unbearable to some Army officers: they committed suicide after hearing the Emperor's broadcast. But few disobeyed; even half-plausible reasoning sufficed, coming from their personal deity. This is why the attempted coup failed. Could the Japanese have been convinced without actual atomic attacks? It's unlikely; as it was, the Army did its best to minimize the seriousness of the situation until the evidence overwhelmed them. The early reports from Hiroshima were widely belittled or taken to be exaggerations. Perhaps a demonstration could have been sufficiently convincing, but I doubt it. In short, the atomic bombs were a key event in making Japan's surrender possible (not desirable, POSSIBLE!). Possibly the pro-surrender faction could have swung it without them, but it's not likely. The military coup would have been almost inevitable, and substantial parts of the Army would have fought to the last man regardless. Don't forget, also, that the surrender saved more than just the lives of the Allied invasion troops. Probably an equal number of Japanese would have died in the fighting. And until the atom bombings, both the Allied POW's in Japan and the Allied intelligence agencies charged with their welfare considered it almost certain that final Japanese defeat would result in the massacre of all Allied soldiers in Japanese hands, orders or no orders. For more details on the matter (a couple of hundred pages of them), the best book by far that I have found is Thomas Coffey's IMPERIAL TRAGEDY. Part 2 of this book is an attempt to reconstruct every detail of the events in Japan leading up to the surrender. (Part 1 is a similar treatment of Pearl Harbor.) Coffey is the only author whose work I've seen whose primary sources include first-hand accounts from the men involved (or their immediate associates, for those no longer alive). Another good (although more limited) discussion of the subject can be found in NAGASAKI: THE NECESSARY BOMB? (author's name forgotten, dammit, and my copy isn't handy). Both published circa 1975, possibly still in print. ------------------------------ Date: 2 Jun 82 22:12:47-EDT (Wed) From: Ron Minnich Subject: mba & business schools again (sorry!) In the sunday nyt business section there was a short article on Abernathy and Hayes , the two Harvard B-school professors who had the temerity to point out the obvious. Thought someone might be interested. One of the two (forget which) told an interesting story. He had given a lecture to a group of Europeans about the problems that over-regulation, unions, and the usual bugaboos were causing American business. He noticed that they were all chuckling, and discovered to his surprise that no one believed him. He was shocked enough by their rejection of his ideas that he began to reconsider them. ------------------------------ Date: 3 June 1982 1113-EDT (Thursday) From: Robert.Frederking at CMU-10A (C410RF60) Subject: Re: de facto laws Besides the examples you mention, Ohio has an interesting one: there are two kinds of speed limits, one on white signs and one on yellow signs. The white variety are the legal limit, and you may get a ticket for exceding it. The yellow ones are posted at road hazards, such as bad curves, and are real (i.e., you may kill yourself if you ignore it). There is also a nasty habit for the de facto speed limit to be clamped down to 55 without much warning (the Feds have threatened to cancel Ohio's highway funds because it has the fastest average rate of speed of any state (well over 55)). On another note, Atlantic Monthly had an article on how beat policemen enforce community standards (instead of the law) and how this contributes to the "feeling" of public safety (I haven't had a chance to read it, however). Also, in another sense, the legislators are even further removed from the law, since (as a lawyer here says) the law is what the *courts* say it is, and they often interpret it based on reasonableness, consistency, etc., as opposed to letter-by-letter. ------------------------------ Date: 3 Jun 1982 18:09:53-EDT From: csin!cjh at CCA-UNIX Subject: Re: de jure vs de facto Even people I know who hate NYC don't make that broad a claim; sounds like deliberate exaggeration. But it wouldn't surprise me if buildings were \passed/, entirely innocently, while not complying with all parts of the code, as I doubt there is a single inspector who is both conversant with all the applicable rules and allowed enough time to make sure they've all been followed. Application \within the law/ is always a problem. Consider the Bartley-Fox handgun law in Mass: a year in jail for carrying an unlicensed handgun (!!summary wording only!!). This only requires that the arresting officer present the charge in those terms and that the prosecutor choose to prosecute under that statute. A recent case in which one of an extended family of dwarves got picked up on this law received national coverage. Even more scandalous was the case of 5(?) men convicted of gang rape and given completely suspended sentences (rape sentencing seems to land more judges in hot water....). Sometimes I feel entirely in accord with Lafferty's Camiroi (anybody can make a law, but it can be unmade by a few people deciding it's silly; there are rapidly escalating penalties for having laws you make overruled). ------------------------------ Date: 28 May 1982 19:28:44-EDT From: wdh at mit-cipg Subject: Nuns disagree with bishops Yesterday, according to a UPI report in the Times, the leadership of the 1800-member National Coalition of American Nuns issued a statement opposing the Hatch amendment, which would outlaw abortion. Said the nuns, "While we continue to oppose abortion, in principle and in practice, we are likewise convinced that the responsibility for decisions in this regard resides primarily with those who are directly and personally involved," which is a roundabout endorsement of personal choice. This statement underscores the divisions within the Catholic community on this issue, since the bishop's conference has supported the Hatch Amendment. Another interesting sign of this was the photo which appeared in the Times a few weeks ago, of the annual conference of bishops (I think) which showed a priest tearing banners out of the hands of nuns. The bishops, who now support the Freeze, have been used as a lever against feminist groups within the coalition to force silence on the issue of freedom of choice, with the ostensible reason being to avoid alienating the vast constituency the bishops draw. This statement seems to show that the bishops' constituency isn't afraid of facing the issue. The statement urged leaders in the churches, courts and Congress to provide "a more nurturing environment so that women will be encouraged to bring new life into the world.... "It is paradoxical to us that the same leaders who are currently demanding that women bring their babies to term are simultaneously voting to cut off food stamps, child nutrition programs and related benefits essential for the health and well-being of our children...." At the same time, the nuns urged "women everwhere to disavow the use of abortion as a normative means of birth control" and said that women should educate themselves "in ways of being creatively responsible-- insofar as this is possible--for avoiding unwanted pregnancies." (Thanks to KEB@AI for this info...) -Bill ------------------------------ Date: 3 June 1982 21:12 edt From: SSteinberg.SoftArts at MIT-MULTICS Subject: Libertarian Paradise *from: SAS (Seth A. Steinberg) There are some neat stories coming out of that libertarian paradise in Africa, Uganda. Ever since everyone in the army decided that they wanted a piece of the libertarian pie there has been NO government in Uganda, just a bunch of goons with guns selling out to the highest bidder. There is NO income tax, NO property tax, NO speed limits on the highways, NO helmet law so the place is probably rife with investment opportunities. (A lot of big banks are holding back until some government reappears but they always follow the big trends anyway.) ------------------------------ End of POLI-SCI Digest - 30 - -------