The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, brought the United States officially into World War II. According to David Holloway, it seems likely that the atomic bombing of Hiroshima the day before that impelled [Stalin] to speed up Soviet entry into the war and secure the gains promised at Yalta.[59]. The Caribbean and Central America, Greenland, Alaska, and the Aleutian Islands, Iraq, Syria, Burma, and the Arctic are a few of the little known places that were involved. An article that Bernstein published in 1995, The Atomic Bombings Reconsidered,Foreign Affairs74 (1995), 135-152, nicely summarizes his thinking on the key issues. With respect to the point about assembling the weapons, Groves and Stimson informed Truman that the first gun-type weapon should be ready about 1 August 1945 while an implosion weapon would also be available that month. As Yonai explained to Tagaki, he had also confronted naval vice Chief Takijiro Onishi to make sure that he obeyed any decision by the Emperor. Alperovitz, Bernstein, and Sherwin made new contributions as did other historians, social scientists, and journalists including Richard B. Frank, Herbert Bix, Sadao Asada, Kai Bird, Robert James Maddox, Sean Malloy, Robert P. Newman, Robert S. Norris, Tsuyoshi Hagesawa, and J. Samuel Walker.[4]. Bix appears to have moved toward a position close to Hasegawas; see Bix, Japan's Surrender Decision and the Monarchy: Staying the Course in an Unwinnable War,Japan Focus. Togo asked Sato to try to meet with Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov as soon as possible to sound out the Russian attitude on the declaration as well as Japans end-the-war initiative. According to Bix, Hirohito's language helped to transform him from a war to a peace leader, from a cold, aloof monarch to a human being who cared for his people but what chiefly motivated him was his desire to save a politically empowered throne with himself on it.[70], Hirohito said that he would make a recording of the surrender announcement so that the nation could hear it. For Hirohito' surrender speech--the actual broadcastand a translation--seeJapan Times,August2015. As McCloy observed the most contentious issue was whether the proclamation should include language about the preservation of the emperor: This may cause repercussions at home but without it those who seem to know the most about Japan feel there would be very little likelihood of acceptance.. 5g (copy from microfilm), As director of Los Alamos Laboratory, Oppenheimers priority was producing a deliverable bomb, but not so much the effects of the weapon on the people at the target. Thankfully, nuclear weapons have not been exploded in war since 1945, perhaps owing to the taboo against their use shaped by the dropping of the bombs on Japan. The ban on the public use of the phrase was officially lifted when the war ended on August 15, which prompted Hiroshimas local newspaper, the Chgoku Shimbun, to print a few photos of the destroyed city on August 23. Quotation and statistics from Thomas R. Searle, `It Made a Lot of Sense to Kill Skilled Workers: The Firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945,The Journal of Military History55 (2002):103. All Rights Reserved, FJHUMMING: Radio Libertys Russian Language Broadcasts from Taiwan, 75th Anniversary of the Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The second cable on 4 August shows that the schedule advanced to late in the evening of 5 August. This point is central to Alperovitzs thesis that top U.S. officials recognized a two-step logic: relaxing unconditional surrender and a Soviet declaration of war would have been enough to induce Japans surrender without the use of the bomb. Alperovitz, 147; Robert James Maddox,Weapons for Victory: The Hiroshima Decision Fifty Years Later(Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1995), 52; Gabiel Kolko,The Politics of War: The World and United States Foreign Policy, 1943-1945(New York: Pantheon Books, 1990), 421-422. [38], Record Group 457, Records of the National Security Agency/Central Security Service, Magic Diplomatic Summaries 1942-1945, box 18. Barton J. Bernstein, Introduction to Helen S. Hawkins et al. With the goal of having enough fissile material by the first half of 1945 to produce the bombs, Bush was worried that the Germans might get there first. Historians have used this item in the papers of Byrnes aide, Walter Brown, to make a variety of points. 76 (copy from microfilm), Physicists Leo Szilard and James Franck, a Nobel Prize winner, were on the staff of the Metallurgical Laboratory at the University of Chicago, a cover for the Manhattan Project program to produce fuel for the bomb. . [36]. [26], Record Group 107, Office of the Secretary of War, Formerly Top Secret Correspondence of Secretary of War Stimson (Safe File), July 1940-September 1945, box 8, Japan (After December 7/41), A former ambassador to Japan, Joseph Grews extensive knowledge of Japanese politics and culture informed his stance toward the concept of unconditional surrender. Bernstein, however, notes that Bard later denied that he had a meeting with Truman and that White House appointment logs support that claim. 4 (copy from microfilm), General Groves prepared for Stimson, then at Potsdam, a detailed account of the Trinity test. For on-line resources on the first atomic test. While Army Minister Anami tacitly threatened a coup (civil war), the emperor accepted the majority view that the reply to the Potsdam declaration should include only one condition not the four urged by Big Six. Nevertheless, the condition that Hirohito accepted was not the one that foreign minister Togo had brought to the conference. Peter Grose,Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1994), 170-174, 248-249. Barton J. Bernstein has suggested that Trumans comment about all those kids showed his belated recognition that the bomb caused mass casualties and that the target was not purely a military one.