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Connor Pratt
Mrs. Hermes
AP US History 2-1
5 December 2013
Atomic Bomb Research Paper
The atomic bomb was dropped by Allied forces, specifically President Truman and the
United States, first on August 6, 1945 on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in an
attempt to end World War II. The decision was backed by the American people initially, but
some controversy arose in later years. President Truman was forced to make the decision of
killing innocent Japanese citizens or letting our American troops continue fighting overseas. The
decision President Truman was faced with carried extreme magnitude because he had the power
to end the war against Japan, but he would also be unleashing the most destructive weapon the
world had ever seen. Although the decision to drop the bomb on Japan killed over 100,000
Japanese citizens, it was President Truman’s responsibility to protect American soldiers at all
costs.
When the United States entered World War II in 1941, the United States government put
together a team of scientists with the goal of developing the world’s first Atomic Bomb. In
October of 1939, President Roosevelt received a letter from Albert Einstein alerting him of the
possibility that uranium could undergo fission and release massive energy. President Roosevelt
acted immediately, putting together a team of scientists, including Albert Einstein and Robert
Oppenheimer, under the US Army Corps of Engineers. There were approximately thirty research
sites, but the most work was done in Los Alamos, New Mexico, where the first Atomic Bomb
was developed (The Manhattan Project).
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The Manhattan Project, the codename for the Atomic Bomb project, was a well-kept
secret. Throughout World War II, the United States had virtually no clue how far along the
Germans were in the development of their bomb. As a part of D-Day in June of 1944, Major
Boris Pash ran the Alsos mission, to discover how far along in the process the Germans were. In
December of the same year Samuel Goudsmit, a Dutch physicist who was on the mission with
Pash, relayed to the US government that the Germans were about two years behind the United
States in development (Roleff). Just before the series of surrenders by the Axis powers in April
1945, President Franklin D. Roosevelt passed away, leaving the full power of the Atomic Bomb
in the hands of his Vice President, Harry Truman.
When the Atomic bomb was completed, President Truman decided to uphold his
responsibility to the American people and attempt to end World War II with this weapon of mass
destruction. “On July 16, 1945, at 5:30 A.M. at the Trinity Test Site on the Alamogordo Air
Base, New Mexico, the world’s first atom bomb was exploded” (Roleff 76). Now that the
Atomic Bomb was officially ready for use, the moral aspect was left to President Truman. The
Allied forces occupied Iwo Jima and Okinawa, but the Japanese army contained two million
soldiers on the large islands and were prepared to defend against a large scale invasion. President
Truman was forced to decide between killing hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians, or
with sending American soldiers into an extremely hostile environment where there would be
many more casualties.
President Truman and the Allied leaders sent a request of unconditional surrender to the
Japanese government with a threat of complete destruction. The Japanese declined, and the plan
to deploy the Atom Bomb was set in motion. On August 6, 1945, the Enola Gay flew over the
Japanese city of Hiroshima, and the first Atomic Bomb was released (Lace). Thousands of
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people were killed instantly, and the Allied Forces sent another unconditional surrender to the
Japanese. Once again, it was declined, and for a second time in four days, the Enola Gay flew
over Nagasaki, and again dropped the Atom Bomb. Finally, on August 14, 1945, the Japanese
surrendered, resulting in the end of World War II. Over 200,000 Japanese were killed by the two
bombs, including about 100,000 killed by radiation sickness (The Decision to Drop the Bomb).
President Truman’s responsibility was to protect American lives, and when he ordered
the Atomic Bomb to be dropped, it showed he was determined to uphold his responsibilities as
President. Many over the years have argued that the decision made by President Truman and his
advisors was racist and an abuse of his powers, arguing that the United States would have never
done something of this magnitude to a white nation. Critics of Truman also claim that the United
States should have demonstrated the force of the Atomic Bomb for the Japanese in a test area. In
reality, if the United States had not used the Atomic Bomb, many American soldiers would have
been killed, and it would have resulted in severe criticism of President Truman. The decision
made by President Truman was the correct one, and it reflected his responsibility to protect
American lives at all cost.
When President Truman was faced with decision whether or not to drop the Atomic
Bomb, he also had to decide on whether or not to follow his morality, or his responsibility to
America. This weapon of mass destruction also showed a possibility of being merely a threat, too
dangerous to unleash on the world. As soon as it was ready, President Truman made his decision.
The United States dropped two Atomic Bombs before the surrender of Japan and the end of
World War II. The Atomic Bomb was the most destructive weapon the world had ever seen, and
brought a decision based on responsibility to President Truman.
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Works Cited
Lace, William L. The Atom Bomb. San Diego: Lucent Books, Inc., 2002. Book.
Roleff, Tamara L. The Atom Bomb. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, Inc., 2000. Book.
The Decision to Drop the Bomb. n.d. Web. 13 November 2013.
The Manhattan Project. n.d. Web. 13 November 2013.