Position Paper
Assignment
Humanities 8
2003
Historians
have several theories in regard to the use of the atomic bombs on
Your job is to evaluate the evidence and then write a position paper on whether the decision to drop the bomb was justified. To do this you will need to formulate an answer to some key questions: Why did President Truman decide to drop the bomb? Were there better courses of action? Was there adequate moral cause to inflict the suffering that the two bombs caused? An excellent paper will not only defend your point of view, but also point out the main fallacies of other interpretations.
Obviously, this paper will be your opinion. Even renowned historians disagree on these issues. The purpose of this assignment is for you to learn how to interpret historical research to formulate a thesis and support your position. An assignment like this requires a great deal of specific knowledge that a general study of World War II cannot give you. Realistically, you would need to do several weeks of reading and research before you could hope to get an overall view of the available information. We do not have the time or resources to do this. This is a “half research paper,” as the evidence has already been collected for you. You do not need to collect any additional research.
The body of your paper should be four to six pages typewritten. The main emphasis of this exercise is to evaluate evidence and integrate it into your writing. You must cite at least five pieces of evidence in your paper. The paper should be double-spaced and have normal fonts and margins. All evidence that you use should be credited in accordance with MLA standards (this will require you to reformat the bibliographical information that accompanies the evidence). Quotations over four lines should be blocked. Do not block quote more than ten lines. Anything longer than this would be better off paraphrased (but still credited).
The main things that you will be evaluated on are the way you select evidence to defend your point of view, the way you integrate this evidence into the narrative of your paper, and the quality of your writing. A reasonably intelligent person who knows little about this subject should be able to read your paper and understand what you are trying to say. Anything discussed in class, contained in your reading text, or in the general information section of this handout may be considered general knowledge, should not be directly quoted, and does not need to be credited.
This exercise should teach you how to write a good historical research paper without the need to do outside research. Research skills are important, but this assignment focuses on the rest of the process and saves you (and your parents) the agony of numerous trips to the library. We will spend a great deal of class time discussing how you should go about organizing, writing and citing evidence in your paper.
Remember that this
paper is due on the due date whether you are in school or not.
CONTENT
(50%)
Clear thesis paragraph containing your opinion
Adherence to thesis throughout the paper
Selection of main points
Selection of evidence to support thesis
Historical accuracy
Conclusion reflects thesis without redundancy
COMPOSITION (30%)
Introduction of evidence and integration of evidence into narrative
Clear topic sentences
Overall clarity and composition
Proper grammar, punctuation, spelling, capitalization
FORMATTING (20%)
Formatting of paper in MLA style
Citation of evidence in MLA style
Works Cited format (15 point deduction if missing)
Proper spacing/block quotations
The huge casualties suffered at
As the war with
The Japanese government had
become badly divided late in the war.
Civilian leaders such as Prime Minister (Premier) Suzuki and Foreign
Minister
The
By the spring of 1945 the
On July 31, 1945, President
Truman gave the order to use the bomb as soon as weather permitted after August
2. The first bomb was dropped on
The
Cordell Hull, Memoirs of Cordell Hull, Vol. II (New York: Macmillan, 1948), pp. 1570-1571.
[President Roosevelt’s comments to the press on February 12, 1943]
The only terms we shall deal … are the terms proclaimed
at
Franklin D. Roosevelt, Public Papers of the Presidents, Vol. XIII, p. 210.
Practically all Germans deny the fact they surrendered in the last war, but this time they are going to know it. And so are the Japs.
Gar Alperovitz, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), p. 39.
[President Truman’s statement of May 8, 1945 upon
Unconditional surrender does not mean the extermination
or enslavement of the Japanese people.
Alperovitz, The Decision To Use The Atomic Bomb, p. 35. (SECOND REFERENCES TO A CITED WORK WILL BE CITED IN ABREVIATED FORM. CHECK THE FIRST REFERENCE FOR COMPLETE INFORMATION.)
The significance of the Emperor in Japanese society was no secret to American leaders: The Japanese regarded the Emperor as a deity, a god—more like Jesus or the incarnate Buddha than an ordinary human being. Until the surrender occurred, the Japanese people at large had never been allowed to hear the Emperor’s voice….
Alanzo Hamby, “Truman and the Bomb” History Today, August, 1995, pp. 18-25.
For most Americans, “unconditional surrender” had become
a wartime objective carved in stone; having obtained it from
Ronald H. Spector, Eagle Against the Sun: The American War With
Byrnes was convinced that a retreat from unconditional surrender could have devastating political consequences for the president, since the vast majority of the public was still opposed to retention of the Emperor.
Henry L. Stimson Diaries,
July 24. 1945, Manuscripts and Archives,
I then spoke of the importance which I attributed to the
reassurance of the Japanese on the continuance of their dynasty, and I felt
that the insertion of that in the formal warning was important and might be
just the thing that would make or mar their acceptance, but that I had heard
from Byrnes that they preferred not to put it in…
Alperovitz, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, p. 300.
