Would you have dropped the atomic bomb on Japan?

Question

Would you have dropped the atomic bomb? Why or why not? Would you have dropped it somewhere else?

Answer 1

yes and plenty of other places too

Answer 2

Probably

Why - because the only other alternative at the time was an invasion of Japan. The chances of Japan winning the war was slim to none, yet they wouldn't surrender/negotiate.

The choices at the time were -

1. Invade Japan and lose 100K's of Allied soldiers (90% American) and untold number of Japanese lives.

2. Drop this new bomb that nobody knew exactly what would happen and try and force Japan to surrender and at least save the allied forces from high numbers of casualties.

Keep in mind that the US did a lot of above ground nuclear testing after the end of WWII, exposing their own soldiers to the radiation. I don't really think they knew what the consequences were going to be prior to unleashing the nuclear genie.

Also, using the bomb removed all doubt about which country was now the #1 superpower. It gave the US a stronger position in the post WWII world.

Answer 3

Under the same circumstances, yes. It was necessary to bring the war to a quick end. In the long run I think it saved many lives, US and Japanese. An invasion of Japan would have been horrendously brutal.

Many people point to the casualties from the atom bombs as the most horrific thing imaginable. But realisitcally, more people died in the fire bomb raids on Tokyo than at Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Also, they were not randomly selected targets, each contained an important target, and were scheduled for massive bombardments anyway.

Answer 4

Yes I would have dropped the bomb just to let Stalin know what I've got in my backyard. But I would have picked a spot of national identity where few if anyone lived. Here the nippers would have seen the power of the weapon and you can bet Stalin would know of it soon enough. If that did not work then there are many islands were the Japanese army were holed up. I would have bombed them. If that did not work then the Imperial palace would be the last drop. Because after that bombing the people would run to the white flags.
Furthermore what most people do not realize yet : is that the Japanese were very close to completing their own atomic bomb.
Very close. Their desperation would have dropped the bomb on the enemies soil. Then where would we be?

Answer 5

Consider this. Japan was not surrundering to your terms. Invasion estimates were outragously high, most were around one million. Your soldiers would be fighting women and children as well as soldiers. Compare that with the thousands that were killed in the blasts. Two cities were destroyed, but how many more would have been destroyed in an invasion?
Given looking at the facts that Truman had AT THE TIME (not 20/20 hindsight) I would have also ordered the dropping of the bombs, hoping that Japan would surrunder.

Answer 6

I hope not. I'd like to think that I could have waited long enough to see that Japan was falling apart anyway.

Dropping the bomb on Japan did NOT win us the war. All it did is rush it to an end.

Look at the problems that have grown from it. We are still the only nation to have ever used a nuclear weapon on another. I don't think history will treat us so kindly once the people who lived in that time period have passed on.

But that's just it, isn't it? I didn't live then. I wasn't in Truman's shoes. He made the best decision possible with the information he had at that time.

Answer 7

Yes, but that is the only place and time I would have dropped the atomic bomb-- in Japan in August of 1945. At the time it saved hundreds of thousands of American, not to mention Japanese lives.

Answer 8

I would like to hope that today, with the information we now have, no one would drop an atomic bomb anywhere. At the time it happened, however, I believe that the decision made (to drop the bomb) very much seemed to be the right one. They didn't know all the effects of radiation yet.

Answer 9

Probably. We had cracked the Japanese codes and knew that they were planning on executing over a half million allied prisoners (both military and civilian) if we invaded Japan. That alone would have been enough for me to "send them a message" (the bomb) that they needed to change their minds. Today we tend to forget that Hiroshima was a major military center. An entire Japanese army, over 150,000 men were based in and around the city.

Answer 10

Maybe if I had an airplane, but I wouldn't drop it on Japan but on Flynt, Michigan. Imagine the implications this would have had on the U.S. auto industry. I'd first make sure all citizens were evacuated from the city before I made the drop. So no loss of life, just trying to help the auto industry kick butt!

Answer 11

Assuming I were President; yes, I would have dropped them but on sparsely populated areas with the pretext that if Japan did not surrender, then we would drop the bomb on major cities.
Alternately, a conventional American military invasion and occupation of Japan to force it to surrender would have taken who knows how long and how many American troops' lives and Japanese civilian lives?