Justification for the United States Dropping the Atomic Bomb On August 6, 1945, The US bomber the “Enola Gay” dropped the atomic warhead that would spark controversy for years to come. The warhead that was dropped, “Little Boy” was the first time that there has been the destruction of a large city like Hiroshima within a matter of seconds. Approximately 135 thousand people evaporated (Jennings, Why the Bomb was Dropped) in a matter of seconds after dropping. Shortly after, Major General Charles Sweeney, decided to drop another bomb of which the Japanese city of Nagasaki would be destroyed. The bomb, “Fat Man” was made ready for deployment, and dropped without second thought. The destruction of this city had “no prior approval from the president”. …show more content…
The Nanking Massacre is a prime example of this instance. The Japanese raped and murdered over 300 thousand people during the six weeks it occurred. This manicure started on December 17th 1937. The Japanese arrived “with orders issued to "kill all captives."” (The History Place). The Nanking Massacre was reported my many United States news groups and reinforced the American ideaology that the Japanese were simply savages. Terms like “the only good jap is a dead jap” (Jennings, Why the Bomb was Dropped) arose from the American hatred of them. Prior to the dropping of the bomb, the Allied Powers requested for Japan to surrender, but their requests were ignored. The ignorance of this request after being threatened to surrender not only angered the men in charge, but the sum of the American people. After the first bomb was dropped, the emperor took the risk of waiting for the next attack. This decision would hang the 80 thousand lives lost at Nagasaki over his head. Furthermore, the Japanese leaders did not believe that the bomb was atomic. (Maddox) They did not even mention the idea of surrender during their meeting together and suggested to the emperor not to do so. The leaders said that it was impossible for the Americans to collect enough material to even build an atomic bomb. …show more content…
The petition never saw the light of day until 1961 when it was declassified by the United States government.(“Szilard petition”) However, Leo Szilard was the one that urged the United States to build the bomb in the first place, sending a proposal to President Roosevelt that he collaborated with Albert Einstein
As a result of these bombings, many lives were lost, but ultimately many lives ended up being saved. “To drop the atomic bombs on the Japanese cities as the only way to avoid a full-scale
The dropping of the bombs were necessary and fair due to the refusal of the Japanese to surrender, the millions of lives saved by a quick end to the war, and the warnings given to the Japanese. To begin, the Japanese soldiers have it ingrained in their brains that it is dishonorable to surrender. The author of Drop the Bomb as agreed by saying that “the Japanese have demonstrated a willingness to fight to the death”. During the war there were many times for the Japanese to surrender, but it was never done. With this in mind, they would have continued to drag out the war, which shows that dropping the bombs sped up the war which lessened the casualties.
The United States generals Dwight D. Eisenhower and Douglas McArthur objected to the use of the atomic bombs. Eisenhower expressed that the Japanese were ready to surrender and opposed the United States being the first to detonate such a deadly weapon. McArthur concluded that the Japanese had already been defeated and considered the use of atomic bombs militarily unnecessary. Many scientists protested the utilization of atomic bombs, including scientists who contributed to their development. One petition expressing opposition to the detonation of the atomic bomb contained the signatures of 155 scientists involved in its creation.
Was America right to use atomic weapons against Japan? The dropping of the atomic bomb in Japan at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, was the end of WWII. However, there has been much conflict considering the use of the bomb. In this essay, I will discuss reasons from both sides of the argument and justify my opinion.
The atomic bomb made this justified because this made the long lasting war end and people knew they were going to survive and see their loved ones again. Soldiers have been exhausted physically and mentally thought the war and
World War II introduced the most dangerous weapon in the world, the atomic bomb. When the US used it on Japan we went to far and caused unnecessary damage to the people. Many people believe this to the only truth but, the real truth is that dropping the atomic bomb was a necessary evil we had to use in order to win the war in World War II and future wars to come. It save many american soldiers lives, stopped the Soviets from joining, and helped us win against Japan. First and foremost, World War II caused many casualties for both sides of the war.
In the twentieth century, the United States dropped two atomic bombs, which were the most powerful weapons at that time, on Japan. It happened on August 6 and August 9, 1945. The atomic bombs killed 226,000 Japanese and ended the war. However, America should not have dropped the atomic bombs for two reasons. First, it was not necessary to drop the bomb to win the war militarily or to get the Japanese to surrender.
Name: Course Instructor: Class: Date: Critical Book Review: Prompt and Utter Destruction Introduction Within weeks, word on the US dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki began to spread that the main reason behind the bombs was to save the lives of Americans (Bernard). It was put that hundreds of thousands of American military causalities were saved through the bombings.
1. Immediate Aftermath On August 6, 1945, at 8:15 a.m., an atomic bomb by the name of “Little Boy” detonated 1,900 feet above the city of Hiroshima. The bomb exploded directly above the Shima Surgical Clinic with the force of about 16 kilotons of TNT, causing the burst temperature to exceed 1 million degrees Celsius and creating a massive fireball measuring 840 feet in diameter. The explosion killed an estimated 70,000 to 80,000 and injured a similar number.
Was America Justified in dropping the atom bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945? On August 6th, 1945 at 8:16 AM, a great yet horrific event in history occurred. This event is known as the dropping of the atom bomb on the city of Hiroshima, Japan, the event that would begin and end the pain and suffering of millions. The atom bomb was dropped by an American B-29 Superfortress bomber named Enola Gay and
Document 7 shows Japanese soldiers killing American soldiers during WWII, it was described the “March of Death.” Document 35 talks about the attack on Pearl Harbor:” The principal political, social, and military objective of the United States in the summer of 1945 was the prompt and complete surrender of Japan. Only the complete destruction of her military power could open way to lasting peace… (Secretary of War Henry Stimson, 1947). This document explains the only way to end the conflict between Japan is to destroy their military base, this shows how dangerous Japan was towards the U.S. Lastly, document 44 shows a Japanese soldier carrying a dead Lady Liberty, whom is a patriotic symbol of the U.S.
President Harry Truman gave an executive order in 1945 to drop to atomic bombs in popular downtown cities in Japan. With the guidance of many scientists and political leaders President Truman made the extremely tough decision to drop the bombs. After listening to arguments from both sides President Truman came to the conclusion that dropping bombs would be the best thing to do for this war. It would also show that the United States had an extreme military power. Many American politicians were for the idea of dropping the bomb, because they believed that it was the only way to end the war and get Japan to surrender.
It had completely disappeared under this awful blanket of smoke and fire.5 One main reason, according to Ryan Browne, that the United States decided to bomb Hiroshima, was that Japan would most likely surrender from the war.6 However the Japanese Empire believed that the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was the only one the United States had in their possession, this belief placed by Army Minister Korechika Anami.7 Until the second bombing of Nagasaki. Three days after “Little Boy” blew up over the city of Hiroshima, another atomic bomb, “Fat Man”, was dropped over the city of Nagasaki at 11:02 a.m.8 This, like the bomb three days before, killed over 70,000 people instantly, coming to a combined total of over 140,000 people killed between the two bombings.9 The Japanese knew then that the United States would keeping bombing
Thesis statement: Though many speculate that the act of dropping the atomic bomb on Japan (Hiroshima and Nagasaki) while not doing so on Europe (Germany and Italy) was racially motivated, racism played little to no role in these bombings. The United States of America and her allies were willing to end World War II at any cost, had the atomic bombs been available they would have been deployed in Europe. In the 1940’s there is no doubt that the United States of America was engulfed by mass anti-Japanese hysteria which inevitably bled over into America’s foreign policy. During this period Japanese people living in both Japan and the United States of America were seen as less that human.
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.