The Decision to use the Atomic Bomb
Sixty years ago today, on August 6, 1945, under instruction from President Harry Truman, a United States B-29 “Superfortress” bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. “The combined heat and blast pulverized everything in the explosion’s immediate vicinity, generated spontaneous fires that devastated almost 11.4 square km (4.4 square miles), and killed between 70,000 and 80,000 people, as well as injuring more than 70,000 others.”
In his statement to the American people Truman said:
“With this bomb we have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing power of our armed forces. In their present form these bombs are now in production, and even more powerful forms are in development.
“It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East.
(and intriguingly, also “Atomic energy may in the future supplement the power that now comes from coal, oil, and falling water, but at present it cannot be produced on a basis to compete with them commercially. Before that comes there must be a long period of intensive research.”)
Three days later, another bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. The second blast “killed 39,000 people outright and injured 25,000.”
Imagine, more than 100,000 killed, another 100,000 injured by just two bombs.
This week’s The Weekly Standard has an excellent article on “Why Truman Dropped the Bomb”. Britannica has additional coverage in “The Atomic Decision (from International Relations)”, “The Decision to use the Atomic Bomb” and elsewhere.
[via Britannica’s This Day in History and Arts & Letters Daily.]