Those who feel for the dead and diseased of Hiroshima & Nagasaki, and who take into account what a terrible force came into play with the use of this evil creation, seem to agree that mass killing of civilians is not just.

To all those who seem to feel that it is just, brush your shoulders off the next time something like 9/11 happens.

Understand that the strategy of bringing up atrocities committed by the other side is beside the point. If you feel that the terrorization and murder of civilians on one side is bad, you can't meaningfully argue that it was OK on yours.

Was the bombing strategically effective? The only way to argue against this would be to construct a theory of how repercussions from this event hurt America in the long run. That doesn't seem impossible to me.

Understand that if you are arguing with those who were against the bombings, they are not denying that it was in some sense strategically effective. They are arguing that it was morally wrong. Go ahead and spin yourself into contradiction by arguing against the place of morals in war... then explain why the average person who agrees with the bombings has different feelings about the Final Solution.

The question is, do you see the moral wrong perpetrated by the United States. Assuming you do, you should see the value in the US making an apology. If you do not see the mass murder of civilians as a MORAL wrong, then I'd love to see what you teach your children about the difference between good and bad.

Glossary:
"did what we had to do" = argument from strategy
"didn't need to do it" = argument from morality