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[71]. Bernstein, Understanding the Atomic Bomb and the Japanese Surrender,Diplomatic History19 (1995), 146-147; Alperovitz, 415; Frank, 246. 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. which was the world's first atomic bomb to be used in welfare. did not mean that the war would continue. The explosion over Hiroshima wiped out 95 percent of the city and killed 80,000 people. Debates on Alternatives to First Use and Unconditional Surrender, IV. [54], This summary included several intercepted messages from Sato, who conveyed his despair and exasperation over what he saw as Tokyos inability to develop terms for ending the war: [I]f the Government and the Military dilly-dally in bringing this resolution to fruition, then all Japan will be reduced to ashes. Sato remained skeptical that the Soviets would have any interest in discussions with Tokyo: it is absolutely unthinkable that Russia would ignore the Three Power Proclamation and then engage in conversations with our special envoy., Documents 60A-D: These messages convey the process of creating and transmitting the execution order to bomb Hiroshima. With the goal of having enough fissile material by the first half of 1945 to produce the bombs, Bush was worried that the Germans might get there first. The bombings have always been presented to young Americans in . By Marc Gallicchio. The discussion of weapons effects centered on blast damage models; radiation and other effects were overlooked. they used the atomic bomb to intimidate russia and not to force a war with japan. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-AEC), An overview of the destruction of Hiroshima [undated, circa August-September 1945]. [23]. Three days later, it dropped another on Nagasaki. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-BT), This shows "Little Boy" being raised for loading into the Enola Gay's bomb bay. Two days later an atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, killing an estimated . The atomic bombs dropped on the Japanese cities Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of World War IIcodenamed "Little Boy" and "Fat Man," respectivelycaused widespread destruction . Frank, 286-287; Sherwin, 233-237; Bernstein (1995), 150; Maddox, 148. The embassy teams included GRU members Mikhail Ivanov and German Sergeev in August, and TASS correspondent Anatoliy Varshavskiy, former acting military attach Mikhail Romanov, and Naval apparatus employee Sergey Kikenin in September. The discussion of available targets included Hiroshima, the largest untouched target not on the 21st Bomber Command priority list. But other targets were under consideration, including Yawata (northern Kyushu), Yokohama, and Tokyo (even though it was practically rubble.) The problem was that the Air Force had a policy of laying waste to Japans cities which created tension with the objective of reserving some urban targets for nuclear destruction. The contacts never went far and Dulles never received encouragement to pursue them. Through an award winning Digital Archive, the Project allows scholars, journalists, students, and the interested public to reassess the Cold War and its many contemporarylegacies. Historians have suggested a number of ways in which the atomic bomb might have alienated Stalin- 1. If the United States had been more flexible about the demand for unconditional surrender by explicitly or implicitly guaranteeing a constitutional monarchy would Japan have surrendered earlier than it did? Lower image - August 11, 1945, photo by 6th Photo Reconnaissance Group Background on the U. S. Atomic Project, III. The weapon is in the pit covered with canvas. 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.) If Russia used a nuclear weapon of any type, "I expect (the president) to say we're in a new situation, and the U.S. will directly enter the war against Russia to stop this government that has . Stimson, who later wrote up the meeting in his diary, also prepared a discussion paper, which raised broader policy issues associated with the imminent possession of the most terrible weapon ever known in human history., In a background report prepared for the meeting, Groves provided a detailed overview of the bomb project from the raw materials to processing nuclear fuel to assembling the weapons to plans for using them, which were starting to crystallize. 202-994-7000 ornsarchiv@gwu.edu, Nagasaki, August 10, 1945; photograph by Yosuke Yamahata; used with permission of copyright holder, Shogo Yamahata/Courtesy: IDG films. Pumpkins referred to bright orange, pumpkin-shaped high explosive bombsshaped like the Fat Man implosion weapon--used for bombing run test missions. Responding to this threat, the United States placed an embargo on scrap metal, oil, and aviation fuel heading to Japan and froze Japanese assets in the United States. It was Meiklejohns birthday and during the dinner party, Eisenhower and McCloy had an interesting discussion of atomic weapons, which included comments alluding to scientists statements about what appears to be the H-bomb project (a 20 megaton weapon), recollection of the early fear that an atomic detonation could burn up the atmosphere, and the Navys reluctance to use its battleships to test atomic weapons. [79]. For reviews of the controversy, see Barton J. Bernstein, The Struggle Over History: Defining the Hiroshima Narrative, ibid., 128-256, and Charles T. OReilly and William A. Rooney,The Enola Gay and The Smithsonian(Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, 2005). There Stimson kept track of S-1 developments, including news of the successful first test (see entry for July 16) and the ongoing deployments for nuclear use against Japan. 