Name: ________________________________________________________ Date: ___________________ Class: __________
Hiroshima
World War II Pacific Theatre – Historical Backdrop
“It is Japan's mission to be supreme in Asia, the South Seas and eventually the four corners of the world.”
General Sadao Araki
When Emperor Hirohito ascended to the throne in 1926,
Japan was enveloped in a struggle between liberals and
leftists on one side, and ultraconservatives on the other. In
1925, universal male suffrage was introduced, increasing
the electorate from 3.3 to 12.5 million. Yet as the left
pushed for further democratic reforms, right-wing
politicians pushed for legislation to ban organisations that
threatened the state by advocating wealth distribution or
political change. This resulted in 1925’s ‘Peace
Preservation Law’, which massively curtailed political
freedom.
As the left disintegrated, ultra-nationalism began to loom
large. Japanese nationalism was born at the end of the
nineteenth century. During the Meiji period,
industrialisation, centralisation, mass education and
military conscription produced a shift in popular
allegiances. Feudal loyalties were replaced by loyalty to
the state, personified by the Emperor.
Although early ultra-nationalists called for a tempering of
Japan’s ‘westernisation’, through limits on
industrialisation, their focus changed after the First World
War. Western politicians criticised Japan’s imperial
ambitions and limited Japanese military expansion (in
1922’s Five Power Naval Limitation Agreement). The
1924 Japanese Exclusion Act prohibited Japanese
immigration into the US. Ultra-nationalists saw these
actions as provocative; they moved towards xenophobic,
emperor-centred and Asia-centric positions, portraying the
‘ABCD Powers’ (America-British-Chinese-Dutch) as
threatening the Japanese Empire.
Between 1928 and 1932, Japan faced domestic crisis.
Economic collapse associated with the Great Depression
provoked spiralling prices, unemployment, falling exports
and social unrest. In November 1930, the Prime Minister
Hamaguchi Osachi was shot by an ultra-nationalist. In
summer 1931, as control slipped away from the civilian
government, the army acted independently to invade
Manchuria. Troops quickly conquered the entire border
region, establishing the puppet state of Manchukuo.
Though the League of Nations condemned the action, it
was powerless to intervene, and Japan promptly withdrew
its membership. International isolation fed ultranationalism. Mayors, teachers and Shinto priests were
recruited by ultra-nationalist movements to indoctrinate
citizens.
In May 1932, an attempt by army officers to assassinate
Hamaguchi’s successor stopped short of becoming a full-
blown coup, but ended rule by political parties. Between
1932 and 1936, admirals ruled Japan. Within government,
the idea of the ‘Greater East Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere’
emerged. This plan called for Asian unification against
western imperialism under Japanese leadership, leading to
Asian self-sufficiency and prosperity. In reality, it meant
an agenda of Japanese imperial domination in the Far East.
In July 1937, Japanese soldiers at the Marco Polo Bridge
on the Manchuria border used explosions heard on the
Chinese side as a pretext to invade China. The offensive
developed into a full scale war, blessed by Hirohito. Japan
enjoyed military superiority over China. The army
advanced quickly and occupied Peking. By December, the
Japanese had defeated Chinese forces at Shanghai and
seized Nanking. There Japanese troops committed the
greatest atrocity of an incredibly brutal war: the ‘Rape of
Nanking’, in which an estimated 300,000 civilians were
slaughtered.
By 1939, the war was in stalemate; Chinese Communist
and Nationalist forces continued to resist. Yet Japanese
imperial ambitions were undimmed. In 1940, Japan signed
the Tripartite Pact, creating the Rome-Tokyo-Berlin Axis,
building on the alliance created in 1936 by the AntiComintern Pact. Japan now looked hungrily towards the
oil-rich Dutch East Indies to fuel its Co-Prosperity Sphere.
In 1941, when Imperial General Headquarters rejected
Roosevelt’s ultimatum regarding the removal of troops
from China and French Indochina, the US President
announced an oil embargo on Japan. For Japan, the move
was the perfect pretext for war, unleashed in December
1941 with the Pearl Harbor attack.