What is striking about the modern evidence is that every top presidential civilian and military advisor up to this point in time [the Potsdam Conference] except Byrnes—as well as Prime Minister Churchill and the top British military leadership—clearly and directly urged a clarification of the unconditional surrender formula.
Section 3: …The full application of our military power, backed by our resolve, will mean the inevitable and complete destruction of the Japanese armed forces and just as inevitably the utter devastation of the Japanese homeland.
Section 10: We do not intend that the Japanese shall be enslaved as a race or destroyed as nation, but stern justice shall be meted out to all war criminals, including those who have visited cruelties on our prisoners….
Section 13: We call upon the Government of Japan to proclaim the unconditional surrender of all the Japanese armed forces, and to provide proper and adequate assurance of their good faith in such action. The alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction.
Frank, Richard B. Downfall: The End of the Japanese Empire (New York: Random House, 1999), p. 28.
Major General Alexander Archer Vandegrift, the Marine commander on Guadalcanal wrote: “I have never heard or read of this kind of fighting. These people refuse to surrender. The wounded wait until men come up to examine them . . . and blow themselves and the other fellow to pieces with a hand grenade.”
Joint Chiefs of Staff, Pacific Strategy, April 25, 1945, p. 245.
[Policy paper by the heads of the Army, Navy, and Marines]
It is by no means certain… that “unconditional surrender” can be brought about by any means….
In no case to date in this war have organized Japanese units surrendered. The concept of “unconditional surrender” is foreign to the Japanese nature.
Frank, Downfall, p.189.
On March 23 [1945], the [Japanese] cabinet ordered the formation of the Patriotic Citizens Fighting Corps across the whole nation. This corps constituted a mechanism for inducting the whole body of citizens. The entire public, in effect, became subject to call-up under Volunteer Enlistment Law, which applied to all men ages 15-60 and all women ages 17 to 40.
Alperovitz, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, p. 85.
[Internal War Department report of April 30, 1946]
The Japanese leaders had decided to surrender and were
merely looking for sufficient pretext to convince the die-hard Army Group that
Japan had lost the war and must capitulate to the Allies. The entry of
Robert Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1954), pp. 68-69.
In his opening speech to the [Japanese Parliament], which convened on June 9, [Premier] Suzuki [who took office in March 1945] went perhaps even further than he had in any of his earlier pronouncements.... Unconditional surrender was out of the question. It will result in the “destruction” of the national policy and the “ruin” of the Japanese race. There was only one path Japan could follow and that was “to fight to the very end.”
Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender, pp. 70-71.
[Butow explains the Japanese concept of haragei, which is the act of saying one thing and doing another]
If so many of those who moved within the circle of the ruling elite were addicted to practicing haragei, just how could there ever have been any confidence or understanding among them? …the fact remains that from the moment he became Premier until the day he resigned no one could ever be quite sure of what Suzuki would do next.
Combined Chiefs of Staff Report, July 8, 1945 quoted in Alperovitz, The Decision To Use The Atomic Bomb, p. 22.
The Japanese ruling groups are aware of the desperate military situation….
We believe that a considerable portion of the Japanese population now consider absolute military defeat to be probable. The increasing effects of sea blockade and the cumulative devastation wrought by strategic bombing, which has already rendered millions homeless and has destroyed from 25% to 50% of the buildup [sic] area of Japan’s most important cities, should make this realization increasingly general.
MAGIC, No 1205, July 13, 1945.
[Intercepted message from Foreign Minister Togo to Ambassador Sato in Moscow (July 13, 1945)]
His Majesty the Emperor, mindful of the fact that the present war daily brings greater evil and sacrifice upon the peoples of all belligerent powers, desires from his heart that it may be quickly terminated…. so long as England and the United States insist upon unconditional surrender the Japanese Empire has no alternative but to fight on with all its strength for the honor and the existence of the Motherland.
James F. Byrnes, All in One Lifetime (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1958), p. 308.
[Intercepted message from Foreign Minister Togo to Ambassador Sato (July 21, 1945)]
We cannot consent to unconditional surrender under any circumstances. Even if the war drags on, so long as the enemy demands unconditional surrender we will fight as one man against the enemy in accordance with the Emperor’s command.
Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender, p. 148.
[Japanese Prime Minister Suzuki’s response to the Potsdam Declaration, July 28, 1945]
I consider the joint proclamation of the three powers to be a rehash of the Cairo Declaration. The government does not regard it as a thing of any great value; the government will just ignore it. We will press forward resolutely to carry the war to a successful conclusion.
Henry L. Stimson, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb,” Harper’s, February 1947, pp. 104-105.
On July 28 the Premier of Japan, Suzuki, rejected the Potsdam ultimatum by announcing that it was “unworthy of public notice.” In the face of this rejection we could only proceed to demonstrate that the ultimatum had meant exactly what it said….
Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender, p. 151.
