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Alperovitz treated this entry as evidence in support of the atomic diplomacy argument, but other historians, ranging from Robert Maddox to Gabriel Kolko, have denied that the timing of the Potsdam conference had anything to do with the goal of using the bomb to intimidate the Soviets. 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. Was the bombing of Nagasaki unnecessary? In a progress report, Bush told President Roosevelt that the bomb project was on a pilot plant basis, but not yet at the production stage. The World Wide Web includes significant documentary resources on these events. The U.S. reply, drafted during the course of the day, did not explicitly reject the note but suggested that any notion about the prerogatives of the Emperor would be superceded by the concept that all Japanese would be Subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers. The language was ambiguous enough to enable Japanese readers, upon Hirohitos urging, to believe that they could decide for themselves the Emperors future role. 5. [32], Record Group 353, Records of Interdepartmental and Intradepartmental Committees, Secretarys Staff Meetings Minutes, 1944-1947 (copy from microfilm). If you were President Truman in 1945, would you have dropped the bomb? The museum has justfinished a massive renovation of the museum and its exhibitions, the first major renovation in more than 20 years and the largest since the museum opened its doors in 1957. Concerned that President Roosevelt had an overly cavalier belief about the possibility of maintaining a post-war Anglo-American atomic monopoly, Bush and Conant recognized the limits of secrecy and wanted to disabuse senior officials of the notion that an atomic monopoly was possible. These cables are the earliest reports of the mission; the bombing of Nagasaki killed immediately at least 39,000 people, with more dying later. [77]. The U.S. documents cited here will be familiar to many knowledgeable readers on the Hiroshima-Nagasaki controversy and the history of the Manhattan Project. Two days later an atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, killing an estimated . However, it is striking that none of the people sent to ground zero in the immediate aftermath of the bombings were scientists or technicians. Russia is very much in the minds of the people who give any thought to world affairs, and distrust and suspicion of her are very widespread. Confronting the Problem of Radiation Poisoning, XII. We gave them fair warning and asked them to quit. The last remark aggravated Navy Minister Yonai who saw it as irresponsible. [54]. Were the Japanese ready to surrender before the bombs were dropped? Norris also noted that Trumans decision amounted to a decision not to override previous plans to use the bomb.[12], Henry Stimson Diary, Sterling Library, Yale University (microfilm at Library of Congress), Record Group 200, Papers of General Leslie R. Groves, Correspondence 1941-1970, box 3, F, RG 77, MED Records, Top Secret Documents, File no. This memorandum from General Groves to General Marshall captured how far the Manhattan Project had come in less than two years since Bushs December 1942 report to President Roosevelt. Schaffer,Wings of Judgment, 143-146. [70]. The traditional story of Japan's surrender has a simple timeline. With the material that follows, the National Security Archive publishes the most comprehensive on-line collection to date of declassified U.S. government documents on the atomic bomb and the end of the war in the Pacific. On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb was dropped on the people of Hiroshima. Whether this meant that Truman was getting ready for a confrontation with Stalin over Eastern Europe and other matters has also been the subject of debate. That goal, he feared, raised terrifying prospects with implications for the inevitable destruction of our present day civilization. Once the U.S. had used the bomb in combat other great powers would not tolerate a monopoly by any nation and the sole possessor would be be the most hated and feared nation on earth. Even the U.S.s closest allies would want the bomb because how could they know where our friendship might be five, ten, or twenty years hence. Nuclear proliferation and arms races would be certain unless the U.S. worked toward international supervision and inspection of nuclear plants. Frank, 273-274; Bernstein, The Alarming Japanese Buildup on Southern Kyushu, Growing U.S. Within days after the bombing of Hiroshima, U.S. military intelligence intercepted Japanese reports on the destruction of the city. [Photograph: The atomic cloud rising over Nagasaki, Japan, August 9, 1945. The United States, then, dropped the bombs to end the war that Japan had unleashed in Asia in 1931 and extended to the United States at Pearl Harborand thereby probably avoided an invasion that. The embassy teams included GRU members Mikhail Ivanov and German Sergeev in August, and TASS correspondent Anatoliy Varshavskiy, former acting military attach Mikhail Romanov, and Naval apparatus employee Sergey Kikenin in September. Nor does it include any of the interviews, documents prepared after the events, and post-World War II correspondence, etc. How is the current debate about immigration in the United States rooted in our nations past? Hasegawa cited it and other documents to make a larger point about the inability of the Japanese government to agree on concrete proposals to negotiate an end to the war. [3]. Not altogether certain that surrender was imminent, Army intelligence did not rule out the possibility that Tokyo would try to drag out the negotiations or reject the Byrnes proposal and continue fighting. Thousands more would die of radiation exposure. The Soviets had notified Japan's Ambassador to Moscow on the night of the eighth that the Soviet Union would be at war with Japan as of August 9th (Butow, pg. Brown Papers, box 68, folder 13, Transcript/Draft B, Returning from the Potsdam Conference, sailing on the U.S.S. ], Documents 1A-C: Report of the Uranium Committee, National Archives, Records of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Record Group 227 (hereinafter RG 227), Bush-Conant papers microfilm collection, Roll 1, Target 2, Folder 1, "S-1 Historical File, Section A (1940-1941).". 