Frank Costigliola,France and the United States: The Cold Alliance Since World War II(New York, Twayne, 1992), 38-39. The documents cover multiple aspects of the bombings and their context. atomic bomb dropped to intimidate russia Why did the Americans decide to carry out these attacks? The 509th Composite Groups cover story for its secret mission was the preparation of Pumpkins for use in battle. The alternative is prompt and utter destruction. The next day, in response to questions from journalists about the governments reaction to the ultimatum, Prime Minister Suzuki apparently said that We can only ignore [mokusatsu] it. Dbq help!! The atomic bomb on Hiroshima | CourseNotes Eisenhowers son John cast doubts about the memoir statements, although he attested that when the general first learned about the bomb he was downcast. 8). 1947: How the American people feel about the atomic bomb [56] Groves also provided the schedule for the delivery of the weapons: the components of the gun-type bomb to be used on Hiroshima had arrived on Tinian, while the parts of the second weapon to be dropped were leaving San Francisco. On August 6, 1945 the American war plane Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, killing between 70,000 and 100,000 Japanese. This document is General Curtis LeMays report on the firebombing of Tokyo--the most destructive air raid in history--which burned down over 16 square miles of the city, killed up to 100,000 civilians (the official figure was 83,793), injured more than 40,000, and made over 1 million homeless. For some historians, the urban fire-bombing strategy facilitated atomic targeting by creating a new moral context, in which earlier proscriptions against intentional targeting of civilians had eroded. [2]. [23] It is possible that Truman was informed of such discussions and their conclusions, although he clung to a belief that the prospective targets were strictly military. However, as soon as the Allied occupation of Japan came into force on September 19, the strict press code imposed by the General Headquarters of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, as well as the above-mentioned self-censorship imposed by the Japanese press, caused a delay in the way the atomic bombings were reported upon in Japan. [7], Documents 2A-B: Going Ahead with the Bomb, RG 227, Bush-Conant papers microfilm collection, Roll 1, Target 2, Folder 1, "S-1 Historical File, Section II (1941-1942), The Manhattan Project never had an official charter establishing it and defining its mission, but these two documents are the functional equivalent of a charter, in terms of presidential approvals for the mission, not to mention for a huge budget. As Alperovitz notes, the Davies papers include variant diary entries and it is difficult to know which are the most accurate. Seventy years ago this month, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Soviet Union declared war on Japan, and the Japanese government surrendered to the United States and its allies. The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, brought the United States officially into World War II. Both Richard Frank and Barton Bernstein have used intelligence reporting and analysis of the major buildup of Japanese forces on southern Kyushu to argue that U.S. military planners were so concerned about this development that by early August 1945 they were reconsidering their invasion plans. The final decision to drop the atomic bomb, when it was made the following day, July 25, was decidedly anticlimactic. This document is a typed-up version of the hand-written original (which Browns family has provided to Clemson University). Wartime alliance tensions - Reasons for the Cold War - BBC According to Hasegawa, this was an important, even startling, conversation: it showed that Stalin took the atomic bomb seriously; moreover, he disclosed that the Soviets were working on their own atomic program. Bernstein, however, notes that Bard later denied that he had a meeting with Truman and that White House appointment logs support that claim. Moreover, recent significant contributions to the scholarly literature have been taken into account. During a conversation with Joseph E. Davies, a prominent Washington lawyer and former ambassador to the Soviet Union, Truman said that he wanted to delay talks with Stalin and Churchill until July when the first atomic device had been tested. [13] According to the Foreword, the purpose of the raid, which dropped 1,665 tons of incendiary bombs, was to destroy industrial and strategic targets not to bomb indiscriminately civilian populations. Air Force planners, however, did not distinguish civilian workers from the industrial and strategic structures that they were trying to destroy. At the end, Stimson shared his doubts about targeting cities and killing civilians through area bombing because of its impact on the U.S.s reputation as well as on the problem of finding targets for the atomic bomb. World War II was fought by millions of people in all corners of the world. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - Encyclopedia Britannica General George C. Marshall is the only high-level official whose contemporaneous (pre-Hiroshima) doubts about using the weapons against cities are on record. Drawing on contemporary documents and journals, Masuji Ibuses novelBlack Rain(Tokyo, Kodansha, 1982) provides an unforgettable account of the bombing of Hiroshima and its aftermath. As for targeting, however, he had a more significant role. Possibly not wanting to take responsibility for the first use of nuclear weapons, Army Air Force commanders sought formal authorization from Chief of Staff Marshall who was then in Potsdam, RG 77, MED Records, Top Secret Documents, Files no. 5g. If that failed to persuade Tokyo, he proposed that the United States disclose the secret of the atomic bomb to secure Japans unconditional surrender. A few days later another Japanese city, Nagasaki, was obliterated by a second atomic bomb. My analysis will provide some historical and political context and offer an initial assessment of these documents. Collectively the decoded messages were known as Magic. How this came about is explained in an internal history of pre-war and World War II Army and Navy code-breaking activities prepared by William F. Friedman, a central figure in the development of U.S. government cryptology during the 20th century. To keep his pledge at Yalta to enter the war against Japan and to secure the territorial concessions promised at the conference (e.g., Soviet annexation of the Kuriles and southern Sakhalin and a Soviet naval base at Port Arthur, etc.) Hoover proposed a compromise solution with Japan that would allow Tokyo to retain part of its empire in East Asia (including Korea and Japan) as a way to head off Soviet influence in the region. Alperovitz, Bernstein, and Sherwin made new contributions as did other historians, social scientists, and journalists including Richard B. Frank, Herbert Bix, Sadao Asada, Kai Bird, Robert James Maddox, Sean Malloy, Robert P. Newman, Robert S. Norris, Tsuyoshi Hagesawa, and J. Samuel Walker.[4]. The Japanese were vicious fighters, however, and every victory cost more time, material, and, sadly, lives. [9], RG 77, Correspondence ("Top Secret") of the Manhattan Engineer District, 1942-1946, file 25M. The First Nuclear Strikes and their Impact, XI. The U.S. reply, drafted during the course of the day, did not explicitly reject the note but suggested that any notion about the prerogatives of the Emperor would be superceded by the concept that all Japanese would be Subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers. The language was ambiguous enough to enable Japanese readers, upon Hirohitos urging, to believe that they could decide for themselves the Emperors future role. As the Russian invasion of Ukraine shows, nuclear threats are real, present, and dangerous. However, it is striking that none of the people sent to ground zero in the immediate aftermath of the bombings were scientists or technicians. [44]. An entry from Admiral Tagaki's diary for August 8 conveys more information on the mood in elite Japanese circles after Hiroshima, but before the Soviet declaration of war and the bombing of Nagasaki. Japan was already a day late in responding to the Byrnes Note and Hirohito agreed to move quickly. The HarryS. Truman Library and Museum is part of the Presidential Libraries system administered by the National Archives and Records Administration,a federal agency. That there may be a difference between the two sources becomes evident from some of the entries; for example, in the entry for July 18, 1945 Brown wrote: "Although I knew about the atomic bomb when I wrote these notes, I dared not place it in writing in my book., The degree to which the typed-up version reflects the original is worth investigating. Confronting the Problem of Radiation Poisoning, XII. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-AEC), An overview of the destruction of Hiroshima [undated, circa August-September 1945]. and offer details on potential protection (protective clothing against a uranium bomb includes rubber and any kind of insulation against electricity). Fax: 816-268-8295. The atomic bomb changed STALIN'S attitude. [57], How influential the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and later Nagasaki compared to the impact of the Soviet declaration of war were to the Japanese decision to surrender has been the subject of controversy among historians. [79]. For discussion of the importance of this memorandum, see Sherwin, 126-127, and Hershberg, James B. Conant, 203-207. Peter Grose,Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1994), 170-174, 248-249. bobert. Augusta, Truman learned about the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and announced it twice, first to those in the wardroom (socializing/dining area for commissioned officers), and then to the sailors mess. Claypool, 1984) With such motivation to back them, the United States felt justified in dropping the atomic bomb in order to prevent the spread of communism in Europe by intimidating Russia. In later years, those who knew both thought it unlikely that the general would have expressed misgivings about using the bomb to a civilian superior. Leaflets dropped on cities in Japan warning civilians about the atomic bomb, dropped