[President Truman on August 6, 1945 after the bombing of Hiroshima]
It was to spare the Japanese from utter destruction that the ultimatum of July 26 was issued at Potsdam. Their leaders promptly rejected that ultimatum. If they do not now accept our terms they may expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth....
Frank, Downfall, p.189.
[After Hiroshima, Chief of the Naval General Staff,
Admiral Toyoda] “argued that the
Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender, pp. 161-164.
[The debate among the six Japanese war cabinet members about whether to surrender, August 9, 1945]
While Susuki, [Prime Minister], Togo [Foreign Minister] and Yonai [Navy Minister] were committed in varying degrees to an outright acceptance [of the Potsdam Declaration demanding unconditional surrender] on the basis of the sole reservation that the Imperial house would be maintained, Anami [War Minister], Umezu [Army Chief of Staff], and Toyoda [Navy Chief of Staff], felt quite differently…. What gagged these men—all true “Samurai” bred in an uncompromising tradition—were the other points Yonai had mentioned. They wanted either to prevent a security occupation entirely or to exclude at least the metropolis of Tokyo... So far as war criminals were concerned, they felt it should be Japan and not the victorious enemy who must try such cases. In effect, they also wanted to accept the surrender of their own men...
From the standpoint of making postwar rationalizations and of “opening up the future of the country” it was psychologically vital for the Japanese army and navy to make it appear as if they had voluntarily disbanded their military might in order to save the nation and the world at large from the continued ravages of war. If they could do this, they could very easily later plant an appealing suggestion to the effect that the imperial forces of Great Japan had not really suffered defeat at all. For this reason, too, a security occupation and war crimes trials conducted by Allied tribunals had to be avoided at all costs... [It is unlikely that the U.S. would have even considered these terms.]
Togo pointedly asked whether Japan could win the war if a collapse of this type [of negotiations] occurred. To this the military heads could not only reply that although they were not certain of ultimate victory, they were still capable of one more campaign-a “decisive” battle in the homeland…. The Council was deadlocked… Although the atomic attack on Hiroshima had made it impossible for any one present to continue to deny the urgency of Japan’s situation, it apparently had not made a deep enough impression upon the chiefs of staff and the War Minister to make them willing to cast their lot outright for a termination of the war.
“The Bomb: 50 Years Later
“The bomb was unfortunate, but it was the only means to
bring
Professor Asada cites Japanese archival evidence that military officials were likely to fight on, furiously, until the end.
“Sacrifice 20 million Japanese lives,” a senior navy official urged in August 1945, with tears in his eyes as he proposed a huge suicide attack on the Allies.
The Prime Minister at the time, Kantaro Suzuki later described the atomic bomb as “an extremely favorable opportunity,” and suggested that conventional bombs would not have been enough. The Japanese navy minister described the atomic bomb as a “gift from heaven” and the Emperor’s top advisor said that the peace faction had been “assisted by the atomic bomb in our endeavor to end the war.”
The Japanese documents also reveal a little-known factor
that may have played a role in ending the war.
An American pilot [Lieutenant Marcus McDilda]
was shot down on Aug. 8 and lied to his Japanese
interrogators, saying that the
William Craig, The Fall
of
At 2:00 a.m. [on August 10], over two hours after the discussion began deep under the streets of Tokyo, Suzuki did the unprecedented… “I believe that everyone has fully expressed his opinion but I regret that we did not come to an agreement. As it is a matter of great importance, there is no way left but to rely on the decision of His Imperial Majesty.” He addressed the Emperor: “Your Imperial Decision is requested as to which proposal should be adopted, the Foreign Minister’s [favoring acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration] or the one with the four conditions [Japanese disarmament of their own troops, no occupation, war crimes trials only in Japanese courts, and the guaranteed preservation of the Emperor].” Suzuki had trumped the opposition, which had never expected the Emperor to speak….
Hirohito rose. He began to speak slowly, as though feeling for the proper words:
“I agree with the Foreign Minister’s plan. I have given serious thought to the situation prevailing at home and abroad and have concluded that continuing the war can only mean destruction for the nation and a prolongation of bloodshed and cruelty in the world. Those who argue for continuing the war once assured me that new battalions and supplies would be ready at Kujikurihama by June 1. I realize now that this cannot be fulfilled even by September. As for those who wish for one last battle here on our own soil, let me remind them of the disparity between their previous plans and what has actually taken place. I cannot bear to see my innocent people struggle any longer… the time has come when we must bear the unbearable….”
Hirohito did not wait for a reaction, but rose from his chair and went to the door….
No one raised his voice either in protest or agreement. There was no sound….
At 7:33 A.M., wireless operators in the Foreign Ministry Building in downtown Tokyo began clicking off the momentous news in code….
General T.F. Farrell.
Memorandum to Major General L., R.
After the Hiroshima strike we scheduled the second attack for 11 August [local time]. On learning that bad weather was predicted for that time, we reviewed the status of the assembly work for the Fat Man [the second atomic bomb], our uncompleted test program, and readiness of the planes and crews. It was determined that with an all-out effort, everything could be ready for takeoff on the early morning of 9 August [local time], provided our final test of the Fat Man proved satisfactory, which it did. The decision turned out to be fortunate in that several days of bad weather followed 9 August.