100 (copy from microfilm). zhuri james net worth 2021 . [67], National Archives, RG 165, Army Operations OPD, Executive Files 1940-1945, box 12, Exec #2. Most of these individuals were bureaucrats, which also explains the lack of scientific terms and technical observations on the effects of radiation. Thousands died later from radiation sickness. The First Nuclear Strikes and their Impact, XI. According to the official US version of history, an A-bomb was dropped on Hiroshima on 6 August 1945, and another on Nagasaki three days later, to force Japan to surrender. The Soviet Union declared war on Japan on August 8, and the following day the United States dropped the second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, killing an additional 100,000 people. The third con was it created anger. A U.S. War Department photograph of Hiroshima after the atomic bombing, undated. Some years after Trumans death, a hand-written diary that he kept during the Potsdam conference surfaced in his personal papers. The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, brought the United States officially into World War II. [40], L.D. 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. At Potsdam, Stimson raised his objections to targeting Japans cultural capital, Kyoto, and Truman supported the secretarys efforts to drop that city from the target list [See Documents 47 and 48]. On 25 July Marshall informed Handy that Secretary of War Stimson had approved the text; that same day, Handy signed off on a directive which ordered the use of atomic weapons on Japan, with the first weapon assigned to one of four possible targetsHiroshima, Kokura, Niigata, or Nagasaki. Updated National Security Archive Posting Marks 75thAnniversary of the Atomic Bombings of Japan and the End of World War II, Extensive Compilation of Primary Source Documents Explores Manhattan Project, Eisenhowers Early Misgivings about First Nuclear Use, Curtis LeMay and the Firebombing of Tokyo, Debates over Japanese Surrender Terms, Atomic Targeting Decisions, and Lagging Awareness of Radiation Effects, First update - April 27, 2007 After considerable pressure from Harriman, the Soviets signed off on the reply but not before tensions surfaced over the control of Japan--whether Moscow would have a Supreme Commander there as well. 4 (copy from microfilm), General Groves prepared for Stimson, then at Potsdam, a detailed account of the Trinity test. 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. Early the next day, General Anami committed suicide. Until 1949, when the USSR succeeded in testing its own bomb, the Soviet Unions knowledge of the effects of radiation was indeed very poor. The war had shown that the Japanese were fighting for the Emperor who convinced them that it was better to die than surrender. In Japan and elsewhere around the world, each anniversary is observed with great solemnity. They also discussed postwar legislation on the atom and the pending Henry D. Smyth report on the scientific work underlying the Manhattan project and postwar domestic controls of the atom. Harriman Papers, Library of Congress, box 211, Robert Pickens Meiklejohn World War II Diary At London and Moscow March 10, 1941-February 14, 1946, Volume II (Privately printed, 1980 [Printed from hand-written originals]) (Reproduced with permission), Robert P. Meiklejohn, who worked as Ambassador W. A. Harrimans administrative assistant at the U.S. Embassies in Moscow and London during and after World War II, kept a detailed diary of his experiences and observations. The United States, along with other countries, criticized Japanese aggression but shied away from any economic or military punishments. The total destruction of that city, and the instant incineration of 40,000 mostly civilian people, occurred just three days after the destruction of Hiroshima by a 15-kiloton uranium bomb, which instantly killed 70,000. [36]. [28], In a report to Stimson, Oppenheimer and colleagues on the scientific advisory panel--Arthur Compton, Ernest O. Lawrence, and Enrico Fermitacitly disagreed with the report of the Met Lab scientists. Marshall believed that the latter required Soviet entry and an invasion of Kyushu, even suggesting that Soviet entry might be the decisive action levering them into capitulation. Truman and the Chiefs reviewed plans to land troops on Kyushu on 1 November, which Marshall believed was essential because air power was not decisive. For on-line resources on the first atomic test. At this time, several treaties were in place to limit the size of navies in the Pacific Ocean. Initialed by President Roosevelt (VB OK FDR), this may have been the closest that he came to a formal approval of the Manhattan Project. Frank, 258; Bernstein (1995), 147; Walker (2005), 