c. August 6, 1945. Thanks to Alex Wellerstein for the suggestion and the archival link. Nevertheless, his diary suggests that military hard-liners were very much in charge and that Prime Minister Suzuki was talking tough against surrender, by evoking last ditch moments in Japanese history and warning of the danger that subordinate commanders might not obey surrender orders. Bush-Conant papers, S-1 Historical File, Reports to and Conferences with the President (1942-1944), National Archives, Record Group 77, Records of the Army Corps of Engineers (hereinafter RG 77), Manhattan Engineering District (MED), Minutes of the Military Policy Meeting (5 May 1943), Correspondence (Top Secret) of the Manhattan Engineer District, 1942-1946, microfilm publication M1109 (Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration, 1980), Roll 3, Target 6, Folder 23, Military Policy Committee, Minutes of Meetings, Before the Manhattan Project had produced any weapons, senior U.S. government officials had Japanese targets in mind. Dropped the Atom Bomb One reason as to why the United States dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima was because it would have saved American lives and ended the war with Japan very quickly. How the Hiroshima Bombing Ended WWIIAnd Started the Cold War - HISTORY To the extent that the atomic bombing was critically important to the Japanese decision to surrender would it have been enough to destroy one city? [26], Record Group 107, Office of the Secretary of War, Formerly Top Secret Correspondence of Secretary of War Stimson (Safe File), July 1940-September 1945, box 8, Japan (After December 7/41), A former ambassador to Japan, Joseph Grews extensive knowledge of Japanese politics and culture informed his stance toward the concept of unconditional surrender. 5. Relations between the United States and Japan worsened when Japanese forces took aim at Indochina with the goal of capturing oil rich areas of the East Indies. Did America drop the bomb in revenge, to prevent the USSR spreading? Pages 12 through 15 of those notes refer to the atomic bombing of Japan: You know the most terrible decision a man ever had to make was made by me at Potsdam. The result was approximately 80,000 deaths in just the first few minutes. The record of this meeting has figured in the complex debate over the estimates of casualties stemming from a possible invasion of Japan. Thankfully, nuclear weapons have not been exploded in war since 1945, perhaps owing to the taboo against their use shaped by the dropping of the bombs on Japan. At the time, the American people cheered the . Besides Truman, guests included New York Governor Thomas Dewey (Republican presidential candidate in 1944 and 1948), foreign ambassadors, members of the cabinet and the Supreme Court, the military high command, and various senators and representatives. [51] Togos private position was more nuanced than Suzukis; he told Sato that we are adopting a policy of careful study. That Stalin had not signed the declaration (Truman and Churchill did not ask him to) led to questions about the Soviet attitude. Soviet forces in the east had attacked in the neighbourhood of Gradekovo, where the railroad from Vladivostok crosses the frontier. "The US decision to drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima was a diplomatic measure calculated to intimidate the USSR in the post-second World War era rather than strictly a military measure designed to force Japan to unconditionallysurrender" Procedure: Use the documents, textbook pages 845-849, and your knowledge of the era to support a position on Thus, he wanted Roosevelts instructions as to whether the project should be vigorously pushed throughout. Unlike the pilot plant proposal described above, Bush described a real production order for the bomb, at an estimated cost of a serious figure: $400 million, which was an optimistic projection given the eventual cost of $1.9 billion. Barton J. Bernstein and Martin Sherwin have argued that if top Washington policymakers had kept tight control of the delivery of the bomb instead of delegating it to Groves the attack on Nagasaki could have been avoided. Due to the relations of Russia . atomic bomb dropped to intimidate russia - kedaksempoi.com RG 77, MED Records, H-B files, folder no. McCloy was part of a drafting committee at work on the text of a proclamation to Japan to be signed by heads of state at the forthcoming Potsdam conference. The atomic bomb is the subject of much controversy. 