Kashif hussain
In August 1945 Atomic Bombs Were Dropped On Hiroshima And Nagasaki. Why Did The Americans Decide To Carry Out These Attacks?
On 7th December 1941 the Japanese made a pre-emptive strike on Pearl Harbour, where they caught the Americans off guard inflicting many casualties. This caused in America declaring war on Japan on 8th December 1941. The Japanese were being pushed back in 1943 and 1944 but Allied casualties were too high due to the attitude of the Japanese. This resulted in President Truman deciding to drop two atomic bombs, on Hiroshima on 6th August 1941, and on Nagasaki on 9th August 1941. In Hiroshima 130,000 and in Nagasaki 66,000 were found dead from the devastating affect of the atomic bomb leaving the city in ruins?
Truman wanted to drop the bomb simply to bring an end to the war as quickly as possible due to the vast amount of bloodshed done already to both sides. At the same time he wanted to end the war without mass casualties to either side. But of coarse his priority was the American army and navy due to the fanatic bravery the Japanese fought. Truman found that the only way to end the war was by an invasion of Japan itself, which would only result in mass bloodshed for both sides. So Truman dropped the bomb to scare the Japanese into surrendering, which would end the war quickly and prevent mass casualties.
The attitude of the Japanese was simply bizarre as they would not surrender in any circumstances including the civilians. This attitude resulted in mass casualties for the Americans as Japanese women and children were involved in the war. ‘On Tarawa Atoll, only 17 of the 4700 Japanese defenders were left alive at the end of the battle’ (From Global War by J.Brooman). This meant that the Americans had to kill every Japanese to win the battle. These were small islands outside of Japan, where as in mainland Japan it would be far worse with vast casualties. In Okinawa, 80,000 Japanese soldiers were able to hold down 500,000 US soldiers for a month, as they had to look through out the island. This meant that the invasion of Japan would result in a prolonged war. Small islands outside of Japan such as Iwo Jima, which is only 7 square miles, contained 21,000 defenders dug into a detailed underground fortress including 13,000 yards of tunnels, 5,000 pillboxes, and bunkers. The Japanese commander Kuribayashi had new tactics of fighting from hidden positions and he told his men they must kill 10 of the enemy before they die themselves. With this attitude 1,083 soldiers surrendered and 6,000 US soldiers died, and such fortresses in Japan itself would be difficult to fight or virtually impossible. ‘Any weapon which would bring an end to the war and save a million casualties among the American boys was justified…atomic bomb would be successful…Japanese to surrender on our terms’, said the US secretary of State in 1945, which may be bias as he would support the decision of dropping the atomic bomb. The kamikaze tactics used by the Japanese meant that planes packed with explosives would be driven into US navy ships causing great damage and casualties. At Saipan the Japanese defeat resulted in the men, women and children committing suicide by jumping off the cliffs. They would simply not surrender as after the two atomic bombs 500 military personnel committed suicide. Even Vice Admiral Onishi Takijro wanted to obtain better surrender terms by a dogged defence of Japan. The Prime Minister of Japan even announced that they would fight on after USA gave a Potsdam Declaration, as they weren’t accepting defeat. America yet dropped leaflets describing the horrific scenes they’ll suffer from the bomb with a warning but these were rejected by the public. It was known that many Japanese children were strapped with TNT and thrown under American tanks, as they died honourably. Admiral Leahy made predictions that one of the islands Kyushu has about 560,000 soldiers as of early August and 250,000 American soldiers would die. It was soon found out that it actually had over 900,000 men at Kyushu, twice as many thought. Leahy’s estimates that the Americans would have preponderance, when in fact the 767,000 soldiers who would compromise were already greatly outnumbered three months before Operation Olympic. The Japanese resistance meant that they had to conquer their country yard by yard, which would require the loss of millions of American lives. So the dropping of the bomb would help shorten the war as its devastating affect would rip the Japanese cities to pieces and they would surrender. That is because if they don’t surrender they’ll know more bombs like these would be dropped.