In 1931, Japan, eager for the vast natural resources to be
found in China and seeing her obvious weakness, invaded
and occupied Manchuria. It was turned into a nominally
independent state called Manchukuo, but the Chinese
Emperor who ruled it was a puppet of the Japanese. When
China appealed to the League of Nations to intervene, the
League published the Lytton Report which condemned
Japanese aggression. The only real consequence of this
was that an outraged Japanese delegation stormed out of
the League of Nations, never to return.
In the 1930’s the Chinese suffered continued territorial
encroachment from the Japanese, using their Manchurian
base. The whole north of the country was gradually taken
over. The official strategy of the KMT was to secure
control of China by defeating her internal enemies first
(Communists and various warlords), and only then turning
attention to the defence of the frontier. This meant the
Name: ________________________________________________________ Date: ___________________ Class: __________
Japanese encountered virtually no resistance, apart from
pummelled American battleships, US aircraft carriers
some popular uprisings by Chinese peasants which were
escaped unscathed. This was critical because the Pacific
brutally suppressed.
Fleet would have been virtually incapable of operating
without them.
By 1940, the war descended into stalemate. The Japanese
seemed unable to force victory, nor the Chinese to evict
The following day, the US declared war against Japan,
the Japanese from the territory they had conquered. But
where a shared sense of outrage and hatred had united the
western intervention in the form of economic sanctions
country’s bitterly divided media and public behind
(most importantly oil) against Japan would transform the
Roosevelt. On 11 December 1941, Germany and Italy
nature of the war. It was in response to these sanctions that
declared war on the United States, thus bringing America
Japan decided to attack America at Pearl Harbor, and so
into World War II.
initiate World War II in the Far East.
Shortly before 8am on Sunday 7 December 1941, the first
of two waves of Japanese aircraft launched a devastating
attack on the US Pacific Fleet, moored at Pearl Harbor in
Hawaii. The raid, which came with no warning and no
declaration of war, destroyed four battleships and damaged
four more in just two hours. It also destroyed 188 US
aircraft. While 100 Japanese perished in the attack, more
than 2,400 Americans were killed, with another 1,200
injured.
Pearl Harbor appeared to be a huge success for Japan. It
was followed by rapid Japanese conquests in Hong Kong,
Singapore, Burma, the Philippines, Malaya and New
Guinea. Yet in the long term, the attack was strategically
catastrophic. The ‘sleeping giant’ had been awoken, and in
America, a sense of fury now accompanied the
mobilisation for war of the world’s most powerful
economy. The losses at Pearl Harbor would soon be more
than made good, and used to take a terrible vengeance on
Japan.
The causes of the attack on Pearl Harbor stemmed from
intensifying Japanese-American rivalry in the Pacific.
Japan’s imperial ambitions had been evident from as early
as 1931, when she invaded Manchuria. The conquered
region’s bountiful resources were then used to supply
Japan’s war machine. Leaving the League of Nations in
1933, Japan pursued an aggressive foreign policy aimed at
creating the ‘Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere’, a
euphemism for a Japanese empire modelled on European
ones of the 19th century.
December 1941 was a black month for the Allies.
Following the attack on Pearl Harbour on 7 December, the
seemingly unstoppable Japanese steamed their way
through the Pacific and South East Asia, attacking the
islands of Wake and Guam, the Philippines, Malaysia,
Thailand and Burma. For Britain, the most severe material,
strategic and psychological blow came with the loss of two
of the ‘jewels’ in its imperial crown: Hong Kong and
Singapore.
Japan became seen as a serious threat to the economic
interests and influence of the US and European powers in
Asia. By July 1937, with Japan engaged in all-out war with
China, relations plunged to new lows. US President
Roosevelt imposed economic sanctions, and Japan turned
to the Axis powers, signing the Tripartite Pact with
Germany and Italy in September 1940.
When Japan occupied French Indochina in July 1941,
Roosevelt continued to avoid direct confrontation. But
Japan’s imperial ambitions in the Pacific had placed her on
a collision course with the United States, which controlled
the Philippines and had extensive economic interests
throughout the region. When the US imposed an oil
embargo on Japan, threatening to suffocate her economy,
Japan’s response was to risk everything on a massive preemptive strike which would knock the US out of the
Pacific, clearing the way for a Japanese conquest of
resource-rich South East Asia.