322. Bernsteins detailed commentary on Trumans diary has not been reproduced here except for the opening pages where he provides context and background. By 1937 Japan controlled large sections of China and accusations of war crimes against the Chinese people became commonplace. [39], The last item discusses Japanese contacts with representatives of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Switzerland. Probably the work of General George A. Lincoln at Army Operations, this document was prepared a few weeks before the Potsdam conference when senior officials were starting to finalize the text of the declaration that Truman, Churchill, and Chiang would issue there. The Soviets already knew about the U.S. atomic project from espionage sources in the United States and Britain so Molotovs comment to Ambassador Harriman about the secrecy surrounding the U.S. atomic project can be taken with a grain of salt, although the Soviets were probably unaware of specific plans for nuclear use. Stalin considered various dates to schedule an attack. President Truman, who ordered the bomb, defended it as a way to bring about surrender and save U.S. military lives that would have been lost in a ground invasion of Japan. On the other hand much of the confirmed evidence Alperovitz presented was baffling. The material reproduced here gives a sense of the state of play of Foreign Minister Togos attempt to secure Soviet mediation. [62]. [55] On 22 July Marshall asked Deputy Chief of Staff Thomas Handy to prepare a draft; General Groves wrote one which went to Potsdam for Marshalls approval. Was there another way to end the war? How much Power does a President actually have? Malloy, A Very Pleasant Way to Die, 531-534. His estimate of 250,000 U.S. soldiers spared far exceeded that made by General Marshall in June 1945, which was in the range of 31,000 (comparable to the Battle of Luzon) [See Document 26]. On 30 October 1961, the Soviet Union detonated the Tsar Bomba nuclear bomb over the Novaya Zemlya archipelago in northern Russia. Some of the key elements of Stimsons argument were his assumption that Japan is susceptible to reason and that Japanese might be even more inclined to surrender if we do not exclude a constitutional monarchy under her present dynasty. The possibility of a Soviet attack would be part of the threat. As part of the threat message, Stimson alluded to the inevitability and completeness of the destruction which Japan could suffer, but he did not make it clear whether unconditional surrender terms should be clarified before using the atomic bomb. The explosion over Hiroshima wiped out 95 percent of the city and killed 80,000 people. For example, the governing clique that supported the peace moves was not trying to stave off defeat but was seeking Soviet help to end the war. 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. On August 6, 1945, a B-29 "superbomber" dropped a uranium bomb over Hiroshima in an attempt to force Japan's unconditional surrender. For a review of the debate on casualty estimates, see Walker (2005), 315, 317-318, 321, 323, and 324-325. [53], RG 457, Summaries of Intercepted Japanese Messages (Magic Far East Summary, March 20, 1942 October 2, 1945), box 7, SRS 491-547, This Far East Summary included reports on the Japanese Armys plans to disperse fuel stocks to reduce vulnerability to bombing attacks, the text of a directive by the commander of naval forces on Operation Homeland, the preparations and planning to repel a U.S. invasion of Honshu, and the specific identification of army divisions located in, or moving into, Kyushu. Information from the late John Taylor, National Archives. If it was, he believed that the bomb would be the master card in U.S. diplomacy. The possibility of modifying the concept of unconditional surrender so that it guaranteed the continuation of the emperor remained hotly contested within the U.S. government. To a great extent the documents selected for this compilation have been declassified for years, even decades; the most recent declassifications were in the 1990s. Alperovitz, 226; Bernstein, Understanding the Atomic Bomb and the Japanese Surrender,Diplomatic History19 (1995), 237, note 22. [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. 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). An illustration of a nuclear bomb exploding in a city. they used the atomic bomb to intimidate russia and not to force a war with japan. The 27-tonne Soviet Tsar Bomba was the most powerful weapon ever constructed. They caused terrible human losses and destruction at the time and more deaths and sickness in the years ahead from the radiation effects. Tagaki was soon at the center of a cabal of Japanese defense officials, civil servants, and academics, which concluded that, in the end, the emperor would have to impose his decision on the military and the government. Takagi kept a detailed account of his activities, part of which was in diary form, the other part of which he kept on index cards. [7], Documents 2A-B: Going Ahead with the Bomb, RG 227, Bush-Conant papers microfilm collection, Roll 1, Target 2, Folder 1, "S-1 Historical File, Section II (1941-1942), The Manhattan Project never had an official charter establishing it and defining its mission, but these two documents are the functional equivalent of a charter, in terms of presidential approvals for the mission, not to mention for a huge budget. While U.S. leaders hailed the bombings at the time and for many years afterwards for bringing the Pacific war to an end and