Do you think it was it nessesary to drop the atomic bomb to end world war two? why or why not?

Answer 1

Both sides were not going to give up. More damage would have been inflicted to both nations. While studying Japanese culture its difficult to believe they surrendered even after the atomic bombs were dropped.

Answer 2

Any given military action is not a matter of nessesary or not. What needs to be nessesary is the end result. Is ending the war nessesary? Yes.

Was dropping the bomb cost effective? Not money wise but with the huge loss of life, the loss of non-combatant life, the historical and world opinion of the action. Was all this negative equal to or less than the bennefits attainied by reaching the desired goal.

someone desided it was. It would appear fewer people were killed by the bomb than the estimated extension of the war.

Answer 3

Whether or not it was "necessary" to drop the A-bomb is still an open matter of debate to this very day. But the fact remains: it DID bring about a faster end to the war than what it would have been if the United States had been forced to rely upon a ground invasion to accomplish an unconditional surrender from the Japanese government.

Answer 4

confident indexed decrease than are some key factors. a million) some estimates placed the type of yankee deaths for an invasion of Japan at a million million. to place that for the period of attitude to invade Japan replaced into going to value greater lives than the different conflict this us of a has fought from the Revolution to the present Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. 2) the militia ordered such a number of of crimson hearts that we've not any had to reserve to any extent further in over 60 years. The Generals have been specific that it replaced into going to be that bloody. lower back we've been waiting for greater casualties than we had in Korea, Vietnam, Panama, Grenada, the 1st Gulf conflict, Somelia, Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Iraq etc. 3) The Japanease weren't going to offer up. Even after the 1st bomb the Japanease militia replaced into making waiting their defenses for the suitable conflict. 4) If an invasion might have began the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki could have been firebombed besides. remember the bombing raid on Tokyo killed greater human beings than the two of the Atomic Bombs. 5) The Russians had invaded Japanease occupied territory. If we did no longer drop the bombs it is amazingly probable Japan could have been divided in to Northern Japan and Southern Japan. In the two different cases the place a rustic replaced into divided in Asia in the process the chilly conflict, a warm conflict broking provider out (Korea, and Vietnam). 6) Had the invasion began Japan replaced into going to murde all the POW's that they had which replaced into hundreds upon hundreds. 7) Japan replaced into going to combat to the final guy, woman, and infant. there have been posters in Japan saying 3 hundred million perish at the same time. 8) The Japanease had already proved they might combat to the bitter end on Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Casualties in the two those battles have been heavier than envisioned.

Answer 5

Its a difficult one to answer. The question hinges, for me, on whether Truman was sure that the Japanese were going to surrender.

If he knew they were going to surrender, then dropping the bomb was wrong.

If he knew they were going to fight on, then dropping the bomb was right.

The situation seems to have been somewhere in-between. Strangely it sems that even the Japanese had not decided whether to surrender or not. Of the six-man Japanese war cabinet, three favoured surrender, three favoured going down fighting, even after Hiroshima, when reports were so badly confused to the extent that some blamed an out-of-control cooking fire for burning the city down! After Nagasaki the situation became a bit clearer and the Emperor himself intervened to break the stalemate and surrender, but even then there was a brief unsuccessful attempted coup by some of the army officers in favour of resisting to the last.

If the war had continued for even a few weeks longer the Japanese civilian casualties would likely have been worse due to the fire-bombing campaign, after all more people were killed in one raid on Tokyo than at Hiroshima. Having to invade Japan would have been dreadful, Allied casualties are estimated anywhere between 100,000 to 1 million men, and if the Japanese resisted to the end (as had happened at Okinawa) tens of millions of Japanese civilians would have been killed. Somewhat strangely on the date of the proposed invasion in November 1945 very strong typhoon occurred, which could have wrecked the Allied plans and sunk much of the invasion fleet, had it not all been over by then.

On balance I think its right that the bomb was dropped but it should have been dropped on a PURELY military traget such as an army camp or airfield. Truman can be criticised for not making sufficient effort to get the Japanese to surrender before the bomb was dropped but I think the political situation in Tokyo would likely have precluded such a fast conclusion of the war.

Of course its easy to be wise after the event!

Answer 6

i guess you can look at it this way, was the war before the bomb coming to an end.........no. We dropped 2 bombs didn't we, cause someone wasn't paying attention. What happened after the second bomb was dropped. Someone took notice and gave up didn't they.

War in and of itself may or may not always be necessary with or without a bomb being dropped. I think it all depends on who you ask.

Answer 7

Well, I think it was a major contributor to the quick end to the Pacific Theater. Had the United States not conducted the attacks, more lives would have been lost as the Japanese were very well trained to fight on the ground, not to mention they had a program to train every man, woman, and child as a soldier. The Pacific Theater conflicts probably would have stretched for a good long while had the US not done what it did.

Personally, I believe it was a horrific way to kill people, but that's the military. They strive to kill lots of people in the quickest amount of time.

Answer 8

Yes, the Japanese were not getting the message. That's probably the only way we could have won that war. It's too bad that so many civilians and children got hurt too, though. But it also made the Soviet Union sit up and take notice so that we didn't have to use it during the Cold War. Just the threat of it was enough to scare them, which was a good thing.

Answer 9

I believe something drastic had to be done to end the war. The traditional Japanese culture placed a heavy emphasis on honor, as seen by the Kamikaze pilots who gave their lives for the glory of the empire. I believe they would have fought us tooth and nail, man woman and child if we invaded the homeland, and we actually might have killed more people civilian and military, Japanese and American, and destroyed more cities by using conventional warfare than we would have by targeting two specific cities. However, the atom bomb left a terrible legacy of sickness and destruction that I don't believe should ever be tapped into again. So, the atom bomb may have actually saved lives by frightening Japan into surrendering, but by using nuclear weapons, we opened up a pandora's box of super-destructive warfare.

Answer 10

Yes it was right. You can not compare the 1941/45 fanatical Japanese reign of murder and terror with the present peace loving Japanese people.
During that war many American and British servicemen lost their lives to free Asia of that horrible war time enemy regime.
Many lost their lives as a result of bobby traps placed on already dead soldiers, and as a result of suicide bombers. It is estimated that the cost of invading Japan in 1945 would have been 1 million British and American lives.
Which would you prefer, 100000 enemy dead from the bombs or 1 million of our soldiers killed due to the war lasting for up to an extra year.

Answer 11

Perhaps not in retrospect with all we know today. The decision was made based upon the information available at the time and not with the benefit of 20-20 hindsight and second guessing. With that in mind, I believe that the decision by Harry Truman to drop the bomb and end the war as quickly as possible was the best one he could have made. Others will disagree, but none of us were in his shoes, so it would be really hard to make a judgment.

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