The Japanese achieved complete surprise at Pearl Harbor,
something that can largely be attributed to failures in US
intelligence. Although the US had cracked Japanese radio
codes, in this case the raw data was not interpreted
correctly by army and navy. Although the attack
With the December 1941 Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor,
the Second Sino-Japanese War, which had been rumbling
on since 1937, was transformed into a major theatre of
World War II.
At approximately 8.15am on 6 August 1945 a US B-29
bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of
Hiroshima, instantly killing around 80,000 people. Three
days later, a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki,
causing the deaths of 40,000 more. The dropping of the
bombs, which occurred by executive order of US President
Harry Truman, remains the only nuclear attack in history.
In the months following the attack, roughly 100,000 more
people died slow, horrendous deaths as a result of radiation
poisoning.
Since 1942, more than 100,000 scientists of the Manhattan
Project had been working on the bomb’s development. At
the time, it was the largest collective scientific effort ever
undertaken. It involved 37 installations across the US, 13
university laboratories and a host of prestigious
participants such as the Nobel prizewinning physicists
Arthur Holly Compton and Harold Urey. Directed by the
Army's chief engineer, Brigadier General Leslie R.
Groves, the Manhattan Project was also the most secret
wartime project in history. At first, scientists worked in
Name: ________________________________________________________ Date: ___________________ Class: __________
isolation in different parts of the US, unaware of the
scientists, servicemen and journalists to arrive on the scene
magnitude of the project in which they were involved.
produced vivid and heartrending reports describing a
Later, the project was centralised and moved to an isolated
charred landscape populated by hideously burnt people,
laboratory headed by physicist J. Robert Oppenheimer in
coughing up and urinating blood and waiting to die.
Los Alamos, New Mexico. On 16 July 1945, scientists
carried out the first trial of the bomb in the New Mexico
As questions regarding the ethical implications of the
desert. President Truman received news of the successful
attacks grew, the US Air Force and Navy both published
test whilst negotiating the post-war settlement in Europe at
reports which claimed (respectively) that the conventional
the Potsdam Conference.
bombing and submarine war against Japan would have
soon forced her to surrender. Joseph Grew, America’s last
ambassador to Japan before the war started, also publicly
Although voices within the US Military expressed caution
alleged that the Truman administration knew about (and
regarding the use of the new weapon against Japan,
ignored) Japanese attempts to open surrender negotiations
Truman was convinced that the bomb was the correct and
with the US using the USSR as a mediator. At this time,
only option. Six months of intense strategic fire-bombing
another interpretation - most famously espoused in 1965
of 37 Japanese cities had done little to break the Hirohito
by political economist Gar Alperovitz in his book Atomic
regime’s resolve, and Japan continued to resolutely ignore
Diplomacy - emerged: the atomic bombing of Japan had
the demand for unconditional surrender made at Potsdam.
been motivated by a desire to demonstrate the US’s
In such circumstances, the use of the atom bomb was seen
military might to the Soviet Union, about whom the
as the best means of forcing Japan to surrender, and ending
Americans were increasingly nervous.
the war. The alternative, of an Allied invasion of the
Japanese home islands, was expected to cost hundreds of
The moral aspect of the attacks upon Hiroshima and
thousands of casualties.
Nagasaki continues to divide historians. While some argue
that the terrible long term human cost to the Japanese
The effects of the attack were devastating. The predicted
population can never justify the use of such weapons,
Japanese surrender, which came on 15 August - just six
others maintain that in the context of total war, it would
days after the detonation over Nagasaki - ended World
have been immoral if atomic weapons had not been used to
War II. Yet the shocking human effects soon led many to
end the war as quickly as possible.
cast doubts upon the use of this weapon. The first western
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
Hiroshima: Anticipation Guide
Consider the statements below. Decide if you agree or disagree; circle your opinion. For statement #4, please complete the
statement as you see fit. For ALL: Write four to five sentences thoroughly explaining why that is your opinion.
1. In a time of war, you must act in the interest of your nation’s troops before considering the lives of enemy
civilians.
Agree
Disagree
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
2. In the face of an unrelenting enemy and significant loss of life, it is appropriate to use any means necessary to
end a conflict.
Agree
Disagree
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
3. In a time of war, surrendering is a dishonor to those who have sacrificed so much for their nation.
Agree
Disagree
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
4. In a time of war, responsibility for a morally questionable military act ultimately falls on
___________________________________ .
(for example, soldier who carries out the act; military official who gives the directive; civilian official—like the President—who
oversees the directive; an expert on the matter—like a scientist who worked on a new weapon—who supported the decision;
etc.)