Vincent Jones, The Army and the Atomic Bomb (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, 1985), p. 504.
The untested uranium bomb had been used on Hiroshima. Scientists were confident of its triggering mechanism. The more adventurous trigger for plutonium bombs was tested at Los Alamos. There was a very small quantity of fissionable U-235 uranium compared to the much more plentiful quantities of plutonium.
Frank, Downfall, p. 342.
On the morning of August 10, Stimson stressed to Truman that the Emperor would prove indispensable in securing the compliance of Japan’s armed forces. Absent the Emperor’s assistance, America would face “a score of bloody Iwo Jimas and Okinawas all across China and the New Netherlands [Indonesia].”
Harry S. Truman, Handwritten Journal, August 10, 1945, Box 333, President’s Secretary’s Files, Harry S. Truman Library.
At lunch at my desk and discussed the Jap offer to surrender which came in a couple of hours earlier. They wanted to make a condition precedent to surrender. Our terms are “unconditional.” They wanted to keep the Emperor. We told ‘em we’d tell ‘em how to keep him, but we’d make the terms.
Interrogation of Prince Konoye, November 9, 1945, Roll 5, USSBS Interrogations of Japanese Leaders and Responses to Questionnaires, M1654, RG 243, NA.
[Imperial Envoy Prince Konoye]
The army had dug themselves in the mountains and their
idea … was fighting from every little hole or rock in the mountains…. I don’t think the Emperor would have let them
go that far. He would have done
something to stop them.
Craig, The Fall of
[War Cabinet meeting of August 13. Military leaders, led by General Anami continued to resist the Emperor’s decision to surrender.]
For several hours the two factions sparred for position, for an opening. It was hopeless. The same conditions were imposed by the military, the same objections to them raised by the statesmen. Each side had become rigidly committed to its own cause.
[Meanwhile junior army officers plotted a coup d’ etat]
The rebellion was set for 10:00 A.M. the following morning. General Mori had already been approached and had promised to think about it [he refused and was assassinated]. Even if he refused, the coup could proceed because most of his regimental commanders had agreed to act. Marquis Kido [the Emperor’s top advisor] and Premier Suzuki would be imprisoned and the Emperor placed in a form of protective custody.
[Top army leaders such as General Anami and General Tanaka refused to support the coup after the Emperor reiterated his decision to surrender in a meeting of the War Cabinet on August 14. The rebellion took place in the early hours of the morning prior to the Emperor’s message on August 15. It failed and Anami, who had agonized over his decision not to support it, committed hari-kiri.]
Hamby, “Truman and the Bomb,” pp. 24-25.
The Allies gave their approval to American terms. Japan remained silent. On August 13, Truman authorized one last terrible 1,000-plane raid on Tokyo. Presiding over a final meeting of his War Council, Hirohito demanded an acceptance of the United States’ offer. Within twenty-four hours die-hard army officers attempted a coup d’ etat that was barely suppressed…. a brute certainty remains. Japan did not muster the will to surrender until two atomic bombs had been dropped.
Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender, pp. 207-209.
At approximately 10:50 that morning, August 14, the Emperor… walked into the air raid shelter where the first imperial conference had been held five days before and took his place in front of a hushed audience composed of cabinet ministers, Supreme Counselors, and other high officials of state. [The debate over the decision to accept the American surrender terms continued.] When the last word had been said—and indeed it was their last—the Emperor began to speak:
“I have listened carefully to each of the arguments presented in opposition to the view that Japan should accept the Allied reply as it stands… but my own thoughts have not undergone any change…. it is my belief that a continuation of the war promises nothing but additional destruction…. I can not endure the thought of letting my people suffer any longer. A continuation of the war would bring death to tens, perhaps even hundreds, of thousands of persons. The whole nation would be reduced to ashes…”
Once again the Emperor had committed himself, only this time his words were final…. Everywhere within the inner councils of the state the murmur became a world-wide roar: JAPAN HAS SURRENDERED! THE WAR IN THE PACIFIC IS OVER!
Craig, The Fall of
[The Emperor’s surrender message to the Japanese people, August 15, 1945]
… the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the power of which to do damage is indeed incalculable, taking the toll of many innocent lives. Should we continue to fight, it would not only result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but it would also lead to the total extinction of human civilization…. This is the reason why we have ordered the acceptance of the provisions of the Joint Declaration of the Powers.
Butow, Japan’s Decision to Surrender, p. 233.
Had Tojo been Premier instead of Suzuki, or a man of Tojo’s character held Anami’s post in the War Ministry, even the Emperor’s own words might not have resulted in an immediate termination of the war. The fact that the Emperor was forced to state his views twice, first on the night of August 9/10 and again on the morning of August 14, suggests that compliance was by no means automatic.
