Do you support Truman's decision to use the atomic bomb?

Question

What do you think we got out of it? I mean the conflict was caused BECAUSE he used it..what's the compromise?

Answer 1

NO it was wrong!

Answer 2

Yes sadly to say. It is a really hard thing to have made at the time and there was NO WAY TRUMAN could have know the true power and Cold War that would erupt from this.

His objective was to save American soldier lives. They estimated that it would cost over 1 million American lives taking the Island of Japan. So he reasoned that destroying two cities with only a few hundred thousand casualties was the lesser of two evils. If WE the US were to have 1 million expected casualties what about the Japanese Casualties as well? How many of them would there have been more as each fought to the bitter end and death and rarely surrendered. The whole populace would have fought us woman and children.

It would be like our nation being invaded, most of the populace is armed and they would take up arms against any invaders along side with the army.

I wonder if Truman had KNOWN what would happen in the future by the creation and use of the Atom bomb if he would have used it then. He had know way to know the way the future would unfold. His main concern was saving lives. Yes dropping two Atom bombs seems like a strange way of saving lives, but if WWII life was much different as was mentalities and thoughts of the Japanese.

I think so many more lives on both sides would have been lost had it not been used and only if he could have seen the future would he have been able to consider alternatives. Overall I think it was necessary but unfortunate at the same time and I do hope it is NEVER used again in any fashion, even testing!

Answer 3

It really depends on whether the alternative was the invasion of Japan's home islands. So almost certainly yes.

Some say that the Japanese were ready to surrender before the first bomb was dropped -- and between the first and second bombs. That bungled communications led to the Americans misreading the situation.

That would be tragic, truly.

Maybe there is some comfort in considering that the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki died saving the world from far worse atomic casualties. Without the horrible photos and eyewitness testimony to their suffering, a nation might be much more ready to experiment with the new weapon -- using loads far heavier than the 20 kiloton bombs dropped on those cities.

Paul Fussell, the deeply antiwar American English professor and writer -- an infantry lieutenant in WWII -- has written that no American in Japanese captivity has ever been sorry for Hiroshima... for not risking one more day of that captivity.

Answer 4

WHAT conflict was caused by his decision to use it?
Homework again, huh?
The use of the atom/hydrogen bombs at the end of World War II caused the END of that awful War. It saved 100's of thousands of Allied lives and MORE Japanese lives.
What WE got out of it was an opportunity to live - as did the Japanese. They also had their entire Country and economy rebuilt - at our expense.
My answer is a bit subjective - my Father, having served in Europe for almost four years, was on a troop ship in New York Harbor getting ready to ship out to the Pacific when Truman had the guts to order those bombs dropped.
I don't see a compromise here - maybe your textbook provides you with one.
Hopefully no similar decision will ever have to be made in the future - although I doubt it.
Now, do your homework.

Bonzo - please understand that just about every building left standing in Japan was involved in War production at the end of the War. This was NOT a deliberate attack on civilian populations. Any city we hit would have killed civilians - but also put a huge crimp in that which the Japs were still producing.
Further note that Kyoto was off limits due to its historical/religious significance. I didn't see the Japs taking care to not destroy structures of significance. Especially in China.
And if Hiroshima didn't convince them - how on earth can you think that dropping one in an unpopulated area would have made any impression whatsoever? THEY and THEY alone are responsible for Nagasaki (and Hiroshima.)

Answer 5

I cannot say that using the atomic bomb on Japan was a bad idea given what the alternative was likely to be, but I need a lot more convincing not to say that it was a bad idea to drop the first one over a large city. Dropping it over a remote area in Japan would, I should think, have gotten the message across with far less loss of life as to what would happen if Japan didn't surrender.

Answer 6

ice got this right ill just ad a small bit.The japanese were preparing a fanatical defence of there island down to the last man woman and child.this was no empty propaganda threat either this was going to be slaughter the likes of which this world has never seen.Yes the atomic bombs killed Many people but the death total was only a small fraction of the total that would have resulted from a invasion.
The US Army was going to send many divisions from newly conquered Germany.The Russians were going to help with the invasion(this caused cold war trouble by the way).The British were also going to help.We would have needed them all and then some.The atomic bomb's ended the need for a costly invasion that would have caused the afformentioned bloodshed but would have created another cold war Berlin type scenario to deal with, and one was more than enough.

Answer 7

After 67 years, i guess i can support an action that ended world hostilities. Did it save thousands or millions of GI and Japanese civilian lives? Who knows, but the best guess is that it did....based on Iwo and their preprations on the main Japanes isles.

Do i support the carpet bombing, incendiary attacks and indiscriminate bombing of civilians that killed more than the two atomic bombs? Again, since it was total war and both sides were guilty of attacking civilians, i'd say as a 67-year old Monday morning quarterback, we had to do what we had to do. Do I like it?....no. Was it necessary?....yes.

Is seems that those who try to moralize war, especially 67 years after the fact, are the ones who will most likely be defeated in a war. To me, that is the lesson of Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Answer 8

How can anybody NOT support the use of the atomic bomb? It certainly ended the war more quickly than it otherwise would have and save countless lives. We need another Give 'Em Hell Harry in office today!

Answer 9

Hello,

Yes.

1) It brought the Pacific War to a grinding halt.

2) It saved 500,000 to a million allied lives had Japan needed to be taken by door to door fighting. Okinawa was a good dress rehearsal for this.


Mike K

Answer 10

>>I mean the conflict was caused BECAUSE he used it..

What?

I support his use of the bomb. The alternatives were millions more deaths and the possible complete destruction of the Japanese culture.

The Japanese should be thanking us for using the bomb, quickly ending the war, and thus saving their nation and their culture.

Answer 11

Truman did the best he could with the facts that were known at the time.