Atomic Bomb
The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki marked the end to the world's largest armed conflict. Many debates have surfaced over the ethics of such an attack. The bomb itself caused massive amounts of casualties while the unknown effects of radiation caused many more deaths amongst the survivors of the blast. Despite the ghastly effects of such a weapon, it offered the best choice for a quick and easy defeat of Japan. President Truman, who authorized the use of the atomic bomb, made a wise decision under the circumstances of the war. The Japanese refusal to surrender, the massive amount of allied casualties involved in invading the Japanese mainland and the ineffectuality of a military blockade in forcing Japan to surrender made the bomb a necessary last resort. There were several conventional methods that were suggested to bring Japan to its knees. These included a naval blockade, an extensive aerial bombardment or an invasion of the island of Japan. Japan posed little or no offensive threat to American forces. Despite this fact the Japanese were the most tenacious and driven of Americas foes throughout the war. The battles for Okinawa, Wake and Guam all were ample testament to the Japane
Therefore President Truman was also unaware of these effects when he made the decision to drop the bombs. The roughly equal civilian and military parties were locked in a struggle over surrender. First and most obvious was that one of the three bombs that were left which were difficult to produce and very expensive to procure had just been used to annihilate an area of no military value at all. It was a forceful enough message to prod the normally withdrawn emperor into action for peace. Besides looking very foolish, America would have caused even greater diehard sentiments among the Japanese. Only when the atomic bombs were dropped the deadlock was broken and peace achieved. American bombing raids over Japan were inflicting massive amounts of casualties and causing tremendous damage to Japanese cities. 99) Only one plane needed to be fuelled, crewed and maintained. By the war's conclusion the Japanese kamikaze attacks had sunk 3 aircraft carriers damaged 285 craft and sunk a total of 34. This is very important because the atomic bomb was seen just as a really, really big conventional bomb. This meant that if the blockade were to be successful the Japanese would have to be starved into surrendering. With the information that Truman had been given, dropping an atomic bomb was much like a conventional bombing raid. The amount of deaths caused by an invasion would have easily dwarfed those of the atomic bombings. Japanese pilots would strap themselves into planes laden with explosives and fly them into American ships.
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Acceptance Essays
