“When you arrive in Hiroshima, you can look around and for 25 and perhaps 30 square miles you can see hardly a building. It gives you an empty feeling in the stomach to see such man-made devastation” – Wilfred Burchett. That is a quote directly from Wilfred Burchett speaking of the damage that was left after the judgment call from President Harry Truman to drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Today my assignment is to consider myself as President Truman at that time and settle on if I would have taken the same course of action as the commander and chief. Truman indeed faced an impracticable choice preceding his giving of the command to drop the bomb; either he could risk the lives of fifty percent of American soldiers or he could use the new found nuclear weapon on the people and cities of Japan. Most Americans have questioned the acts of President Truman back in those days, as a matter of fact those debates still carry on today; conversely today I try to put myself in his shoes to see if he was justified in his decision. . First I would like to look at some of the facts that led up to the pivotal verdict which caused so much destruction to Japan and its people. After Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, the United States would engage in World War II against Japan. I truly don’t believe anyone believed that the war would last as long as it did; nevertheless, after 44 months of fighting, the American people were growing weary of the war and wanted their troops to come home. Many
In the brutal and deadly Pacific Theater of World War ll, President Truman had to make a crucial decision on whether or not to drop the atomic bomb on Japan. Some believe that Truman’s actions to drop the atomic bomb were unethical and inhumane; however, Truman was justified in his decision to use the atomic bomb against Japan due to the fact that they are our enemy, saving American lives is the first priority, and the atomic bomb will ultimately prevent Russia from gaining control of Asia.
Claire Wyma President Truman was not justified in his decision to use Atomic weapons against Japan because the U.S. now has a threatening appeal, it goes against morals and humanity, and the bomb resulted in a tragic number of casualties. First, President Truman’s use of the Atomic bomb was unjustified because the U.S. now has a threatening appeal to other countries. In Admiral William E. Leahy’s memoirs, “I Was There,” he states, “In being the first to use it [the Atomic bomb], we. . . adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages” (Doc 3). The idea of whether or not the Atomic bomb should be dropped has been debated for years.
On August 6, 1945, the U.S. dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. To this day there is controversy on whether the U.S. should have risked the lives of hundreds of thousands of people to win the second world war. The U.S. Should have considered other options before dropping the bomb on Hiroshima. There were many alternative actions that could have taken place instead of dropping the bomb, but President Truman decided that using it was the best way to get the Japanese to surrender. If he would have chosen differently, the world would be a different place today.
Truman was right to drop the atomic bomb, rather than invade Japan. Invading japan would have cost one million u.s. casualties and one million plus japan casualties. If Truman would have invaded Japan the Japanese Soldiers and civilians would fight to the death rather than be captured. Truman was right to drop the atomic bomb because, saved lives ,and was humane. Additionally, Truman was right to drop the atomic bomb because it saved lives.
In 1945, at the order of President Harry Truman, the United States of America dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which triggered controversy worldwide. The debate arose between two sides, with one favoring the decision and the other calling it inhumane. Those favoring the decision agreed with President Truman, that dropping the atomic bomb was justified because it ended World War II. Those in favor also believed the bombing was justified because the US had given Japan a chance to surrender before they made the decision to drop the bomb. Those against the decision claimed Japan was ready to surrender and the bombing was unnecessary.
1. Long after World War II and the use of the atomic bombs against Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a great debate remains. It seems that there are two main potential arguments as to why the bombs were detonated and whether or not they were even necessary to begin with. The first theory surrounds the notion of the national security interests of the United States. In this theory essentially, Truman’s actions had been defended and justified as necessary in order to quickly end the war with U.S. causalities kept to a minimum.
