THE BIGGEST DECISION

The Biggest Decision: Why We Had To Drop the Atomic Bomb

The Biggest Decision: Why We Had To Drop the Atomic Bomb

IntroductionOn August 6, 1945 the United States dropped the first atomic bomb over the Japanese city of Hiroshima, followed three days later with the use of another atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Some people believe that the U.S. should not have dropped the atomic because the war would be over a few months later.A lot of second guessing has gone into America's use of atomic bombs on Japan in August 1945, even starting with former general and future president Dwight Eisenhower in 1948 who did not want America to be the first to use nuclear weapons.DiscussionAccording to the article namely, “The Biggest Decision: Why We Had to Drop the Atomic Bomb” by Robert J. Maddox, the author worked on dispelling some of the myths that have popped up since 1945. The generals may have overestimated the Allied casualties, but the June 8 meeting with Truman stated that General George Marshall estimated that only 31,000 casualties would be inflicted during the invasion of Kyushu (Operation Olympic). What intelligence sources had discovered in the days before Hiroshima, the Japanese Imperial Command had correctly guessed what the Allies were planning and had reinforced Kyushu with over 500,000 (actually over 900,000 but the Allies did not know that at the time).When Truman was making the decision of whether or not to drop the atom bomb he had to take into account the massive amount of troops that would be lost if we had made a full scale invasion. By this point it was clear that Truman just wanted the war to be over and he wanted an unconditional surrender which required more force to acquire.Therefore, the logic follows that Truman made the decision to drop the bomb in order to spare more lives, mainly American lives, from a costly invasion.The war in Europe was over, and critics have claimed that the U.S. was trying to get the Soviets to either withdraw from Eastern Europe or at least be more open to agreeing with U.S. demands. However, Stalin was given the info about the success of the Trinity test (from spies) and therefore knew about the atomic bomb. Whether or not he felt intimidated, was not recorded.Another sticking point was whether Japan was ready to surrender. According to the Maddox article, Japan had sent peace ...