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
5. Any nation with substantial technological, economic, and political power has a duty to the global community to
lead by example.
Agree
Disagree
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
6. Revenge is an appropriate motive for a counterstrike in wartime.
Agree
Disagree
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
[Japanese Leaders]
PREMIER SUZUKI'S SPEECH BEFORE THE JAPANESE IMPERIAL DIET
June 9, 1945
New York Times
Having heard the gracious words of His Imperial Majesty,
the Emperor, following the opening of the Diet, I am filled
with trepidation and inspiration. It is my sincerest wish to
be able to serve as an administrator in complete response
to His Majesty's wishes.
I was filled with trepidation when the Imperial Palace and
the Omiya detached palace were set afire by enemy
bombings the other day. Fortunately, their imperial
majesties were not harmed and I am thankful that His
Majesty has been able to conduct all state affairs in his
office in the Imperial Palace.
peace and the welfare of mankind than His Imperial
Majesty, the Emperor.
The brutal and inhuman acts of both America and England
are aimed to make it impossible for us to follow our
national policy as proclaimed by the Emperor Meiji, who
said: "Our fundamental policy is based on justice and
righteousness in the past as well as at the present, and
that is true and infallible both at home and abroad."
This means that Japan is fighting a war to uphold the
principle of human justice and we must fight to the last.
Today our empire is facing the most critical situation in
the history of our nation. The war situation gradually is
becoming more acute, despite the efforts made by the
whole nation, and we have witnessed the advance of the
enemy on Okinawa.
In this present war, various participating nations have
cleverly declared their reasons for becoming involved in
the conflict, but in the final analysis the war was brought
about by jealousy, which is the lowest of human
emotions.
However, through the courageous and brilliant fighting of
our land and sea forces, together with the efforts of our
Government and people, we have inflicted enormous
losses on the enemy on Okinawa. The unswerving loyalty
and heroism and the undying exploits of our men will long
remain in the pages of history. I want to pay deep respect
to their noble deeds.
I hear that the enemy is boasting of his demand for
unconditional surrender of Japan. Unconditional
surrender means that our national structure and our
people will be destroyed. Against such boastful talk there
is only one measure we must take, to fight to the last.
There are factors in the situation on Okinawa today that
arouse anxiety and we have reached a stage where we
can expect the advance of the enemy, at some time, to
other areas of our mainland. The time has arrived when
all our 100,000,000 people must look at the situation
objectively and meet it with manifest determination.
From the very beginning the Greater East Asia war has
clearly been a holy war. This has clearly been stated in the
imperial rescript. The tyrannical attitude adopted by the
United States and Britain at that time, as well as their evil
designs, jeopardized the existence and safety of our
empire.
Our empire had no choice but to take her stand and fight
in order to assure her own existence and defense and to
maintain the fruits of her many years of effort to stabilize
conditions in East Asia.
I have served His Imperial Majesty over a period of many
years and I am deeply impressed with this honor. As bold
as it may seem, I firmly believe there is no one in the
entire world, who is more deeply concerned with world
I am thankful that Manchukuo, China and other nations of
Greater East Asia are standing firm by their treaties with
our empire and that they are contributing a great deal to
the holy war.
In the final analysis, the current war is a war for the
liberation of East Asia and should it miscarry the freedom
of the peoples of Greater East Asia will be lost forever.
Not only that, but world justice will be trampled
underfoot.
The fundamental policy of our empire for world order is
the establishment of laws guaranteeing security based on
the principle of non-aggression and non-menace in order
to insure the co-existence and co-prosperity of every
nation and every people under a general principle of
political equality, economic reciprocity and respect for the
traditional culture of each nation.
From this standpoint, our empire awaits the unification of
China, which will be the salvation of that nation, and
desires the furthering of friendly relations with neutral
countries.
