deterrence against conventional warfare...
I would much rather have a medium risk of conventional warfare than a small risk of nuclear apocalypse. Humanity can recover from conventional warfare; we can't recover from global thermonuclear war.
if we had reason to believe that the japanese were going to surrender, we wouldn't have drafted elaborate plans for the invasion, relocated troops and equipment, and drafted death toll estimates (of which, approached 10 million on the japanese side due to untrained conscripts, which the japs had already demonstrated large-scale usage of).
don't take this the wrong way but i think the late-war US high command thought about this a little more thoroughly than you
Sure, we drafted plans, but that doesn't mean we were expecting to use them, and the situation changed rapidly in the final months of the war. Furthermore, if you believe the US was only concerned about defeating Japan, you'd be naive; we were already plotting against the Soviets before the war ended, and the nuclear bombs were an opportunity to show off and show our superiority.
You are right that I'm not necessarily qualified to talk about this. I would refer you to Oliver Stone's
documentary on the matter - he talks about the bomb later in the episode.
1. Yes it is, the media keeps reporting that North Korea wants to wipe Guam off the map but they aren't going to anytime soon. Annoying Orange said that they'd be met with "fire and fury" if so but neither of these countries are engaging eachother therefore causing a proxy war.
Yeah... that's not a proxy war. That's just insult-flinging. A proxy war is a war between the pawns of great powers in lieu of direct warfare. The canonical examples are the Korean War, Vietnam War, and Afghan War, all between American proxies (South Korea, South Vietnam, Afghan jihadists) and Soviet proxies (North Korea, North Vietnam, Afghan socialists). Other examples include the Greek Civil War (American- and British-backed royalists vs Soviet-backed communists) and Spanish Civil War (national socialist- and Italian-backed fascists vs Soviet-backed republicans).
2. Yes it is, why do you think Riddler invaded Poland?
That was a really terrible example to pick. He invaded Poland to gain land (
lebensraum) for Germany - he certainly didn't want the Poles to live like the Germans.