5b (copy from microfilm), Two days after the bombing of Hiroshima, Groves provided Chief of Staff Marshall with a report which included messages from Captain William S. Parsons and others about the impact of the detonation which, through prompt radiation effects, fire storms, and blast effects, immediately killed at least 70,000, with many dying later from radiation sickness and other causes. At the time of the first report, various methods for producing a chain reaction were envisioned and money was being budgeted to try them out. Bernstein (1995), 146. Plainly Davies thought otherwise. At 10:50 a.m., he met with the leadership at the bomb shelter in his palace. Brown Papers, box 68, folder 13, Transcript/Draft B, Returning from the Potsdam Conference, sailing on the U.S.S. By the summer, once production plants would be at work, he proposed that the War Department take over the project. This report included an intercept of a message from Sato reporting that it was impossible to see Molotov and that unless the Togo had a concrete and definite plan for terminating the war he saw no point in attempting to meet with him. John HerseysHiroshima, first published in the New Yorkerin 1946 encouraged unsettled readers to question the bombings while church groups and some commentators, most prominently Norman Cousins, explicitly criticized them. Toward that end, in 2005, at the time of the 60th anniversary of the bombings, staff at the National Security Archive compiled and scanned a significant number of declassified U.S. government documents to make them more widely available. Included are documents on the early stages of the U.S. atomic bomb project, Army Air Force GeneralCurtis LeMays reporton the firebombing of Tokyo (March 1945), Secretary of War HenryStimsons requestsfor modification of unconditional surrender terms,Soviet documentsrelating to the events, excerpts from the Robert P. Meiklejohn diaries mentioned above, and selections from the diaries of Walter J. After the first minute of dropping "Fat Man," 39,000 men, women and children were killed. Maddox, 83-84; Hasegawa, 126-128. Today, historians continue to debate this decision. This latest iteration of the collection includes corrections, a few minor revisions, and updated footnotes to take into account recently published secondary literature. Some months later, with the Manhattan Project already underway and under the direction of General Leslie Grove, Bush outlined to Roosevelt the effort necessary to produce six fission bombs. According to Herbert Bix, for months Hirohito had believed that the outlook for a negotiated peace could be improved if Japan fought and won one last decisive battle, thus, he delayed surrender, continuing to procrastinate until the bomb was dropped and the Soviets attacked.[52]. Private collections were also important, such as the Henry L. Stimson Papers held at Yale University (although available on microfilm, for example, at the Library of Congress) and the papers of W. Averell Harriman at the Library of Congress. For tug of war, see Hasegawa, 226-227. Another intercept of a cable from Togo to Sato shows that the Foreign Minister rejected unconditional surrender and that the Emperor was not asking the Russians mediation in anything like unconditional surrender. Incidentally, this `Magic Diplomatic Summary indicates the broad scope and capabilities of the program; for example, it includes translations of intercepted French messages (see pages 8-9). Photo restoration by TX Unlimited, San Francisco, A nuclear weapon of the "Little Boy" type, the uranium gun-type detonated over Hiroshima. With Truman having ordered a halt to the atomic bombings [See document 78], Marshall wrote on Grove's memo that the bomb was not to be released over Japan without express authority from the President., Library of Congress Manuscript Division, Papers of W. Averell Harriman, box 181, Chron File Aug 10-12, 1945, Japans prospective surrender was the subject of detailed discussion between Harriman, British Ambassador Kerr, and Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov during the evening of August 10 (with a follow-up meeting occurring at 2 a.m.). Bernstein, introduction,Toward a Livable World, xxxvii-xxxviii. The killing of workers in the urban-industrial sector was one of the explicit goals of the air campaign against Japanese cities. On August 6,1945 Hiroshima and Nagasaki were attacked by atomic bombs that were dropped by the U.S Military. 25,000 more were injured. atomic bomb dropped to intimidate russia - joinclasses.com That is why, on August 8, Japanese newspapers first reported that the enemy used a new type of bomb in attacking Hiroshima, but the details are still under investigation., The phrasing a new type of bomb ( shingata bakudan) was used because the expression atomic bomb ( genshi bakudan) was prohibited by the Japanese government during the war. At this time, several treaties were in place to limit the size of navies in the Pacific Ocean. Brown recounted Byrnes debriefing of the 10 August White House meeting on the Japanese peace offer, an account which differed somewhat from that in the Stimson diary. The bomb missed Gregg's house by just 100 yards, and the explosion caused by the TNT trigger created a hole in Walter Gregg's garden that measured 24 feet in depth and 50 feet in width. Not altogether certain that surrender was imminent, Army intelligence did not rule out the possibility that Tokyo would try to drag out the negotiations or reject the Byrnes proposal and continue fighting. were the atomic strikes necessary primarily to avert an invasion of Japan in November 1945? Brewster suggested that Japan could be used as a target for a demonstration of the bomb, which he did not further define. This photo was taken from the Red Cross Hospital Building about one mile from the bomb burst. How decisive was the atomic bombings