You press a button and death flies down. One second, the bomb is hanging harmlessly in your racks, completely under your control. The next it is hurtling down through the air and nothing in your power can revoke what you have done.
_{—CHARLES LINDBERGH}

With contributions from scholars from Japan, the United States, and Europe, Bombing Civilians examines a crucial question: why did military planning in the early twentieth century shift its focus from bombing military targets to bombing civilians?

From the British bombing of Iraq in the early 1920s to the most recent conflicts in Kosovo, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Lebanon, Bombing Civilians analyzes in detail the history of indiscriminate bombing, examining the fundamental questions of how this theory justifying mass killing originated and why it was employed as a compelling military strategy for decades, both before and since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The book includes major new arguments, such as Japanese historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa’s bold claim that it was the Soviet invasion rather than the atomic bombs that compelled the Japanese to surrender in the Pacific War.

Combining historical and contemporary analysis, Bombing Civilians makes an important argument about international law and the morality of war.

Marilyn B. Young is a professor of history at New York University. She has been a Guggenheim Fellow and is the author of numerous books, including The Vietnam Wars, 1945–1990, and co-editor of Iraq and the Lessons of Vietnam (The New Press). She lives in New York City. Yuki Tanaka is Research Professor at Hiroshima Peace Institute of Hiroshima City University. Since the mid-1980s he has been concentrating his research on war crimes and is the author of several books, including Japan’s Comfort Women and Hidden Horrors.

Pub Date: Fall 2008
Format: hardcover
Trim: 5 1/2 x 8 1/4, 304 pages
ISBN: 978-1-59558-363-5