Hiroshima: First Use of the Atomic Bomb
Copyright © 2005-6, Henry J. Sage
President Harry Truman's decision to use the atomic bomb on Japan remains one of the most controversial decisions in the history of the modern world. Much of the controversy, however, has been generated by what we know about atomic and nuclear weapons that we did not know at the time that the first bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1944.
World War II had been going on for a long time—since 1937 in Asia and since 1939 in Europe, and even then the world had hardly been a peaceful place before the fighting broke out on both fronts. In 1939 millions of adults still remembered the carnage of the first World War, and as World War II coursed onward, it became apparent that the devastation wrought by much more powerful weapons was reaching heights not even approached in 1914 -- 1918.
There was little lofty rhetoric in America's entry into the second World War compared with Woodrow Wilson's hopes to fight a war to end all wars and to “make the world safe for democracy.” True, the Atlantic Charter, agreed to by Roosevelt and Churchill in 1941, laid out the general principles under which the United States and Great Britain would conduct themselves in World War II. But it should be remembered that President Roosevelt agreed to the Atlantic charter even before the United States was formally at war. Furthermore, the horrors of the German concentration camps and Japanese death camps were not yet apparent at the time Churchill and Roosevelt conferred in Newfoundland. In 1943 the position adopted was by Roosevelt and Churchill at the Casablanca Conference was “unconditional surrender.” The war was being fought to bring down evil rulers—democracy would come later.
The movement toward the use of the atomic bomb was triggered by a letter from Albert Einstein to President Roosevelt in 1939. Einstein's letter, which he later regretted sending, suggested that Germany might be attempting to develop a some kind of powerful weapon using atomic power. The scientific underpinnings necessary for such a project had existed for some time but had not yet become fully developed. Roosevelt decided to go forward with the development of the atomic bomb a project, code named “Manhattan,” on the understandable grounds that if such weapons were going to be developed, the United States ought to try to keep pace. If terrible weapons, which we now refer to as weapons of mass destruction, were developed by an enemy, they might be used with devastating effects on populations, or they could be used for blackmail purposes. In either case it was desirable that the United States not be caught short in the race for new weapons.
Thus the work commenced at various places in the United States, including Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the University of Chicago, and various other laboratories around the country that were independently developing some of the resources and components which would eventually be used in the atomic bomb. The main work, however, was done at Alamogordo, New Mexico, under the direction of Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer. The research there was conducted under conditions of the strictest secrecy, although it is now known that a Russian spy actually got information about the atomic bomb project to the Soviet Union. The work was challenging, intense, and nerve-racking for those concerned. Various books and movies have been produced to dramatize developments at Alamogordo, and for those who would seek more detail their worth consulting. (See below.)
The Manhattan Project was monitored closely at the highest level by Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson. President Roosevelt was kept apprised in a general way, but he knew few of the details of the bombs development. When he plucked relatively unknown senator Harry Truman from the United States Senate to be his running mate in 1944, he was nearing the end of his life, and was probably aware of it at some level. For reasons which Roosevelt's biographers have never been able to fully explain, and which were probably unexplainable to anyone including the president himself, President Roosevelt chose not to take Vice President Truman into his confidence, assuming and very likely hoping that he would continue to live long enough to see the end of the war. Truman could deal with the leftover mess.
Alas, that was not meant to be, for Roosevelt died approximately one month before Germany's capitulation in May, 1945. Although Vice President Truman had caught wind of the atomic bomb project when he was still a senator, he had been warned off by Secretary Simpson and Army Chief of Staff General George Marshall on the grounds that Manhattan was something about which as few people as possible needed to know. Senator Truman accepted that, but upon becoming president he was soon the apprised of the ongoing attempts to create the atomic bomb. At the time of his accession the first test was about 90 days off, though the timing was still uncertain.
When the war closed in Europe, all attention was focused on Japan. The conquest of Okinawa was underway, and that island was the last stepping stone before American forces embarked on what was to be the inevitable invasion of the Japanese homeland. The first phase of that invasion was scheduled for November 1945, the second phase tentatively planned for February, 1946. The Japanese had fought fiercely throughout Southeast Asia and the Pacific and had made American soldiers, sailors and marines pay a fearful price to capture relatively small pieces of land. For example the conquest of Iwo Jima, an island of a mere eight square miles, cost United States Marines over 25,000 casualties, more than one for every Japanese defender. The anticipated fanaticism with which the Japanese were sure to defend their homeland promised tens of thousands of additional casualties.
The prospects for the invasion of the Japanese home islands were indeed daunting. We know that the Japanese were training all able-bodied citizens, male and female, in various arts of defense, including hand to hand combat. Although the Japanese had nearly exhausted their supply of aircraft for further kamikaze attacks, they were developing tiny suicide submarines. Those small vessels would be piloted by one operator and would carry explosives which would be detonated under the invasion vessels. In addition, the Japanese still had a large army on the mainland of China, although moving it to the homeland would have been difficult, given that the United States Navy totally dominated Asian waters by the summer of 1945. Nevertheless, the prospects for the invasionwere seen as likely to be successful, but a very high cost, both to Americans and Japanese.
In July, 1945, President Truman was in Potsdam, Germany, just outside Berlin, conferring with Josef Stalin and Winston Churchill, who was soonto be replaced by David Lloyd George. The Allied leaders were discussing plans for the postwar disposition of occupied Germany and the remaining battle against Japan. While in Potsdam President Truman was informed that the test of the atomic bomb in New Mexico had been successful. Whereas Prime Minister Churchill was excited by the news, Premier Stalin seemed unimpressed and in fact probably already knew of the American project Manhattan though the spy Klaus Fuchs. In any case, after conferring with Secretary Stimson and others President Truman sent a message to the Japanese government informing them that unless they were willing to surrender forthwith, they would face terrible destruction. When the Japanese failed to respond, President Truman sent word to the Army Air Forces on Saipan to use the bomb on targets which had already been selected, the final decision being left up to the local commanders.
Hiroshima was selected as the first site, and the bomb was dropped successfully on August 6, 1945. Three days later on August 9, the second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. The death and destruction was beyond what most people imagined, but it is now clear that the shock of the two atomic bombs precipitated the Japanese surrender. The nuclear age had begun.
Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer was the “father of the atomic bomb.” This recent biography is said to be definitive about the man and the times.
History 122 Part 3 | Updated November 2, 2006 | World War II Part I