[64]. Record Group 107, Office of the Secretary of War, Formerly Top Secret Correspondence of Secretary of War Stimson (Safe File), July 1940-September 1945, box 12, S-1, Tacitly dissenting from the Targeting Committees recommendations, Army Chief of Staff George Marshall argued for initial nuclear use against a clear-cut military target such as a large naval installation. If that did not work, manufacturing areas could be targeted, but only after warning their inhabitants. If the Japanese decided to keep fighting, G-2 opined that Atomic bombs will not have a decisive effect in the next 30 days. Richard Frank has pointed out that this and other documents indicate that high level military figures remained unsure as to how close Japan really was to surrender. Dbq help!! Moreover, to shed light on the considerations that induced Japans surrender, this briefing book includes new translations of Japanese primary sources on crucial events, including accounts of the conferences on August 9 and 14, where Emperor Hirohito made decisions to accept Allied terms of surrender. [39], The last item discusses Japanese contacts with representatives of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Switzerland. [61], Documents 73A-B: Ramsey Letter from Tinian Island, Library of Congress, J. Robert Oppenheimer Papers, box 60, Ramsey, Norman. The author recommended issuing the declaration just before the bombardment program [against Japan] reaches its peak. Next to that suggestion, Stimson or someone in his immediate office, wrote S1, implying that the atomic bombing of Japanese cities was highly relevant to the timing issue. If there was a misfire the weapon would be difficult for the Japanese to recover, which would not be the case if Tokyo was targeted. Alperovitz, 281-282. In a long and impassioned message, the latter argued why Japan must accept defeat: it is meaningless to prove ones devotion [to the Emperor] by wrecking the State. Togo rejected Satos advice that Japan could accept unconditional surrender with one qualification: the preservation of the Imperial House. Probably unable or unwilling to take a soft position in an official cable, Togo declared that the whole country will pit itself against the enemy in accordance with the Imperial Will as long as the enemy demands unconditional surrender., Naval Historical Center, Operational Archives, James Forrestal Diaries, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal was a regular recipient of Magic intercept reports; this substantial entry reviews the dramatic Sato-Togo exchanges covered in the 22 July Magic summary (although Forrestal misdated Satos cable as first of July instead of the 21st). The events leading up to the dropping of the first atomic bomb can be traced back to 7 th December 1941, when the Japanese attacked the US Pacific fleet at Pearl Harbour. 5b, Despite the reports pouring in from Japan about radiation sickness among the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, General Groves and Dr. Charles Rea, a surgeon who was head of the base hospital at Oak Ridge (and had no specialized knowledge about the biological effects of radiation) dismissed the reports as propaganda. Yonai made sure that Takagi understood his reasons for bringing the war to an end and why he believed that the atomic bomb and the Soviet declaration of war had made it easier for Japan to surrender. In destructive power, the behemoths of the Cold War dwarfed the American atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima. Three-quarters of a century on, Hiroshima and Nagasaki remain emblematic of the dangers and human costs of warfare, specifically the use of nuclear weapons. This proposal had been the subject of positive discussion by the Interim Committee on the grounds that Soviet confidence was necessary to make possible post-war cooperation on atomic energy. Whether or not the atomic bombs should have been dropped is a topic that is still debated. In what Stimson called the letter of an honest man, Oswald C. Brewster sent President Truman a profound analysis of the danger and unfeasibility of a U.S. atomic monopoly. Yonai was upset that Chief of Staff Yoshijiro Umezu and naval chief Suemu Toyada had sent the emperor a memorandum arguing that acceptance of the Brynes note would desecrate the emperors dignity and turn Japan into virtually a slave nation. The emperor chided Umezu and Toyoda for drawing hasty conclusions; in this he had the support of Yonai, who also dressed them down. 5, 27-35 [Translated by Toshihiro Higuchi], The Byrnes Note did not break the stalemate at the cabinet level. According to Hasegawa, Hirohito had become convinced that the preservation of the monarchy was at stake. To what extent were senior officials interested in looking at alternatives to urban targets? 5d (copy from microfilm), On 27 April, military officers and nuclear scientists met to discuss bombing techniques, criteria for target selection, and overall mission requirements. Most of these individuals were bureaucrats, which also explains the lack of scientific terms and technical observations on the effects of radiation. The United States, along with other countries, criticized Japanese aggression but shied away from any economic or military punishments. I am lost! On August 9, 1945, another bomber was in route to Japan, only this time they were heading for Nagasaki with Fat Man, another atomic bomb. [30]. Ramsey, a physicist, served as deputy director of the bomb delivery group, Project Alberta. [48]. What these people were laboring to construct, directly or indirectly, were two types of weaponsa gun-type weapon using U-235 and an implosion weapon using plutonium (although the possibility of U-235 was also under consideration). Barton J. Bernsteins 1987 article, Ike and Hiroshima: Did He Oppose It?The Journal of Strategic Studies10 (1987): 377-389, makes a case against relying on Eisenhowers memoirs and points to relevant