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
Should our mainland become a battleground, we will have
believe that we will be able to overcome all difficulties
all the advantages of geography and the solidarity of our
and accomplish our war aims.
people. In other words, we can easily concentrate a large
number of forces as well as keep them supplied, which
Judging from the trends within enemy countries and
will be greatly different from the situation we faced at the
considering the developments in the international
outset of the war. We certainly will be able to repulse the
situation, I cannot help feel strongly that the only way for
enemy and crush his fighting spirit.
us is to fight to the last. With this conviction I undertook
the organization of the new Cabinet under the command
In this critical war situation, there will be a shortage of
of His Imperial Majesty.
food and difficulties in transportation. Furthermore,
difficulties in the manufacture of munitions will increase.
It is truly a critical time. I wish to be able to fulfill my
But if the whole people will march forward with deathdesire to serve His Majesty with the support of the whole
defying determination, devoting their entire efforts to
people. These are the reasons that this - extraordinary
their own duties and to refreshing their fighting spirit, I
session of the Diet was called, where new bills will be
submitted for deliberation.
[U.S. Military Personnel]
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
Tibbets focused excerpts from
“One hell of a big bang”
Tuesday August 6, 2002 The Guardian [http://www.guardian.co.uk] Today is Hiroshima Day, the anniversary of the first use
of a bomb so powerful that it would come to threaten the existence of the human race. Only two such devices have ever
been used, but now, a decade after the end of the cold war, the world faces new dangers of nuclear attack - from India,
Pakistan, Iraq, al-Qaida, and even the US. Launching a special investigation into nuclear weapons, Paul Tibbets, the man who
piloted the Enola Gay on its mission to Japan, tells Studs Terkel why he has no regrets - and why he wouldn't hesitate to use it
again
___________________________________
Paul Tibbets: One day [in September 1944] I'm running a
test on a B-29, I land, a man meets me. He says he just got
a call from General Uzal Ent [commander of the second air
force] at Colorado Springs, he wants me in his office the
next morning at nine o'clock... Norman said: "OK, we've
got what we call the Manhattan Project. What we're
doing is trying to develop an atomic bomb. We've gotten
to the point now where we can't go much further till we
have airplanes to work with."
[When I got to General Ent’s office ] he gave me an
explanation which probably lasted 45, 50 minutes, and
they left. General Ent looked at me and said, "The other
day, General Arnold [commander general of the army air
corps] offered me three names." Both of the others were
full colonels; I was lieutenant-colonel. He said that when
General Arnold asked which of them could do this atomic
weapons deal, he replied without hesitation, "Paul Tibbets
is the man to do it." I said, "Well, thank you, sir." Then he
laid out what was going on and it was up to me now to
put together an organisation and train them to drop
atomic weapons on both Europe and the Pacific - Tokyo.
Studs Terkel: Interesting that they would have dropped it
on Europe as well. We didn't know that.
Paul Tibbets: My edict was as clear as could be. Drop
simultaneously in Europe and the Pacific because of the
secrecy problem - you couldn't drop it in one part of the
world without dropping it in the other. And so he said, "I
don't know what to tell you, but I know you happen to
have B-29s to start with. I've got a squadron in training in
Nebraska… I want you to go visit them, look at them, talk
to them, do whatever you want. If they don't suit you,
we'll get you some more." He said: "There's nobody could
tell you what you have to do because nobody knows. If
we can do anything to help you, ask me." I said thank you
very much. He said, "Paul, be careful how you treat this
responsibility, because if you're successful you'll probably
be called a hero. And if you're unsuccessful, you might
wind up in prison."
…
Studs Terkel: Did Oppenheimer tell you about the
destructive nature of the bomb?
Paul Tibbets: No.
Studs Terkel: How did you know about that?
Paul Tibbets: From Dr Ramsey. He said the only thing we
can tell you about it is, it's going to explode with the force
of 20,000 tons of TNT. I'd never seen 1lb of TNT blow up.
I'd never heard of anybody who'd seen 100lbs of TNT
blow up. All I felt was that this was gonna be one hell of a
big bang.
Studs Terkel: Twenty thousand tons - that's equivalent to
how many planes full of bombs?
Paul Tibbets: Well, I think the two bombs that we used [at
Hiroshima and Nagasaki] had more power than all the
bombs the air force had used during the war on Europe.
Studs Terkel: So Ramsey told you about the possibilities.