Joseph G. Grew, Turbulent Era: A Diplomatic Record of Forty Years 1904-1945. Vol. II (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1952), p. 1446.
Already Russia is showing us—in Poland, Rumania, Bulgaria, Hungary, Austria, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia—the future world pattern that she visualizes and will aim to create. With her certain stranglehold on these countries, Russia’s power will steadily increase and she will in the not distant future be in a favorable position to extend her control, step by step, through Europe.
Frank, Downfall, p.184.
[Presidential advisor Harry] Hopkins’s cables also divulged Stalin’s expectation that “Russia will share in the actual occupation of Japan.”
Joint Chiefs of Staff, Pacific Strategy, April 25, 1945, p. 250.
Because of our estimated ability to interdict Japanese movement between the Asiatic mainland and Japan proper, early Russian entry into the war against Japan and attendant containing of the Kwantung [Japanese army in China] army is no longer necessary to make invasion feasible.
Stimson Diaries, May 15, 1945.
The trouble is that the President has now promised apparently to meet Stalin and Churchill on the first of July and at that time these questions… will become burning and it may be necessary to have it out with Russia…. Over any such tangled wave of problems the S-1 [atomic bomb] secret would be dominant and yet we will not know until after that time probably, until after that meeting, whether this is a weapon in our hands or not…. it seems a terrible thing to gamble with such big stakes in diplomacy without having your master card in your hand.
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, In the Matter of J. Robert Oppenheimer; Transcript of Hearing before Personal Security Board, Washington, DC, April 12, 1954 Through May 6, 1954 (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1954), pp. 32-33.
J. Robert Oppenheimer said that we “were under incredible pressure to get it done before the Potsdam meeting….”
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission Document 299, Manhattan Engineering District - National Archives, Record Group 77, Box 7, folder 12; box 14, folder 4.
[August 25, 1944 conversation between atomic scientist Leo Szilard and James Byrnes]
Byrnes—Our possessing and
demonstrating the bomb would make
Szilard—(The) interests of peace might best be served and an arms race avoided by not using the bomb against Japan, keeping it secret, and letting the Russians think that our work on it had not succeeded.
Byrnes—How would you get Congress to appropriate money for atomic energy research if you do not show results for the money which has been spent already?
Harry S. Truman, Off the Record: The Private Papers of Harry S. Truman. Edited by Robert H. Ferrell (New York: Harper and Row, 1980), p. 53.
[President Truman’s personal journal, July 17, 1945]
He’ll [Stalin] be in the Jap War on August 15th…. Fini Japs when that comes about.
Harry S. Truman, Dear Bess: The Letters from Harry to Bess Truman, 1910-1959, Edited by Robert H. Ferrell (New York: Norton, 1983), p. 519.
[Letter from Truman to his wife Bess, July 18, 1945 from Potsdam]
I’ve gotten what I came for—Stalin goes to war August 15 with no strings on it.
Truman, Off the Record, pp. 53-54.
[President Truman’s personal journal, July 18, 1945]
P.M. [Churchill] & I ate alone. Discussed Manhattan (it is a success). Decided to tell Stalin about it. Stalin told P.M. of telegram from Jap Emperor asking for peace. Stalin also read his answer to me [a totally noncommittal response]. It was satisfactory. Believe Japs will fold up before Russia comes in.
Stimson Diary, July 22, 1945.
Churchill read Grove’s report (on the successful testing of the atomic bomb in New Mexico) in full… He said, “Now I know what happened to Truman yesterday. I couldn’t understand it. When he got to the meeting after having read this report he was a changed man. He told the Russians just where they got on and off and generally bossed the whole meeting.”
Martin Gilbert, “Never Despair” Winston Churchill, 1945-1965 (London: William Heinemann, 1988), p. 90.
[Winston Churchill to British Foreign Minister Sir Anthony Eden after a conversation with Byrnes on July 23, 1945]
It is quite clear that the United States do not at the present time desire Russian participation in the war against Japan.
Stimson Diary, August 10, 1945.
[Advice to President Truman]
…the thing to do was to get this surrender through as quickly as we can before Russia should get down in reach of the Japanese homeland…. It was of great importance to get the homeland into our hands before the Russians could put in any substantial claim to occupy and help rule it.
Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, p. 306.
The goal was not merely to halt the fighting before an Allied landing, but instantly—before August 15, the earliest date the Red Army was expected to cross the border into North China and Manchuria.
Georgii K. Zhukov, The Memoirs of Marshall Zhukov (New York: Delacorte, 1971), pp. 674-675.
It was clear already then that the U.S. Government
intended to use the atomic weapon for the purpose of achieving its imperialist
goals from a position of strength in “the cold war.” This was amply corroborated on August 6 and
8. Without any military need whatsoever,
the Americans dropped two atomic bombs on the peaceful and densely populated
cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Gavan Daws, Prisoners of the Japanese (New York: William Morrow, 1994), pp. 75-76.