to the Japanese decision to surrender? [62]. Nevertheless, Anami argued, We are still left with some power to fight. Suzuki, who was working quietly with the peace party, declared that the Allied terms were acceptable because they gave a dim hope in the dark of preserving the emperor. Atomic Bomb Dbq - 576 Words | 123 Help Me Those and other questions will be subjects of discussion well into the indefinite future. olive tree children ministries; teaching blog; about our ministry; salvation prayer; contact us The bomb ended the war. Why the U.S. Dropped the Atomic Bomb on Japan in WWII The message that the bombings sent to the world was that whoever possessed those special weapons would prove to be politically superior, thus turning such weapons into the passport to survive and potentially win the Cold War. After Stalin reviewed in considerable detail, Soviet military gains in the Far East, they discussed the possible impact of the atomic bombing on Japans position (Nagasaki had not yet been attacked) and the dangers and difficulty of an atomic weapons program. [43], Barton J. Bernstein, Truman at Potsdam: His Secret Diary, Foreign Service Journal, July/August 1980, excerpts, used with authors permission.[44]. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, Still Pictures Branch, Subject Files, "Atomic Bomb"), Ground Zero at Hiroshima Today: This was the site of Shima Hospital; the atomic explosion occurred 1,870 feet above it (Photo courtesy of Lynn Eden,www.wholeworldonfire.com), The mushroom cloud over Nagasaki shortly after the bombing on August 9. Were the Japanese ready to surrender before the bombs were dropped? Later that year, the Uranium Committee completed its report and OSRD Chairman Vannevar Bush reported the findings to President Roosevelt: As Bush emphasized, the U.S. findings were more conservative than those in the British MAUD report: the bomb would be somewhat less effective, would take longer to produce, and at a higher cost. (Copy from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-AEC), A nuclear weapon of the "Fat Man" type, the plutonium implosion-type detonated over Nagasaki. The intention was to force Japan to surrender, thus avoiding a long war in the Pacific. [42]. For a review of the debate on casualty estimates, see Walker (2005), 315, 317-318, 321, 323, and 324-325. Within a few days Japan surrendered, and the terrible struggle that we call World War II was over. For more recent contributions, see Sean Malloy,Atomic Tragedy: Henry L. Stimson and the Decision to Use the Bomb Against Japan(Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2008), Andrew Rotter,Hiroshima: The World's Bomb(New York: Oxford, 2008), Campbell Craig and Sergey Radchenko,The Atomic Bomb and the Origins of the Cold War(New Haven, Yale University Press, 2008), Wilson D. Miscamble,The Most Controversial Decision: Truman, the Atomic Bombs, and the Defeat of Japan(New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011). To this day, this is the largest nuclear weapon detonated. Later, he met with Secretary of State Byrnes and they discussed the Manhattan Projects secrecy and the huge expenditures. Despite its. [36]. 35+ YEARS OF FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACTION, FOIA Advisory Committee Oversight Reports, a helpful collection of archival documents, on-line resources on the first atomic test. A significant contested question is whether, under the weight of a U.S. blockade and massive conventional bombing, the Japanese were ready to surrender before the bombs were dropped. Information from the late John Taylor, National Archives. Meanwhile, junior Army officers plotted a coup to thwart the plans for surrender. [1], Ever since the atomic bombs were exploded over Japanese cities, historians, social scientists, journalists, World War II veterans, and ordinary citizens have engaged in intense controversy about the events of August 1945. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs brought renewed attention to these documents more recently on August 5, 2015, the same day Naryshkin was pointing a finger at the United States in his speech. Barton Bernstein has also pointed to this as additional evidence of the influence on Stimson of an an older morality. While concerned about the U.S.s reputation, Stimson did not want the Air Force to bomb Japanese cities so thoroughly that the new weapon would not have a fair background to show its strength, a comment that made Truman laugh. The editor has closely reviewed the footnotes and endnotes in a variety of articles and books and selected documents cited by participants on the various sides of the controversy. For further consideration of Tokyo and more likely targets at the time, see Alex Wellerstein, Neglected Niigata,Restricted Data: The Nuclear Secrecy Blog, 9 October 2015. 75 years ago, in August 1945, the United States dropped the first and last atomic bombs used in warfare. Over 200,000 people were killed. The target would be a city--either Hiroshima, Kyoto (still on the list), or Niigata--but specific aiming points would not be specified at that time nor would industrial pin point targets because they were likely to be on the fringes a city.