Is it actually the case that deaths and injuries in H & N are distinctly worse than the deaths and injuries in the other 72 cities levelled by bombing in the few months prior to the H & N bombings?

  Before the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there was the burning of Tokyo. Operation Meetinghouse, the early March 1945 raid on Tokyo that involved over 330 B-29s dropping incendiary bombs from low-altitude at night, killed roughly 100,000 people, and may have injured and made homeless an order of magnitude more. As with all statistics on the damage caused by strategic bombing during World War II, there are debatable points and methodologies, but most people accept that the bombing of Tokyo probably had at least as many deaths as the Hiroshima bombing raid, and probably more. It is sometimes listed as the most single deadly air raid of all time as a consequence.

Horrific, yes. However, estimates for the total number of people killed by Imperial Japan during World War II (primarily 1937–1945) range from roughly 20 to 30 million or higher across the Asia-Pacific theater, and they refused unconditional surrender until 2 atomic bombs stopped them killing who knows how many more.

People who say this gloss over the horrific fire bombing of Tokyo, etc (so bad B-29 crews could smell the bodies burning from thousands of feet above...). Hiroshima and Nagasaki were no worse than that.

I think no creature should be subjected to such pain, but wishing doesn't change the reality that Putin invaded Ukraine, so devices exist to cause such horrible destruction. The remaining question is, who's holding the trigger?

I don't support the use of nuclear weapons (and I'm 100% sure that should Iran get it, they'd wipe Israel off the map) but I honestly think Japan got a better "deal" than eastern Europe by getting two nukes, surrendering, and not being conquered by Russia and becoming a satellite of the USSR.

They haven't suffered decades of communism and have seen an extremely successful recovery from WWII in a short amount of time.

The reason they sided with the nazis --and two nukes were a harsh price to pay for having picked the wrong side-- is because they knew Russia would come after Japan.

The two nukes stopped Russia's thirst for Japan on the spot.

We'd be living in a very different world if the two nukes didn't happen and it's not clear at all Japan would still be japanese.

P.S: I've got family in Japan and I've been many times and I'll probably be going on vacation there next summer. I love Japan.