During WW2 Truman, the United States President at the time, was asked to make one the toughest decision in History. Choosing between dropping an atomic bomb or invading are both choices that will result in a lot of deaths. The huge diffrence between the two was who died wether it be the Japanese with the bomb, or the American soldiers with the invasion. Trumans decision was supposed to end the war sooner, hence reducing the amount of agony,deaths, stress or any other negative effects that could result in the continous war. Truman's decision on dropping the Atomic Bomb's was an efficient course of action for the Americans, but was deffinantly not the most educated decision. If I had been placed in Truman's shoes and had to make this
Was it necessary for Truman to drop the Atomic Bombs on Japan in World War II? On August 6, 1945, the first atomic bomb was dropped by a US aircraft on Hiroshima. This atomic bomb was dropped to force Japan into surrender, this bomb alone destroyed Hiroshima and over 90,000 people were instantly killed in the explosion and an additional 100,000 people perished from burns and radiation sickness. On August 9, 1945 only three days later, the second atomic bomb was dropped over Nagasaki resulting in an additional 80,000 casualties of the Japanese population. The people of Japan surrendered on August 14, 1945 soon after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many people opposed to the use of the atomic bombs because people argued that Truman 's decision to use atomic bombs was a barbaric act of cruelty. People also argued that the US government had other ulterior motives to drop the atomic bomb that were necessary for America 's ideals. Necessary motives like presenting The Soviet Union a strong message for the Soviets to watch their step around America. A conventional way of warfare for Japan 's surrender would have costed many more American lives. Truman and others believed that the atomic bomb was necessary to save American lives but also Japanese lives. These actions from President Truman marked the end of the most destructive war in history. The two sources that will used and evaluated in this paper are is The Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb by Dennis D. Wainstock (1996)
Human life is precious in the sense that it is all about survival. There are qualities found in humans that make survival possible. In the book Hiroshima, by John Hersey, readers experience the core of humanity found in the six survivors during the days, months, and years following the atomic bomb. Through inspiration, perseverance, and a sense of community, the Japanese people demonstrated the strength of the human spirit.
John Hersey once said, “What has kept the world safe from the bomb since 1945 has not been deterrence, in the sense of fear of specific weapons, so much as it 's been memory. The memory of what happened at Hiroshima”. Early morning on August the 6th 1945, the United Sates dropped atomic bombs into the city of Hiroshima, Japan. The “Little Boy” bomb which was equivalent to 20,000 tons of TNT, destroyed most of the city and killed about 130,000 people. There were few people who survived after this traumatic event, and they suffered the horrible burns from explosion, as well as the radiation illness. One year later, John Jersey, a writer American, published “Hiroshima” as an article on The New Yorker which told the story of 6 people who
World War II lasted for six years from September,1 1939 to September 2, 1945 and resulted with Japan's surrender but believe it or not many events occurred both good and bad before anyone could make that choice. Before the declaration of this war japan had made an agreement with the U.S in which they gave them a friendship medal signifying peace. Turns out that wasn't the case japan actually backstabbed the U.S and on the morning of December 7th, 1941 the japanese attacked Pearl Harbor destroying nearly 20 American ships and more than 300 airplanes. About 2,403 sailors, soldiers and civilians were killed and about 1,000 people were wounded. After that the U.S could no longer trust Japan for many reasons they decided to fight back with two atomic bombs on Japan. The dropping of these two bombs on that country in my personal opinion is not justified. My reasons are that this was the first time the U.S was going to try these bombs out so in other words this was an experiment in which they had no clue the amount of damage that
The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are generally seen as successes in Truman’s presidency, although there are a large number of people who see it as a failure as well as a horrendous crime against humanity. However, by making the decision to
John Hersey's journalist narrative, Hiroshima focuses on the detonation of the atomic bomb, Little Boy, that dropped on the city of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Although over one hundred thousand people died in the dropping of the bomb, there were also several survivors. John Hersey travelled to Hiroshima to listen to the experiences of six survivors. Hersey uses his book to tell the story of six of these survivors (spanning from the morning the bomb fell to forty years later) through a compilation of interviews. Hiroshima demonstrates the vast damage and suffering inflicted on the Japanese that resulted from US deployment of the atomic bomb. And although depressing, humbling, and terrifying, this book was very good, interesting, and
This investigation assesses President Harry Truman’s decision to drop atomic bombs on both Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It will determine whether or not his decision was justified. This investigation will scrutinize the reasons that made Harry Truman feel inclined to drop atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Preventing further casualties along with the desire to end the war are two argumentative points that will be analyzed to determine if they were strong enough to justify the dropping
Journal Entry #1: From whose point of view is the story told? What other voices could tell the story? Be sure to explain how the story would be different from this other, new perspective.