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. The possibility of modifying the concept of unconditional surrender so that it guaranteed the continuation of the emperor remained hotly contested within the U.S. government. When the atomic bomb was dropped, I felt: "This is terrible." Immediately thereafter, it was reported Soviet Russia entered the war. General George C. Marshall is the only high-level official whose contemporaneous (pre-Hiroshima) doubts about using the weapons against cities are on record. [50]. According to what Byrnes told Brown, Truman, Stimson, and Leahy favored accepting the Japanese note, but Byrnes objected that the United States should go [no] further than we were willing to go at Potsdam. Stimsons account of the meeting noted Byrnes concerns (troubled and anxious) about the Japanese note and implied that he (Stimson) favored accepting it, but did not picture the debate as starkly as Browns's did. RG 77, Tinian Files, April-December 1945, box 21 (copies courtesy of Barton Bernstein). On August 6,1945 Hiroshima and Nagasaki were attacked by atomic bombs that were dropped by the U.S Military. Suite 701, Gelman Library Colonel John Stone, an assistant to commanding General of the Army Air Forces Henry H. Hap Arnold, had just returned from Potsdam and updated his boss on the plans as they had developed. The Supreme War Council comprised the prime minister, foreign minister, army and navy ministers, and army and navy chiefs of staff; see Hasegawa, 72. This. 8). With Secretary of War Stimson presiding, members of the committee heard reports on a variety of Manhattan Project issues, including the stages of development of the atomic project, problems of secrecy, the possibility of informing the Soviet Union, cooperation with like-minded powers, the military impact of the bomb on Japan, and the problem of undesirable scientists. In his comments on a detonation over Japanese targets, Oppenheimer mentioned that the neutron effect would be dangerous to life for a radius of at least two-thirds of a mile, but did not mention that the radiation could cause prolonged sickness. Togo could not persuade the cabinet, however, and the Army wanted to delay any decisions until it had learned what had happened to Hiroshima. This entry has been cited by all sides of the controversy over whether Truman was trying to keep the Soviets out of the war. 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. If you experience a barrier that affects your ability to access content on this page, let us know via ourContact form. The point was to keep the bombing mission crew safe; concern about radiation effects had no impact on targeting decisions. Those and other questions will be subjects of discussion well into the indefinite future. 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. [44]. Most of these individuals were bureaucrats, which also explains the lack of scientific terms and technical observations on the effects of radiation. The United States used the bomb to end the war with Japan, which began in 1941 when Japan launched an unprovoked attack on Pearl Harbor. His estimate of 250,000 U.S. soldiers spared far exceeded that made by General Marshall in June 1945, which was in the range of 31,000 (comparable to the Battle of Luzon) [See Document 26]. Brown Papers, box 10, folder 12, Byrnes, James F.: Potsdam, Minutes, July-August 1945, Walter Brown, who served as special assistant to Secretary of State Byrnes, kept a diary which provided considerable detail on the Potsdam conference and the growing concerns about Soviet policy among top U.S. officials. According to an Eyewitness Account (and Estimates Heard) In Regard to the Bombing of Hiroshima: Casualties have been estimated at 100,000 persons., Zenshiro Hoshina, Daitoa Senso Hishi: Hoshina Zenshiro Kaiso-roku [Secret History of the Greater East Asia War: Memoir of Zenshiro Hoshina] (Tokyo, Japan: Hara-Shobo, 1975), excerpts from Section 5, The Emperor made go-seidan [= the sacred decision] the decision to terminate the war, 139-149 [translation by Hikaru Tajima]. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-BT), Ground view of Nagasaki before and after the bombing; radiuses in increments of 1,000 feet from Ground Zero are shown. The nuclear age had truly begun with the first military use of atomic weapons. . Later, he met with Secretary of State Byrnes and they discussed the Manhattan Projects secrecy and the huge expenditures. One recommendation shared by many of the scientists, whether they supported the report or not, was that the United States inform Stalin of the bomb before it was used. The U.S. documents cited here will be familiar to many knowledgeable readers on the Hiroshima-Nagasaki controversy and the history of the Manhattan Project. This personal account, written on Tinian, reports his fears about the danger of a nuclear accident, the confusion surrounding the Nagasaki attack, and early Air Force thinking about a nuclear strike force. 