You're making a values judgement on how hard a nation and people should fight to defend themselves. And whatever Japan's stance at the start of the war, they we

You're making a values judgement on how hard a nation and people should fight to defend themselves. And whatever Japan's stance at the start of the war, they were certainly defending their homeland at the end of it. I'm not saying that the calculation of lives was incorrect. All I'm saying is that the "evil culture" reasoning is designed to rationalize to the masses, and it's a distortion of reality. I don't disagree that cultural values can be problematic. I just think it was a bullshit excuse in this particular case.