Paul Tibbets: Even though it was still theory, whatever
those guys told me, that's what happened. So I was ready
to say I wanted to go to war, but I wanted to ask
Oppenheimer how to get away from the bomb after we
dropped it. I told him that when we had dropped bombs
in Europe and North Africa, we'd flown straight ahead
after dropping them - which is also the trajectory of the
bomb. But what should we do this time? He said, "You
can't fly straight ahead because you'd be right over the
top when it blows up and nobody would ever know you
were there." He said I had to turn tangent to the
expanding shockwave. I said, "Well, I've had some
trigonometry, some physics. What is tangency in this
case?" He said it was 159 degrees in either direction.
"Turn 159 degrees as fast as you can and you'll be able to
put yourself the greatest distance from where the bomb
exploded."
…
Paul Tibbets: [When I flew over Hiroshima to drop the
bomb, I got] to that point where I say "one second" and
by the time I'd got that second out of my mouth the
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
airplane had lurched, because 10,000lbs had come out of
word back and the crew loaded it on an airplane and we
the front. I'm in this turn now, tight as I can get it, that
headed back to bring it right on out to Trinian and when
helps me hold my altitude and helps me hold my airspeed
they got it to California debarkation point, the war was
and everything else all the way round. When I level out,
over.
the nose is a little bit high and as I look up there the whole
sky is lit up in the prettiest blues and pinks I've ever seen
…
in my life. It was just great.
Studs Terkel: One big question. Since September 11, what
…
are your thoughts? People talk about nukes, the hydrogen
bomb.
Studs Terkel: Do you ever have any second thoughts
about the bomb?
Paul Tibbets: Let's put it this way. I don't know any more
about these terrorists than you do, I know nothing. When
Paul Tibbets: Second thoughts? No. Studs, look. Number
they bombed the Trade Centre I couldn't believe what
one, I got into the air corps to defend the United States to
was going on. We've fought many enemies at different
the best of my ability. That's what I believe in and that's
times. But we knew who they were and where they were.
what I work for. Number two, I'd had so much experience
These people, we don't know who they are or where they
with airplanes... I'd had jobs where there was no
are. That's the point that bothers me. Because they're
particular direction about how you do it and then of
gonna strike again, I'll put money on it. And it's going to
course I put this thing together with my own thoughts on
be damned dramatic. But they're gonna do it in their own
how it should be because when I got the directive I was to
sweet time. We've got to get into a position where we can
be self-supporting at all times.
kill the bastards. None of this business of taking them to
On the way to the target I was thinking: I can't think of
court, the hell with that. I wouldn't waste five seconds on
any mistakes I've made. Maybe I did make a mistake:
them.
maybe I was too damned assured. At 29 years of age I was
so shot in the ass with confidence I didn't think there was
Studs Terkel: What about the bomb? Einstein said the
anything I couldn't do. Of course, that applied to airplanes
world has changed since the atom was split.
and people. So, no, I had no problem with it. I knew we
did the right thing because when I knew we'd be doing
Paul Tibbets: That's right. It has changed.
that I thought, yes, we're going to kill a lot of people, but
by God we're going to save a lot of lives. We won't have
Studs Terkel: And Oppenheimer knew that.
to invade [Japan].
Paul Tibbets: Oppenheimer is dead. He did something for
Studs Terkel: Why did they drop the second one, the
the world and people don't understand. And it is a free
world.
Bockscar [bomb] on Nagasaki?
Paul Tibbets: Unknown to anybody else - I knew it, but
nobody else knew - there was a third one. See, the first
bomb went off and they didn't hear anything out of the
Japanese for two or three days.
The second bomb was dropped and again they were silent
for another couple of days. Then I got a phone call from
General Curtis LeMay [chief of staff of the strategic air
forces in the Pacific]. He said, "You got another one of
those damn things?" I said, "Yessir." He said, "Where is
it?" I said, "Over in Utah." He said, "Get it out here. You
and your crew are going to fly it." I said, "Yessir." I sent
Studs Terkel: One last thing, when you hear people say,
"Let's nuke 'em," "Let's nuke these people," what do you
think?
Paul Tibbets: Oh, I wouldn't hesitate if I had the choice.
I'd wipe 'em out. You're gonna kill innocent people at the
same time, but we've never fought a damn war anywhere
in the world where they didn't kill innocent people. If the
newspapers would just cut out the shit: "You've killed so
many civilians." That's their tough luck for being there.
