Walter Lippmann's Views on Presidential Ability to Make U.S. Foreign Policy

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)

People who have made this argument suggest that the bombs were effective in both matters of timeliness and casualties (Major Problems in the History of World War II, p. 408). This theory has been backed by individuals such as Robert P. Newman. Robert P. Newman argues, “He ordered the the dropping of the first bombs “as available” as surely as he ordered cancellation of the third. And the White House was fixated on securing Japan’s surrender, on terms that would obviate recrudescence of militarism, as quickly and with as few casualties as possible” (Major Problems in the History of World War II, p. 414).

As president Harry S. Truman states in his speech, “With this bomb we have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing power of our armed forces… We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have above ground in any city” (Document D). This newly attained bomb would not only add to America’s destructive firepower, it would also have the power to end the war. It would ultimately destroy Japan and its ability to continue fighting the war against the Allied

The president had made the public statement that the bombs sole purpose was to “completely destroy Japan’s capacity to make war”. It was also said that dropping the bomb prevented thousands of less deaths that would have occurred from an allied invasion on Japan.

President Truman must have kept in mind the personal political implications of his decision to drop the bomb. With polls showing that Americans overwhelmingly supported the "unconditional surrender" of Japan and with his knowing the strong anti-Japanese sentiments of the American people, I must have felt that I had little political risk in dropping an atomic bomb on Japan."(Harry Truman) President Truman must have also considered his difficulty in explaining to American voters why the government spent two billion dollars to develop a superior weapon if he personally decided not to deploy it, especially if the war had dragged on with additional American casualties. Here is an entry from Truman's diary, "I have to decide Japanese strategy - shall we invade Japan proper or shall we bomb and blockade? That is my hardest decision to date. But I'll make it when I have all the facts."(Ferrell)

Many debates have been provoked based on President Truman's decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945. The debate is not solely based on the bomb being dropped, but more on the actual necessity and intention of the bomb being dropped.

bombing actions on Japanese countries, which were Hiroshima and Nagasaki, were shown as justified actions is the U.S. wanted to save innocent American lives during the war. This is because in document C it stated, “We have used it in order to shorten the agony of war, in order to save thousands and thousands of young Americans.” This quote explains that if the United States didn’t end the war any sooner, thousands and thousands of innocent American lives would have been lost. During the war, Japan was the cause of many American deaths. President Truman wanted to decrease the death rate of Americans lives. He thought that if there was a way to cause much causality on Japan and limit the number of the deaths of American soldiers. This idea that President Truman created became a reality because this idea was the use of the atomic bomb. When the U.S. used the atomic bomb on Japan, it ended the agony of war, saved many American soldiers’ lives, and destroyed Japan’s power to create a war. This quote shows that if the U.S. didn’t stop Japan from surrendering the war, it would’ve costed them a lot because it would cause many casualties of young American soldiers and innocent

The atomic bombs that Harry Truman dropped on the Japanese killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people. This action was unjustified because many innocent Japanese civilians lost their lives in the bombings. These bombs were so powerful that it caused imminent defeat and were not necessary. Also, the US officials were split. The actions Harry Truman had undertaken in the bombing of the Japanese were unjustified because many innocent people were killed, the bomb was not necessary, and the US officials were split.

Dropping the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was justified under the information they had at the time. When criticizing the actions of the Truman administration one needs to consider the effect of knowledge in hindsight. Truman was working under the knowledge that dropping the nuclear bombs would bring a short and fast victory to the Pacific front of the Second World War. As the war had already ended in Europe by this time, leaders were looking to end the campaign in the Pacific as quickly as possible. From a cost benefit perspective dropping the bombs on Japan meant that very few American lives were lost, and the cost of building the bombs compared to the cost of a minimum six month continuation of fighting.Additionally, there was no testing

President Truman’s Chief of Staff, Admiral Leahy, argued in Document 2 that Japan was ready to surrender before the “barbarous” atomic bomb was dropped. Admiral Leahy compared the act of dropping the bomb to the standards of the Dark Ages, and said wars “cannot be won by destroying women and children.” The author in Document 4 reaffirmed Admiral Leahy’s statement by saying that the use of this bomb threatened the notion of morality. He asserted that both “international law,” and the “concept of right and wrong” are meaningless if governments can so easily choose to “annihilate” such a large amount of people with “one stroke.” Document 6 gives an eyewitness account which describes the devastation and aftermath of the bombing.

“Truman stated that his decision to drop the bomb was purely military. Truman believed that the bombs saved Japanese lives as well. Prolonging the war was not an option for the President,” (ushistory.org 1). President Truman and the United States government made a fair decision by dropping the atomic bomb on the Japanese citizens in Hiroshima and Nagasaki during 1945. The bomb allowed the United States to appear more powerful and led to them influencing the rest of the world. The dropping of the atomic bomb was also a just response to the previous atrocities committed by Japan to other countries including the United States. In the long run, the bomb saved more lives that would have been lost in the war, since the bombs caused the

President Harry Truman’s use of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan during the Second World War is the most controversial decision in history. While it was an undoubtedly difficult decision, it was indeed necessary in order to end this six-year war that had ravaged the world. While many critics argue that the bomb was used primarily as an act of vengeance toward Japan, simplifying such a crucial moment in human history downplays the very real risk invading Japan posed to the United States. While avoiding strained relations with the other Allied countries, Truman had to assess the possible danger of the Soviet Union in a post-war world. Furthermore, the possibility of an arms race, the moral implications of using this

The decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the hardest decision for President Truman to make. He had the power right there in his hands to end the war but he would have to unleash the most powerful weapon known to man, at this time. Everyone was very tired of fighting but the Japanese would not give up so Truman decided to drop it. Even though we told Japan that if they did not surrender we would completely demolish some of their cities, they did not listen and they did not surrender. Maybe they did not think about what kind of weapons we would use because

When President Harry S. Truman ordered the nuclear attack on Hiroshima on the 6th of August, 1945, most people were supportive of it because it ended the war before an invasion became necessary. Seventy two years since the first and last nuclear attacks, many 'traditionalist' historians still believe that Truman made the best possible decision in the given circumstances. However, in the 1960's, Truman's critics, who reinterpreted history began to believe that the bomb played no significant role in ending the war and was thus unnecessarily used. These revisionist historians have gone so far as to characterize the use of nuclear weapons as “the single greatest acts of terrorism in human history” (Awan, 16). On the other hand, traditionalists argue that the bomb was an important

Truman couldn 't release the lives of these individuals futile. I trust that the passing of these fighters settled on his choice to drop the bomb moral. Also, with all that being said, the losses from the U.S. key traditional besieging effort significantly obscured the quantity of people who passed on from the nuclear bombings. The March 1945 firebombing of Tokyo alone murdered exactly 120,000 Japanese. A ground intrusion would have brought about almost endless more setbacks. As one researcher who examined the U.S. attack arrange, Operation Downfall, notes: "contingent upon how much Japanese regular people opposed the intrusion, gauges kept running into the millions for Allied setbacks and several millions for Japanese losses"(Keck, 2014, p. 1). That being stated, a solid case can be made that Operation Downfall, in any event as it was arranged, wouldn 't have been important regardless of the possibility that the U.S. hadn 't turned to atomic weapons. Specifically, the Soviet Union 's choice to enter the Pacific War against Japan would have absolutely rushed Japan 's surrender, and in this way spared lives.