saving untold thousands of American lives, that interpretation has since been seriously challenged. Nor is it an attempt to substitute for the extraordinary rich literature on the atomic bombings and the end of World War II. Japan, sensing conflict was inevitable, began planning for an attack on Pearl Harbor by April, 1941. And on Aug. 6, a bomb would fall on Hiroshima, ultimately killing an. As for targeting, however, he had a more significant role. [78]. did not mean that the war would continue. At the Wilson Center, it is part of the Wilson Center's History and Public Policy Program. Besides Truman, guests included New York Governor Thomas Dewey (Republican presidential candidate in 1944 and 1948), foreign ambassadors, members of the cabinet and the Supreme Court, the military high command, and various senators and representatives. Thus, Groves and others would try to suppress findings about radioactive effects, although that was a losing proposition.[76]. With direct access to the documents, readers may develop their own answers to the questions raised above. Atomic Bomb Pros 1. RG 77, Tinian Files, April-December 1945, box 21 (copies courtesy of Barton Bernstein). The Magic intercepts from mid-July have figured in Gar Alperovitzs argument that Truman and his advisers recognized that the Emperor was ready to capitulate if the Allies showed more flexibility on the demand for unconditional surrender. [75]. General George C. Marshall is the only high-level official whose contemporaneous (pre-Hiroshima) doubts about using the weapons against cities are on record. The discussion of area bombing may have reminded him that Japanese civilians remained at risk from U.S. bombing operations. 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]. [2]. Additional bombs will be delivery on the [targets] as soon as made ready by the project staff., RG 77, MED Records, Top Secret Documents, File no. By the summer, once production plants would be at work, he proposed that the War Department take over the project. This account, prepared by Director of Information Shimomura, conveys the drama of the occasion (as well as his interest in shifting the blame for the debacle to the Army). 35+ YEARS OF FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACTION, FOIA Advisory Committee Oversight Reports, a helpful collection of archival documents, on-line resources on the first atomic test. Various personnel and guards are standing around the loading area. 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. The bomb was dropped to impress the Soviets, and persuade them to relax their grip on eastern Europe. For detailed background on the Army Air Forces incendiary bombing planning, see Schaffer (1985) 107-127. Also included, to give a wider perspective, were translations of Japanese documents not widely available before. The bomb ended the war. On this date 74 years ago, the US dropped the first of two atomic bombs on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, killing more than 70,000 people instantly. Cited in Barton J. Bernstein, Truman and the A-Bomb: Targeting Noncombatants, Using the Bomb, and His Defending the "Decision,The Journal of Military History62 (1998), at page 559. Truman Plays Part of Himself in Skit at Gridiron Dinner, and List of Members and Guests at the Gridiron Show,The Washington Post, 16 December 1945. objectives. 24 Jun . Hasegawa, 105; Alperovitz, 67-72; Forrest Pogue,George C. Marshall: Statesman, 1945-1959(New York: Viking, 1987), 18. Eisenhowers son John cast doubts about the memoir statements, although he attested that when the general first learned about the bomb he was downcast. Soviet forces in the east had attacked in the neighbourhood of Gradekovo, where the railroad from Vladivostok crosses the frontier. Two scientists at Oak Ridges Health Division, Henshaw and Coveyou, saw a United Press report in the Knoxville News Sentinel about radiation sickness caused by the bombings. President Franklin Roosevelt called the attack a day which will live in infamy, and the American people were shocked and angered. Early in the morning of August 9th Manchuria was invaded by the Soviet Union. Drawing on contemporary documents and journals, Masuji Ibuses novelBlack Rain(Tokyo, Kodansha, 1982) provides an unforgettable account of the bombing of Hiroshima and its aftermath. Women and children had been taught how to kill with basic weapons. The proposed script for the Smithsonian exhibition can be seen at Philipe Nobile. An intercepted message from Togo to Sato showed that Tokyo remained interested in securing Moscows good office but that it is difficult to decide on concrete peace conditions here at home all at once. [W]e are exerting ourselves to collect the views of all quarters on the matter of concrete terms. Barton Bernstein, Richard Frank, and Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, among others, have argued that the Magic intercepts from the end of July and early August show that the Japanese were far from ready to surrender. [46] During the meeting on August 24, discussed above, Stimson gave his reasons for taking Kyoto off the atomic target list: destroying that city would have caused such bitterness that it could have become impossible to reconcile the Japanese to us in that area rather than to the Russians. Stimson vainly tried to preserve language in the Potsdam Declaration designed to assure the Japanese about the continuance of their dynasty but received Trumans assurance that such a consideration could be conveyed later through diplomatic channels (see entry for July 24). Frank Costigliola,France and the United States: The Cold Alliance Since World War II(New York, Twayne, 1992), 38-39. The Supreme War Council comprised the prime minister, foreign minister, army and navy ministers, and army and navy chiefs of staff; see Hasegawa, 72. With the devastating battle for Okinawa winding up, Truman and the Joint Chiefs stepped back and considered what it would take to secure Japans surrender. 