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
[Truman]
excerpts from
“WHY I DROPPED THE BOMB”
by Harry S. Truman
I was the President who made the decision to unleash
that terrible power, of course, and it was a difficult and
dreadful decision to have to make. Some people have the
mistaken impression that I made it on my own and in
haste and almost on impulse, but I did nothing like that at
all.
If I live to be 100 years old, I’ll never forget the day that I
was first told about the atomic bomb. It was about 7:30
p.m. on the evening of April 12, 1945, just hours after
Franklin Roosevelt [the President at that time] had died at
3:35 p.m., and no more than half an hour after I was
sworn in as President at 7:09 p.m. Henry L. Stimson, who
was Roosevelt’s Secretary of War and then mine, took me
aside and reminded me that Roosevelt had authorized the
development of a sort of super-bomb and that that bomb
was almost ready. I was still stunned by Roosevelt’s death
and by the fact that I was now President, and I didn’t think
much more about it at the time. But then, on April 25,
Stimson asked for a meeting in my office, at which he was
joined by Major General Leslie Groves, who was in charge
of the operation which was developing the bomb, the
Manhattan Project. At the meeting, Stimson handed me a
memorandum which said: “Within four months we shall in
all probability have completed the most terrible weapon
ever known in human history, one bomb which could
destroy a whole city.”
Stimson said gravely that he didn’t know whether we
could or should use the bomb because he was afraid that
it was so powerful that it could end up destroying the
whole world. I felt the same fear as he and Groves
continued to talk about it, and when I read Groves’ 24page report. The report said the first bomb would
probably be ready by July and have the strength of about
500 tons of TNT, and, even more frighteningly, that a
second bomb would probably be ready by August and
have the strength of as much as 1200 tons of TNT. We
weren’t aware then that that was just the tip of the
iceberg. That second bomb turned out to have the power
of 20,000 tons of TNT, and the hydrogen bomb which
eventually followed it had the explosive power of 20
million tons of TNT.
Stimson’s memo suggested the formation of a committee
to assist me in deciding whether to use the bomb on
Japan, and I agreed completely. The committee was called
the Interim Committee…
Then, on May 8, my 61st birthday, the Germans
surrendered, and I had to remind our country that the war
was only half over, that we still had to face the war with
Japan. The winning of that war, we all knew, might even
be more difficult to accomplish, because the Japanese
were self-proclaimed fanatic warriors who made it all too
clear that they preferred death to defeat in battle. Just a
month before, after our soldiers and Marines landed on
Okinawa, the Japanese lost 100,000 men out of the
120,000 in their garrison, and yet, though they were
defeated without any questions, thousands more fell on
their grenades and died rather than surrender.
Nevertheless, I pleaded with the Japanese in my speech
announcing Germany’s surrender, begging them to
surrender too, but I was not too surprised when they
refused. On June 18, I met with the Joint Chiefs of Staff to
discuss what I hoped would be our final push against the
Japanese. We still hadn’t decided whether to use the
atomic bomb, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff suggested that
we plan an attack on Kyushu, the Japanese island on their
extreme west, around the beginning of November, and
follow up with an attack on the more important island of
Honshu.
But the statistics that the generals gave me were as
frightening as the news of the big bomb. The Joint Chiefs
of Staff estimated that the Japanese still had 5000 attack
planes, 17 garrisons on the island of Kyushu alone, and a
total of more than 2 million men on all of the islands of
Japan. General Marshall estimated that, since the
Japanese would fight more fiercely than ever on their own
homeland, we would probably lose 250,000 men and
possibly as many as 500,000 in taking the two islands. I
could not bear this thought, and it led to the decision to
use the atomic bomb.
We talked first about blockading Japan and trying to blast
them into surrender with conventional weaponry; but
Marshall and others made it clear that this would never
work, pointing out that the Germans hadn’t surrendered
until we got troops into Germany itself. Another general
pointed out that Germany’s munitions industries were
more spread apart and harder to hit than Japan’s. When
we finally talked about the atomic bomb, on July 21, and
came to the awful conclusion that it would probably be
the only way the Japanese might be made to surrender
quickly, we talked first about hitting some isolated, lowpopulation area where there would not be too many
casualties but the Japanese could see the power of the
new weapon. Reluctantly, we decided against that as well,
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
feeling it wouldn’t be enough to convince the fanatical
In a speech I made at a major university in 1965, I said:
Japanese. We finally selected four possible target areas,
all heavy military-manufacturing areas: Hiroshima,
“It was a question of saving hundreds of thousands of
Kokura, Nagasaki, and Niigata.