[Describing the Bataan Death March]
The Japanese did not have to answer to Western reason in their killing; they were Japanese in victory, and that was enough. They would see a man desperate for water, catch him throwing himself down at some filthy pond and chop his head off. They would kill a man even if they did not catch him drinking, bayonet him for having water stains on his trousers. They would bayonet a man squatting with dysentery, leave him bleeding to death, fouled, with his pants down around his ankles. They killed men for going too slow, exhausted men dropping back through the column… The Japanese might order prisoners to dig graves and dump corpses in, one on top of the other. Some were thrown in alive, and the Japanese made other prisoners bash them down with shovels, or be bashed themselves and buried, alive or dead.
Thomas Easton, “Torture, Death Awaited Downed Airmen”
The prisoners were eight American airmen, knocked out of the sky over southern Japan during the waning months of World War II, and then torn apart organ by organ while they were still alive.
What occurred here 50 years ago this month, at the
anatomy department of
American prisoners of war were subjected to horrific medical experiments. All of the prisoners died. Most of the physicians and assistants then did their best to hide the evidence of what they had done....
The gruesome experiments performed at the university were variations on research programs Japan conducted in territories it occupied during the war. In the most notorious of these efforts, the Japanese Imperial Army’s Unit 731 killed thousands of Chinese and Russians held prisoner in Japanese-occupied Manchuria, in experiments to develop chemical and biological weapons....
“There was no debate among the doctors about whether to do the operations--that is what made it so strange.” [Dr. Toshio] Tono says. Word of the experiments eventually leaked out
Thirty people were brought to trial by an Allied war crimes tribunal in Yokohama, Japan, on March 11, 1948. Charges included vivisection, wrongful removal of body parts and cannibalism--based upon reports that the experimenters had eaten the livers of the Americans.
Of the thirty defendants, 23 were found guilty of various charges (for lack of proof, the charges of cannibalism had been dismissed).
Ralph A. Bard, Undersecretary of the Navy, Memorandum to
Secretary of War Stimson, June 27, 1945, U.S.
National Archives, Record Group 77, Records of the Chief of Engineers,
Manhattan Engineer District.
Ever since I have been in
touch with this program I have had a feeling that before the bomb is actually
used against Japan that Japan should have some preliminary warning for say two
or three days in advance of use. The
position of the
During recent weeks I have
also had the feeling very definitely that the Japanese government may be
searching for some opportunity which they could use as a medium of surrender. Following the three-power conference
emissaries from this country could contact representatives from Japan somewhere
on the China Coast and make representations with regard to Russia's position
and at the same time give them some information regarding the proposed use of
atomic power, together with whatever assurances the President might care to
make with regard to the Emperor of Japan and the treatment of the Japanese
nation following unconditional surrender. It seems quite possible to me that this
presents the opportunity which the Japanese are looking for.
I don't see that we have
anything in particular to lose in following such a program. The stakes are so tremendous that it is my
opinion very real consideration should be given to some plan of this kind. I do not believe under present circumstances
existing that there is anyone in this country whose evaluation of the chances
of the success of such a program is worth a great deal. The only way to find
out is to try it out.
Richard G. Hewlett and Oscar E. Anderson, The New World, 1939-1946 (University Park: Pennsylvania State Univ. Press, 1962), p. 358.
[May 31, 1945 meeting of the Interim Committee]
The idea of a demonstration was explored for “perhaps ten minutes.” It was pointed out that the deaths from a city attack “would not be greater in order of magnitude than the number already killed in fire raids.” There was also the possibility that the Japanese might attack the bomber—or even bring American prisoners onto the sight. In any case, J. Robert Oppenheimer could think of no demonstration “sufficiently spectacular’ to produce surrender. Also, if the demonstration were to fail, the opportunity to cause maximum shock with a surprise assault would be lost.
John P. Sutherland, “The Story Gen. Marshall Told Me,”
[General George Marshall, Army Chief of Staff]
When we got the bombs we had to use them in the best possible way to save American lives…. I heard all kinds of discussions on how we should use the first one. Some wanted to drop it on the Sea of Japan. But we didn’t know how it would work in water. It might be a dud or get out of control. We just didn’t know.
Others wanted to drop it in a rice paddy to save the lives of the Japanese. But we only had two, and the situation demanded shock action. After using these two bombs against Japan, there would be nothing in reserve….
We had to assume that a force of 2.5 million Japanese would fight to the death, fight as they did on all those islands we attacked. We figured that in their homeland they would fight even harder. We felt this despite what generals with cigars in their mouths [probably referring to Curtis LeMay] had to say about bombing the Japanese into submission. We killed 100,000 Japanese in one raid in one night, but it didn’t mean a thing insofar as actually beating the Japanese.
Interim Committee report, June 1, 1945, from Harry S. Truman, Year of Decisions (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1955), p. 419.
Recommend unanimously:
1. The bomb should be used against Japan as soon as possible.
2. It should be used against a military target surrounded by other buildings.
3. It should be used without prior warning of the nature of the weapon.
James B. Conant [member of the Interim Committee and distinguished scientist] to McGeorge Bundy, November 30, 1946, p. 4, Stimson Papers, Yale University Library.
