The atomic bomb and it's use over the two Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is still a source of heated debate even over fifty years later. Many people on both sides -Japan and The United States- hold the belief that Truman's decision to drop the bomb was a mistake and that under no circumstances should such drastic measures be taken in war. What these people do not realize are the far more horrible alternatives than the destruction of just two cities: an invasion of mainland Japan where millions of more deaths would have occurred, Soviet aid resulting in the division of Japan into a communist nation and the destruction of their culture, the deaths of thousands of Allied prisoners of war held in Japan, and the threat of renewed hostilities from Japan not to mention the possibility of several more years of bloody conflict. Throughout the course of this paper all of these examples will be discussed, as well as why Truman's decision was the most humane and rational for all the nations involved, including Japan.
             Axis power in Europe was destroyed, Hitler and Mussolini were dead, their armies annihilated, their nation's in ruins, Japan however was not. Though weakened from a near four year long war with the Allies, the Japanese continued fighting, as was their code, to fight to the death, and never surrender. President Harry Truman in the interest of saving both American and Japanese lives from an invasion of mainland Japan, authorized the use atomic bombs against Japan.
             The first atomic bomb to be used on Japan was composed of uranium. It was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, on Aug. 6, 1945. The explosion, which had the force of more than 15,000 tons of TNT, instantly and completely devastated 10 square kilometers of the heart of this city of 343,000 inhabitants. Of this number, 66,000 were killed immediately and 69,000 were injured, more than 67 percent of the city's structures were destroyed or damaged. The next atomic bomb ...