5, This review of Japanese capabilities and intentions portrays an economy and society under tremendous strain; nevertheless, the ground component of the Japanese armed forces remains Japans greatest military asset. Alperovitz sees statements in this estimate about the impact of Soviet entry into the war and the possibility of a conditional surrender involving survival of the emperor as an institution as more evidence that the policymakers saw alternatives to nuclear weapons use. With more information on the Alamogordo test available, Groves provided Marshall with detail on the destructive power of atomic weapons. Dropped the Atom Bomb One reason as to why the United States dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima was because it would have saved American lives and ended the war with Japan very quickly. The killing of workers in the urban-industrial sector was one of the explicit goals of the air campaign against Japanese cities. Every August, newspapers are dotted with stories of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, accompanied by a well-picked-over but never resolved . Since 2005, the collection has been updated. This issue of the diplomatic summary also includes Togos account of his notification of the Soviet declaration of war, reports of Soviet military operations in the Far East, and intercepts of French diplomatic traffic. Collectively the decoded messages were known as Magic. How this came about is explained in an internal history of pre-war and World War II Army and Navy code-breaking activities prepared by William F. Friedman, a central figure in the development of U.S. government cryptology during the 20th century. Targeting Germany was rejected because the Germans were considered more likely to secure knowledge from a defective weapon than the Japanese. National Archives Identifier 535795] But it was the opposite, Truman caused the Cold War the moment he dropped the atomic bomb. Besides discussing programmatic matters (e.g., status of gaseous diffusion plants, heavy water production for reactors, and staffing at Las Alamos), the participants agreed that the first use could be Japanese naval forces concentrated at Truk Harbor, an atoll in the Caroline Islands. How decisive was the atomic bombings to the Japanese decision to surrender? In this entry written several months later, Meiklejohn shed light on what much later became an element of the controversy over the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombings: whether any high level civilian or military officials objected to nuclear use. Stimson accepted the language believing that a speedy reply to the Japanese would allow the United States to get the homeland into our hands before the Russians could put in any substantial claim to occupy and help rule it. If the note had included specific provision for a constitutional monarchy, Hasegawa argues, it would have taken the wind out of the sails of the military faction and Japan might have surrendered several days earlier, on August 11 or 12 instead of August 14. The Soviet source reported that the weight of the device was 3 tons (which was in the ball park) and forecast an explosive yield of 5 kilotons. For Groves and the problem of radiation sickness, see Norris, 339-441, Bernstein, Reconsidering the Atomic General: Leslie R. Groves,Journal of Military History67 (2003), 907-908, and Malloy, A Very Pleasant Way to Die, 513-518 and 539-542. Did Truman authorize the use of atomic bombs for diplomatic-political reasons-- to intimidate the Soviets--or was his major goal to force Japan to surrender and bring the war to an early end? At the beginning of the discussion, Eisenhower made a significant statement: he mentioned how he had hoped that the war might have ended without our having to use the atomic bomb. The general implication was that prior to Hiroshima-Nagasaki, he had wanted to avoid using the bomb. Drawing on sources at the National Archives and the Library of Congress as well as Japanese materials, this electronic briefing book includes key documents that historians of the events have relied upon to present their findings and advance their interpretations. The bombings have always been presented to young Americans in . If that failed to persuade Tokyo, he proposed that the United States disclose the secret of the atomic bomb to secure Japans unconditional surrender. However, as soon as the Allied occupation of Japan came into force on September 19, the strict press code imposed by the General Headquarters of the Supreme Commander for the Allied Powers, as well as the above-mentioned self-censorship imposed by the Japanese press, caused a delay in the way the atomic bombings were reported upon in Japan. [72]. Private collections were also important, such as the Henry L. Stimson Papers held at Yale University (although available on microfilm, for example, at the Library of Congress) and the papers of W. Averell Harriman at the Library of Congress. Merkulov reported that the United States had scheduled the test of a nuclear device for that same day, although the actual test took place 6 days later.