153-154, 164 (n)). The third con was it created anger. Sadao Asada emphasizes the shock of the atomic bombs, while Herbert Bix has suggested that Hiroshima and the Soviet declaration of war made Hirohito and his court believe that failure to end the war could lead to the destruction of the imperial house. 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]. To help readers who are less familiar with the debates, commentary on some of the documents will point out, although far from comprehensively, some of the ways in which they have been interpreted. 1. 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. Not knowing that the Soviets had already made a commitment to their Allies to declare war on Japan, Tokyo fruitlessly pursued this option for several weeks. While Lincoln believed that the proposed peace teams were militarily acceptable he doubted that they were workable or that they could check Soviet expansion which he saw as an inescapable result of World War II. It is 28 inches in diameter and 120 inches long. This was the affirmation of the emperors theocratic powers, unencumbered by any law, based on Shinto gods in antiquity, and totally incompatible with a constitutional monarchy. Thus, the Japanese response to the Potsdam declaration opposed any demand which prejudices the prerogatives of his Majesty as a sovereign ruler. This proved to be unacceptable to the Truman administration.[63]. Late in the evening of 9 August, the emperor and his advisers met in the bomb shelter of the Imperial Palace. As indicated by the L.D. For Harrisons convenience, Arneson summarized key decisions made at the 21 June meeting of the Interim Committee, including a recommendation that President Truman use the forthcoming conference of allied leaders to inform Stalin about the atomic project. [7]. Pressure from Secretary of War Stimson had already taken Kyoto off the list of targets for incendiary bombings and he would successfully object to the atomic bombing of that city. 5, This review of Japanese capabilities and intentions portrays an economy and society under tremendous strain; nevertheless, the ground component of the Japanese armed forces remains Japans greatest military asset. Alperovitz sees statements in this estimate about the impact of Soviet entry into the war and the possibility of a conditional surrender involving survival of the emperor as an institution as more evidence that the policymakers saw alternatives to nuclear weapons use. Also relevant to Japanese thinking about surrender, the author speculated, was the Soviet attack on their forces after a declaration of war. Record Group 457, Records of the National Security Agency/Central Security Service, Magic Diplomatic Summaries 1942-1945, box 18. 5d (copy from microfilm), On 27 April, military officers and nuclear scientists met to discuss bombing techniques, criteria for target selection, and overall mission requirements. [27], Commenting on another memorandum by Herbert Hoover, George A. Lincoln discussed war aims, face-saving proposals for Japan, and the nature of the proposed declaration to the Japanese government, including the problem of defining unconditional surrender. Lincoln argued against modifying the concept of unconditional surrender: if it is phrased so as to invite negotiation he saw risks of prolonging the war or a compromise peace. J. Samuel Walker has observed that those risks help explain why senior officials were unwilling to modify the demand for unconditional surrender. However, many historians believe that the attack on Japan-occupied Manchuria by the previously neutral Soviet Union on August 8 had more impact on Japan's leaders. The discussion of area bombing may have reminded him that Japanese civilians remained at risk from U.S. bombing operations. [1]. With Japan close to capitulation, Truman asserted presidential control and ordered a halt to atomic bombings. Rather, they are mostly about damage to inanimate objects. The nuclear age had truly begun with the first military use of atomic weapons. 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. On the August 6, 1945, the world's first atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, by the United States. The total area devastated by the atomic strike on Hiroshima is shown in the darkened area (within the circle) of the photo. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 306-NT). For the extensive literature, see the references in J. Samuel Walker, Prompt and Utter Destruction: Truman and the Use of Atomic Bombs against Japan,Third Edition (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2016) at 131-136, as well as Walkers, Recent Literature on Trumans Atomic Bomb Decision: A Search for Middle Ground,Diplomatic History29 (April 2005): 311-334. [55] On 22 July Marshall asked Deputy Chief of Staff Thomas Handy to prepare a draft; General Groves wrote one which went to Potsdam for Marshalls approval. This summary included intercepts of Japanese diplomatic reporting on the Soviet buildup in the Far East as well as a naval intelligence report on Anglo-American discussions of U.S. plans for the invasion of Japan. National Archives and Records Administration, Record Group 243, Photographs Used In The Report Effects of the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, 1947 - 1947, Local Identifier:243-HP-I-31-3; National Archives ID:22345672. Within a few days Japan surrendered, and the terrible struggle that we call World War II was over. The documents cover multiple aspects of the bombings and their context. 