American Atomic Bombing in WWII
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To most Americans at the end of 1945, the question of whether the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan was justified or unconscionable was probably one that hardly needed to be asked. After years of desperate war, beginning with what almost all Americans viewed as a treacherous attack on Pearl Harbor (Roosevelt) and proceeding through island battles with appalling American casualties, and even greater Japanese casualties, as at Iwo Jima, where more Americans died than in the Normandy landings (Connor, p. 283). It was seriously anticipated that an invasion of Japan itself might cost more American lives than the whole previous war in Europe and Asia, two atomic bombs were dropped -- and Japan surrendered in a few days. The bombs had brought victory and peace; that must have seemed justification enough. Only in later years were many questions raised, and these came amid changed circumstances. The fear of general nuclear annihilation lurked for a generation and more, while a military and political debacle in Vietnam raised doubts about the Cold War against communism, a Cold War that itself highlighted the nuclear spectre, and which was already incipient in the last weeks of the Second World War, when the atomic bombs were dropped on Japan. In this new light, a skepticism about the atomic bombings grew up, exemplified by Gar Alperovitz' article. Alperovitz makes two arguments: first that Japan was already on the point of surrender, and second that even if they were n
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because the Red Army could not directly and militarily bring Japan to its knees. The only certain way to end the war was an invasion. All other options -- continued fire raids against Japan's cities, Soviet entry into the war, the atomic bombs -- might produce an earlier surrender, but could not be counted on in advance to do so.
Viewed in this light, the effect of the bombs as a diplomatic weapon against the Soviets was a secondary issue for American policymakers, useful in the long term but not central to the immediate problem. Even if the United States and the Soviet Union had been on genuinely friendly terms, foreseeing postwar cooperation rather than rivalry, it is implausible that American policymakers would have held back from using the bomb in the hope that an ally's entry into the war might, but not with certainty, bring Japan's surrender.
In August of 1945, therefore, the real choice facing American policymakers was not simply to use the bomb or refrain from doing so, but to use it or to go on achieving much the same result, the mass incineration of Japanese cities and their people, by continuing the fire raids, while carrying forward preparations for an invasion. This would go on until some combination of cont
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Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 1696
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page)
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