…even the success of the test at Alamogordo Proving Grounds did not give 100% assurance that the first bombs used in combat would actually be successful….
“President Truman Did Not Understand.”
[Scientist Leo Szilard]
I knew that Mr. Stimson was a thoughtful man who gave the bomb serious
consideration. He was one of the most thoughtful members of the Truman cabinet.
However, I certainly have to take
exception to the article Stimson wrote after
Now, this argument is
clearly invalid. It is quite true that at the time of
Petition of 70 Atomic Scientists to President Harry S. Truman. July 17, 1945. U.S. National Archives, Record Group 77, Records of the Chief of Engineers, Manhattan Engineer District.
We, the undersigned
scientists, have been working in the field of atomic power. Until recently, we have had to fear that the
The war has to be brought
speedily to a successful conclusion and attacks by atomic bombs may very well
be an effective method of warfare. We
feel, however, that such attacks on
If such public announcement
gave assurance to the Japanese that they could look forward
to a life devoted to peaceful pursuits in their homeland and if
Harry S. Truman interview with Richard
G. Hewlett, January 30, 1959, p. 2, Department of Energy Archives,
I, at once, asked him the main question—whether there had been any consideration of putting a specific warning of the weapon in the Potsdam Declaration. His reply was immediate and positive. He said that certainly the Potsdam Declaration did not contain such a warning but that the Japanese had been warned through secret diplomatic channels by way of both Switzerland and Sweden. He said that this warning told the Japanese that they would be attacked by a new and terrible weapon unless they would surrender.
Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy quoted in Alperovitz, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, pp. 64-64.
[June 18, 1945 meeting with the Joint Chiefs of Staff]
“The President asked if the invasion of Japan by white men would not have the effect of more closely uniting the Japanese.” Stimson replied that: “he thought there was every prospect of this….”
Frank, Downfall, p.184.
Tactically, the Imperial Army envisioned dispatching [kamikaze] waves of 300 to 400 planes about every hour, consistent with an objective of destroying troop transports before the landing. The Army desired that the Navy fly on an equal schedule. Under these projections, the Japanese would saturate the invasion fleet with as many kamikazes in three hours as they sent against Okinawa in three months.
Byrnes, All in One Lifetime, p. 308.
[Byrnes explaining the rationale for the Interim Committee’s June 1 recommendation to use the bomb]
…the imperial armies remained intact, and were estimated
by our General Staff to number over five million effective troops. At least that number of United States
soldiers, sailors, and airmen would be involved in the attack on the Japanese
homeland, and a fifth of these, it was thought, would be casualties.
Ronald Takaki,
Joint War Plans Committee, report of June 15, 1945 estimate of casualties for the invasion of Southern Kyushu and the Tokyo Plain: Killed=40,000, Wounded=150,000, Missing=3,500. Total=193,500.
Barton J. Bernstein. “A Postwar Myth: 500,000
The highest estimate discovered in various planning reports—assuming both the 1945 landing and the full-scale 1946 invasion to have taken place—was in the range of 40,000 to 46,000 deaths.
Frank, Downfall, p. 144.
“A plain reading of the minutes of this meeting [6-18-45, Truman with the Joint Chiefs of Staff] discloses that . . . Truman never got an unambiguous or unanimous answer to his fundamental question about casualties, even for Olympic.” 144
Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change 1953-1956 (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1963), pp. 312-313.
I voiced to him (Secretary of War Stimson) my grave misgivings first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary and secondly, because I thought our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer necessary as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of “face”… It wasn’t necessary to hit them with that awful thing.
New York Herald Tribune, September, 21 1945, p.4.
Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Curtis LeMay:
[The atomic bomb] had nothing to do with the end of the war. He said the war would have been over in two weeks without the use of the atomic bomb or the Russian entry into the war. [LeMay believed continued conventional bombing could have ended the war]
William D. Leahy, I Was There: The Personal Story of the Chief of Staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman (New York: Whittlesey House, 1950), p. 441.
[Admiral Leahy was the Naval Chief of Staff]]
The use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan.
“President Truman Did Not Understand.”
[Scientist Leo Szilard]
Let me say only this much to the moral issue involved: Suppose Germany had developed two bombs before we had any bombs. And suppose Germany had dropped one bomb, say on Rochester and the other on Buffalo, and then having run out of bombs she would have lost the war. Can anyone doubt that we would have then have defined the dropping of atomic bombs on cities as a war crime and that we would have sentenced the Germans who were guilty of this crime to death at Nuremberg and hanged them?
United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Japan’s Struggle to End the War (Washington D.C.: United States Strategic Bombing Survey, Chairman’s Office, July 1946).
Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey’s opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or contemplated. (p. 13)
The fact is, of course, that Japan did surrender without invasion, and with its principal armies intact. Testimony before the Survey shows that the expected "violation of the sacred homeland" raised few fears which expedited the decision to surrender beforehand. Government and Imperial household leaders felt some concern for the "destruction of the Japanese people", but the people were already being shattered by direct air attacks. Anticipated landings were even viewed by the military with hope that they would afford a means of inflicting casualties sufficiently high to improve their chances of a negotiated peace. (p. 45)
The Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs did not defeat Japan, nor by the testimony of the enemy leaders who ended the war did they persuade Japan to accept unconditional surrender. The Emperor, the lord privy seal, the prime minister, the foreign minister and the navy minister had decided as early as May of 1945 that the war should be ended even if it meant acceptance of defeat on allied terms. (p.47).
“Dissecting a Decision that Shook the World,”
…Robert James Maddox of Pennsylvania State University says the [1946 United States Strategic Bombing Survey] survey was “cooked” [distorted] by officials eager to preserve postwar appropriations for conventional weapons.
Stimson, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb,” p. 105.
Had the war continued until the projected invasion on November 1, additional fire raids of B-29’s would have been more destructive of life and property than the very limited number of atomic raids which we could have executed in the same period.
John Hersey,
[Description of those injured by the Hiroshima bombing]
When he had penetrated the bushes, he saw there were about twenty men, and they were all in exactly the same nightmarish state: their faces were wholly burned, their eyesockets were hollow, the fluid from their melted eyes had run down their cheeks. (They must have had their faces upturned when the bomb went off; perhaps they were anti-aircraft personnel.) Their mouths were mere swollen, pus-covered wounds…
Hersey,
[Description of those injured by the Hiroshima bombing]
The first stage had been all over before the doctors even knew they were dealing with a new sickness; it was the direct reaction to the bombardment of the body, at the moment when the bomb went off, by neutrons, beta particles, and gamma rays. The apparently uninjured people who had died so mysteriously in the first few hours or days had succumbed in this first stage. It killed ninety-five percent of the people within a half-mile of the center, and many thousands who were further away….
The second stage set in ten or fifteen days after the bombing. Its first symptom was falling hair. Diarrhea and fever, which in some cases went as high as 106, came next. Twenty-five to thirty days after the explosion, blood disorders appeared; gums bled, the white-blood-cell count dropped sharply, and petechiae appeared on the skin and mucous membranes….
The third stage was the reaction that came when the body struggled to compensate for its ills… In this stage, many patients died of complications, such as infections in the chest cavity. Most burns healed with deep layers of pink, rubbery scar tissue, known as keloid tumors.
“The Bomb: 50 Years Later
Immediately after the bombing [of Nagasaki], survivors dragged out some American prisoners of war—who had lived because they were kept in underground cells—and beat them to death.
Those who were in prisoner of war camps are particularly emphatic about the value of the bomb, because they were scheduled to be killed if the United States invaded.
“For all of us who suffered in the camps,” said Gilbert M. Hair, who was interned by Japanese troops as a child and lost his father and grandfather, the latter bayoneted to death, “we can tell you that none of us would be here if the bomb had not been used.”
John Ray Skates, The
Invasion of
[General George Marshall, Army Chief of Staff related that as many as nine atomic bombs were involved in the planning for the November invasion of Japan]
Three bombs were planned for each of the Corps landing areas in OLYMPIC. One or two would be dropped on each beach during the pre-invasion bombardment. The others would be reserved for defensive positions further inland or for counterattack forces attempting to move to the beachhead.
Skates, The Invasion of
Eight months after Japan’s surrender intelligence officers on the army general staff completed a “what if” study of the invasion of Japan. Their charge was to study the course of events in the war “on the assumption that the U.S. did not use, and had not the capability of using, atomic bombs in the war against Japan….
They were convinced that,, even without the atomic bombs, OLYMPIC would never have been launched…. They concluded that [the failure of Japan’s peace overtures to the USSR] and the sudden Soviet declaration of war … would have been sufficient, even without the atomic bombs, to end the war. However, in the unlikely event that the Japanese continued in the war even after the entry of the USSR, and OLYMPIC had been launched, “The island of Kyushu would have been occupied in not over two months at a cost of 75,000 to 100,000 [American] casualties” In that case, concluded the analysts, the war would have ended no later than 15 February 1946, and CORONET would not have been necessary….
Japanese casualties would have been incalculable, perhaps 250,000 in the OLYMPIC area alone. In addition, continued firebombing … would have incinerated thousands more in Japanese cities.
Victor Weisskopf, The Joy of Insight: Passions of a Physicist (New York: Basic Books, 1990), p. 156.
[A scientist who worked on the bomb]
On some occasion I ventured to say that the first bomb might have been justifiable, but the second was a crime.
[Editorial]
If it were not for the treachery of Pearl Harbor; the horrible cruelties of the Death March…; the stories told by the starved, filth-encrusted, dazed American prisoners coming out of Japanese prison camps, we might feel sorrow for the Japanese who felt the atomic bomb.
Jeffrey T. Stroebel, The