The Huge Entity: The Real Reason Truman Dropped the A-Bomb on Japan?

The Real Reason Truman Dropped the A-Bomb on Japan?

Friday, July 22, 2005 → by Danieru

History is written by the winners. It has and probably always will be that way. Allied attrocities in World War II most definitely happened, but they are seldom mentioned amongst the lists and lists of activities we can find for the enemy (Germany, Japan etc.). The dropping of the A-bomb was an attrocious act, and America has never been questioned over that action because from an allied historical perspective it was a 'necessary' event. I don't dispute the horrors that World War II provided, I just think that dropping the A-Bomb was one of the worst.

60 years in the making, new evidence might throw the commonly held historical slant out the window:

"The US decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 was meant to kick-start the Cold War rather than end the Second World War, according to two nuclear historians who say they have new evidence backing the controversial theory...

...According to an account by Walter Brown, assistant to then-US secretary of state James Byrnes, Truman agreed at a meeting three days before the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima that Japan was "looking for peace". Truman was told by his army generals, Douglas Macarthur and Dwight Eisenhower, and his naval chief of staff, William Leahy, that there was no military need to use the bomb.

"Impressing Russia was more important than ending the war in Japan," says Selden. Truman was also worried that he would be accused of wasting money on the Manhattan Project to build the first nuclear bombs, if the bomb was not used, he adds..." - link

"I AM become death, the shatterer of worlds." - From the Hindu scripture, Bhagavad Gita.

Categories: Japan, USA, A-Bomb, Nuclear, WWII, History, News, Politics

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posted by Danieru at 1:07 AM

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July 24, 2005 7:40 AM

D-Thinker said...

A good political post is rare. Keep it up.

July 25, 2005 1:08 PM

Fleetintime said...

Nicely done site. But I do think there was a great deal more depth to the use of the A bomb than suggested here. True estimates of death from invasion were 10MM Japanese and 1MM Americans without early capitulation. To that point hundreds of thousands of Japanese soldiers and civilians PLUS civilians in Japanese occupied countries were dying every month the war went forward. In addition, the USA, having depended heavily on the reluctant ally USSR's sacrifices in E.Europe, was facing a soon to come wave of USSR attacks into Japanese Islands. USSR would then have taking rights much as they did of the "Eastern Block" countries. Japan would have been a split nation - part communist and part democracy. A disaster for Japan. The Japanese warlords were NOT ready to capitulate as you imply. Up until the end, Hirohito was unwilling to admit he had followed a bad course of action and destroyed the gains his grandfather had made, (largely without the misleading and corrupted Samari killer culture that grew into the military persona in Hirohito's time). Well, it is a much more complicated issue than just "the winners write history".

July 25, 2005 7:46 PM

GaijinBiker said...

"Japan was 'looking for peace'"

...but not unconditional surrender.

July 27, 2005 2:07 AM

Anonymous said...

surely it should be 'I have become death, the shatterer of worlds'

June 27, 2007 6:34 PM

Linda said...

The unconditional surrender caveats set forth at Pottsdam called for the total abdication by Hirohito of the throne and his acquiescence to a post-war trial for war crimes. This remained the single stumbling block for an end to the war. The Japanese felt it would be beneficial to the Allies by leaving such a titular leadership-head in 'view' to unite, support and direct the Japanese people in an orderly acceptance of 'surrender' (heretofore an unknown concept to the Japanese people) during post-war reconstruction and Allied occupation.

But according to various records and accounts (all easily verifiable through internet research - and I don't mean "blogs" - no offense) Japan was willing to accept these "unconditional" conditions as early as May, 1945. The U.S. (Truman and Bynes to be exact) chose to ignore and drop the bomb(s) more as a 'warning' to the burgeoning Communist threat that "we're the big kids on the block now and have the biggest guns so don't mess with us...or else."

Affording no mea culpas to the Japanese war machine and the atrocities committed by them or to in any way disgrace or disparage the loss of our American service persons' lives, IMO, dropping the Hiroshima bomb (and certainly the Nagasaki bomb) was an unnecessary, cruel show of bully strength - not against the Japanese military - but to impress and 'frighten' the Russians at the expense of hundreds of thousands of innocent civilian women and children.

I don't agree, however, that "history is written by the winners". The history that is remembered is written by the winners and it's up to venues such as this to re-write that 'memorable' history. Perhaps even more aptly: Just who are the winners anyway? Are there winners? And what exactly does 'winning' mean?

August 22, 2007 10:07 PM

The Japanese Generals did NOT want to surender, even after the second bomb was dropped. It took the Emperor of Japan to override his generals & anounce to his people that Japan was surendering. Talk to the American Vets, both those being shipped from Europe & those already in the Pacific for the planned invasion of Japan. Ask them how they felt when there was no invasion. Look into the fanatical defense on Iwo Jima, Okinawa, etc. The closer we got to the mainland, the harder it was, with high tolls on both sides, before those islands were secured. If we had to invade Japan because the bomb was not used, at the cost of a million American casualties, What would the reaction of the American people have been when they found out that the bombing was withheld, and the loss of all those lives was unnecesary? Pardon my poor spelling. Jim (80 year old).

December 11, 2008 5:26 AM

I think that we were smart to drop that BOMB on Japan. That is what won us the war. (I think)

December 18, 2008 5:07 PM