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Moreover, ethical questions have shrouded the bombings which caused terrible human losses and in succeeding decades fed a nuclear arms race with the Soviet Union and now Russia and others. As the scientists had learned, a gun-type weapon based on plutonium was impossible because that element had an unexpected property: spontaneous neutron emissions would cause the weapon to fizzle.[10] For both the gun-type and the implosion weapons, a production schedule had been established and both would be available during 1945. Alperovitz, however, treats it as additional evidence that strongly suggests that Truman saw alternatives to using the bomb. An account of the cabinet debates on August 13 prepared by Information Minister Toshiro Shimamura showed the same divisions as before; Anami and a few other ministers continued to argue that the Allies threatened the kokutai and that setting the four conditions (no occupation, etc.) Since the end of WWII, the popular view in the U.S. has been that the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki precipitated Japan's surrender on August 15. The Hiroshima operation was originally slated to begin in early August depending on local conditions. [34], On the eve of the Potsdam conference, Leo Szilard circulated a petition as part of a final effort to discourage military use of the bomb. How decisive was the atomic bombings to the Japanese decision to surrender? RG 77, MED, H-B files, folder no. When Truman received a detailed account of the test, Stimson reported that the President was tremendously pepped up by it and that it gave him an entirely new feeling of confidence (see entry for July 21). How is the current debate about immigration in the United States rooted in our nations past? Eisenhowers son John cast doubts about the memoir statements, although he attested that when the general first learned about the bomb he was downcast. Truman read Stimsons proposal, which he said was powerful, but made no commitments to the details, e.g., the position of the emperor. After considerable pressure from Harriman, the Soviets signed off on the reply but not before tensions surfaced over the control of Japan--whether Moscow would have a Supreme Commander there as well. 576 words. Secretary of Commerce (and former Vice President) Henry Wallace provided a detailed report on the cabinet meeting where Truman and his advisers discussed the Japanese surrender offer, Russian moves into Manchuria, and public opinion on hard surrender terms. On the basic decision, he had simply concurred with the judgments of Stimson, Groves, and others that the bomb would be used as soon as it was available for military use. Quotation and statistics from Thomas R. Searle, `It Made a Lot of Sense to Kill Skilled Workers: The Firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945,The Journal of Military History55 (2002):103. If there was a misfire the weapon would be difficult for the Japanese to recover, which would not be the case if Tokyo was targeted. [46] During the meeting on August 24, discussed above, Stimson gave his reasons for taking Kyoto off the atomic target list: destroying that city would have caused such bitterness that it could have become impossible to reconcile the Japanese to us in that area rather than to the Russians. Stimson vainly tried to preserve language in the Potsdam Declaration designed to assure the Japanese about the continuance of their dynasty but received Trumans assurance that such a consideration could be conveyed later through diplomatic channels (see entry for July 24). Initialed by President Roosevelt (VB OK FDR), this may have been the closest that he came to a formal approval of the Manhattan Project. In fact, after the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, the Japanese militarys Information Division, in charge of media control, intended to announce that the bomb was an atomic one. One of the visitors mentioned at the beginning of the entry was Iwao Yamazaki who became Minister of the Interior in the next cabinet. Stimson did not always have Trumans ear, but historians have frequently cited his diary when he was at the Potsdam conference. The killing of workers in the urban-industrial sector was one of the explicit goals of the air campaign against Japanese cities. An Ordinary Man, His Extraordinary Journey, President Harry S. Truman's White House Staff, National History Day Workshops from the National Archives, Video: Franklin D. Roosevelt and Pearl Harbor, Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb Study Collection, Harry S. Truman Library & Mu.