American lives… You don’t feel normal when you have to
plan hundreds of thousands of…deaths of American boys
I know the world will never forget that the first bomb was
who are alive and joking and having fun while you’re
dropped on Hiroshima on Aug. 6 and the second on
doing your planning. You break your heart and your head
Nagasaki on Aug. 9. One more plea for surrender had
trying to figure out a way to save one life… The name
been made to the Japanese on July 29 and rejected
given to our invasion plan was Olympic, but I saw nothing
immediately. Then I gave the final order, saying I had no
godly about the killing of all the people that would be
qualms “if millions of lives could be saved.” I meant both
necessary to make that invasion. The casualty estimates
American and Japanese lives.
called for 750,000 American casualties—250,000 killed,
500,000 maimed for life… I couldn’t worry about what
The Japanese surrendered five days after the bomb was
history would say about my personal morality. I made the
dropped on Nagasaki, and a number of major Japanese
only decision I ever knew how to make. I did what I
military men and diplomats later confided publicly that
thought was right.”
there would have been no quick surrender without it. For
this reason, I made what I believed to be the only possible
I still think that.
decision.
Truman, Harry S. “Why I Dropped the Bomb.” Parade Magazine, December 4, 1988, pp. 15-17.
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
Writing a Dialectical Response
To encourage active reading, you will be required to complete Dialectic Response Journals for the summary reading selection
you will be assigned over the course of the year. Below are the general requirements as well as a list of prompts for you to
consider as you complete your dialectic response journal entries.
Requirements
1. Each journal response should be approximately 8-10 sentences.
2. Journal entry should begin with brief summary and explanation of context of the selected excerpt.
3. Responses should reflect your questions, statements, and connections related to the reading.
4. Thoughts must be supported with specific examples from the excerpt, and the quote source must be cited.
Directions
Divide your notebook page in half vertically, and format in accordance with the model below. The quote below is an example
not to be used for the sake of your own response – pick your own, and be original!
Summary and Observations (In quote form!)
At the meeting, Stimson handed me a memorandum
which said: “Within four months we shall in all
probability have completed the most terrible
weapon ever known in human history, one bomb
which could destroy a whole city.”
(Truman, Why I Dropped the Bomb, pg. 1)
Journal Prompts
The following are possible starter sentences for your
response to quoted passages in your journal:
1. I do not understand…
2. I noticed that…
3. I now understand…
4. This character reminds me of myself…
5. I think the setting is important because…
6. I think the relationship between _______ and
_______ is interesting because…
7. I really like this (idea, person, attitude, etc.)
because…
8. Something I noticed (appreciated, wondered, etc.)
is…
9. My favorite passage (or quote) is ____________
because…
10. I like (dislike) __________ because.
Responses and Reactions
This quote makes me wonder why we dropped the bomb on Japan,
even though we already apparently understood the power of it. Even
though the scientist had told the president about its potential, maybe
Truman didn’t quite realize what he was working with. Thinking
abstractly about a super weapon and actually seeing the devastation
it causes to innocents are very different things. Did he ever consider
this? What influenced him to make this decision? Was it that he
thought that dropping the bomb would ultimately save more lives
than an invasion of mainland Japan? Or was it the pressure of politics
and the citizens that wanted payback for Pearl Harbor?
Journal/Reading Tips
Make connections with your life or other texts, concepts,
events, etc.
Underline or highlight key words or phrases.
Underline or highlight any difficult vocabulary that you
come across.
Jot down any ideas, questions, images, etc. that strike you
as you are reading.
Try to determine what point the author was trying to make.
Periodically ask yourself if you understand what you just
read.
Name: ______________________________________________________ Date: ____________________ Class: ___________
Hiroshima
Dialectical Response for Primary Source Documents
Select one of the three provided primary source documents on which to write your dialectical responses.
From this piece, select three passages to respond to in the organizer below, following the model provided on the reverse of
this sheet. Remember – responses should be 8-10 sentences each!
Summary and Observations (In quote form!)
Responses and Reactions