The Japanese were ruthless and brutal when it came to their militaristic decisions and motives. Dropping the atomic bomb was our final hope in stopping them from performing further harm. Either way, lives were going to be taken. The question we must ask ourselves is whether we wanted those lives to be those of Americans or the Japanese. President Truman had to make a vital decision, and using nuclear warfare was the only way to stop Japan without killing American soldiers.
“Dropping the atomic bombs on Japan saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of U.S. soldiers and some believed it was the only way to end the war quickly.” in Dropping the A-Bomb Saved Lives. As a result of dropping the bomb Japan lost lives of soldiers, civilians and land. Japan also lost power in their government because of the bombs, and many business, houses got destroyed and created some tension between the governments. The U.S. only had a few choices since Japan wouldn't surrender the U.S. had to do something.
Finally, if they had just used smaller bombs, it might have been enough to push Japan past their tipping point of following the Bushido code, a code that says that they should never surrender, something that proved costly to both sides, as the Japanese used kamikaze throughout the captures of Midway, Okinawa and Iwo Jima. Because Truman could use other, available options, he did not possess the right to resort to dropping the atomic bombs. Even though America warned Japan about the bombs, they still should not have used them. Japan had no idea of the grand effects caused by the atomic bombs. For instance, when the bomb was dropped the radius of the blast was many times larger than any bomb before it.
Truman was justified in dropping the A-Bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Dropping the bomb was an act of strategy, political reasoning and of moral reasoning. Dropping a bomb with such power puts fear into people and is what forced Japan to surrender to America in 1945. The ETO and the Island Hopping Campaign was a perilous fight that never seemed to end. Beginning when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, America joined the fight against Japan after declaring war in the ETO.
The decision to drop atomic bombs was not just a strict military measure to to force japan to unconditionally surrender, but was a diplomatic measure to intimidate the Soviet Union.
The most likely alternate scenario that President Truman would have chosen to ending the war was an outright invasion of Japan. According to the Secretary of War in office at the time, it was “estimated that the invasion of Japan would cost 1.7 to four million American casualties… and five to ten million Japanese deaths” (Henry Stimson). Hard as it may be to accept, Japanese losses would have been far greater without the bombs. President Truman's decision to use the bomb on Hiroshima Japan should be viewed as him choosing the least awful of the options available to him, and the most awful decision being an
The Article also stated that Truman was forced to keep fighting because “ “Despite their heavy losses at Okinawa and the firebombing of Tokyo, the Japanese refused to surrender.” If I was him I wouldn’t have stopped up until they surrendered. The bombings was one of the most terrible things to happen but they didn’t surrender and so I would have kept fighting. Even though the bombing was unconventional he was able to almost completely destroy Tokyo. In which, the bombing was a source of having less soldiers on the Japanese side.
Essay To what extent were the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki justifiable? The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have been controversial. There is much controversy over the issue of whether or not the bombings were necessary to ensure Japanese surrender in the Second World War, on terms satisfactory to the United States of America.
On August 6th, 1945, The United States bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki killing many people. The president at the time, President Truman said that he only wanted to use the bomb in military warfare because it would hurt women and children. The bombing at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was morally incorrect because the Japanese were ready to surrender, it was a crime against humanity, and it affected their physical self. The bombing at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was unsuitable because the Japanese were ready to surrender.
The military would tell their soldiers that the kamikaze attacks were for the good of their country, which led the soldiers to believe that their patriotism and pride was more important than their own lives. The Japanese’s apathy for their people and their inhumane warfare needed to be stopped. The US found significant issues with firing of an atomic bomb, such as the civilian casualties it could cause and the post-war problems it could create with the Russians. Despite the possible repercussions of the atomic bomb, Truman would be right to fire off the atomic bomb into a major Japanese city. He would be right to do this because of how it would protect the american citizens from future attacks on American soil.
Even though it was very inhumane to cause a fellow breed of the human race such a severe amount of suffering, we fairly warned Japan that disaster would come if they didn’t surrender. Furthermore, we had still been pondering among our hostility from Pearl Harbor, in which we never retaliated to. Most importantly, to prevent the loss of American lives, we had to strike at once. Therefore, President Truman’s decision to drop both bombs on Japan was extremely necessary to ensure the safety of American citizens.
In fact, Ralph A. Bard, Undersecretary of the Navy wrote to Secretary of War Stimson in a June 27, 1945 memorandum. “I define this decision as an emotional and reckless decision, Japanese government may be searching for some opportunity which they could use as a medium of surrender” (Bard). In fact, the Japanese government expressed desire to end the war, and would have accepted conditional surrender before the mainland invasion in November. The reason for dropping the bomb was forcing Japan to surrender unconditionally. In America’s opinion, Japan had lost the war; they did not have any capital to negotiate with.
There are many reasons why it could be argued that the dropping of the atomic bomb was justified. One reason is that Japan was warned, they were given plenty of opportunities to surrender such as the Potsdam declaration. The Declaration was issued to Japan by President Truman and the Allies of America after America had tested the Atom bomb on July 26th. The declaration was a proposition of surrender to Japan that linked directly to the dropping of the atomic bomb.
President Truman was treating people even worst by putting them through the torture of the bomb and the resulting effects of the bomb. Time became a major factor into the decision, and dropping the bomb was a result of that fear. On the other side of the argument, the Japanese did bomb Pearl Harbor which was the catalyst that got America involved in the first place. We as a country should not need to compromise with the nation who started the battle.
Theoretically of course, what if a country was to develop a weapon strong enough to completely disintegrate cities and all the people living in it? Coincidently, the United states discovered a bomb that did exactly that and ended up thrusting the world into a new era of weaponized technology towards the end of World War II. Countries from this point on became wary of opposing the United States, aware of the power they possessed, especially since the US had already used this weapon on Japan to end the war.