circumstantial evidence. For example, Bernstein cites the entries for 20 and 24 July to argue that American leaders did not view Soviet entry as a substitute for the bomb but that the latter would be so powerful, and the Soviet presence in Manchuria so militarily significant, that there was no need for actual Soviet intervention in the war. For Brown's diary entry of 3 August 9 1945 historians have developed conflicting interpretations (See discussion of document 57). Moreover, the role of an invasion of Japan in U.S. planning remains a matter of debate, with some arguing that the bombings spared many thousands of American lives that otherwise would have been lost in an invasion. The dropping of two atomic bombs, the tremendous destruction caused by U.S. bombing, and the Soviet declaration of war notwithstanding, important elements of the Japanese Army were unwilling to yield, as was evident from intercepted messages dated 12 and 13 August. Moreover, the collection includes for the first time translations from Japanese sources of high level meetings and discussions in Tokyo, including the conferences when Emperor Hirohito authorized the final decision to surrender. [6]. The documents introduced here were published in Russian for the first time in 1990, and the English version was included in an issue of the Soviet journal International Affairs (1990, no. A full translation of the surrender offer was circulated separately. Moscows opening to Japan in 2015 then engendered a shift in Japan-Russia relations, as confirmed by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrovs visit to Tokyo in April, Prime Minister Shinzo Abes bold visit to Moscow in May and Naryshkins visit to Tokyo in June 2016, right after President Obamas historical visit to Hiroshima at the end of May. Frank, 258; Bernstein (1995), 147; Walker (2005), 322. [50]. The numbered items are military and industrial installations with the percentages of total destruction. We gave them fair warning and asked them to quit. The proposal has been characterized as the most comprehensive attempt by any American policymaker to leverage diplomacy in order to shorten the Pacific War. The message that the bombings sent to the world was that whoever possessed those special weapons would prove to be politically superior, thus turning such weapons into the passport to survive and potentially win the Cold War. RG 77, Tinian Files, April-December 1945, box 20, Envelope G Tinian Files, Top Secret, The prime target for the second atomic attack was Kokura, which had a large army arsenal and ordnance works, but various problems ruled that city out; instead, the crew of the B-29 that carried Fat Man flew to an alternate target at Nagasaki. [29], According to accounts based on post-war recollections and interviews, during the meeting McCloy raised the possibility of winding up the war by guaranteeing the preservation of the emperor albeit as a constitutional monarch. [45]. The first paragraph mocks the Japanese press for exaggerating the aftereffects of the explosion, for giving in to popular rumor that takes press reports to absurdity. The Soviet report suggests that the exaggeration of the Japanese press stemmed from Japans attempt to save face in light of the defeat. For reviews of the controversy, see Barton J. Bernstein, The Struggle Over History: Defining the Hiroshima Narrative, ibid., 128-256, and Charles T. OReilly and William A. Rooney,The Enola Gay and The Smithsonian(Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, 2005). Victims who looked healthy weakened, for unknown reasons and many died. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-BT), The mushroom cloud billowing up 20,000 feet over Hiroshima on the morning of August 6, 1945 (Photo from U.S. National Archives, RG 77-AEC), The Enola Gay returns to Tinian Island after the strike on Hiroshima. Noteworthy publications since 2015 includeMichael D. Gordin and G. John Ikenberry, eds., The Age of Hiroshima (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019); Sheldon Garon, On the Transnational Destruction of Cities: What Japan and the United States Learned from the Bombing of Britain and Germany in the Second World War, Past and Present 247 (2020): 235-271; Katherine E. McKinney, Scott Sagan, and Allen S. Weiner, Why the Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima Would Be Illegal Today, The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 76 (2020); Gregg Mitchell, The Beginning or the End: How Hollywood and America Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (New York: The New Press, 2020); Steve Olson, The Apocalypse Factory: Plutonium and the Making of the Atomic Age (New York: W.W. Norton, 2020); Neil J. Sullivan, The Prometheus Bomb: The Manhattan Project and Government in the Dark (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press/Potomac Books, 2016); Alex Wellerstein; Restricted Data: The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United States,(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, forthcoming, 2020), a memoir by a Hiroshima survivor, Taniguchi Sumitero, The Atomic Bomb on My Back: A Life Story of Survival and Activism (Montpelier, VT: Rootstock Publishing, 2020), and a collection of interviews, Cynthia C. Kelly, ed., The Manhattan Project: The Birth of the Atomic Bomb in the Words of Its Creators, Eyewitnesses, and Historians (Black Dog & Leventhal, 2020). The third con was it created anger. Three days later another atomic device was exploded over Nagasaki. Barton J. Bernstein, Eclipsed by Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Early Thinking about Tactical Nuclear Weapons,International Security15 (Spring 1991): 149-173; Marc Gallicchio, After Nagasaki: General Marshalls Plans for Tactical Nuclear Weapons in Japan,Prologue23 (Winter 1991): 396-404. Letters from Robert Messer and Gar Alperovitz, with Bernsteins response, provide insight into some of the interpretative issues.