The US Went Too Far Essay, Research Paper

In order to end WW2 President Truman believed it was necessary to destroy an entire residential Japanese city with what was the most horrific weapon of its time, the atomic bomb. Near the end of WW2 almost all countries had stopped fighting and the allies were in victory, but the war between Japan and the U.S. was yet to be finished. By this time Japan and the U.S. were very tired of fighting and both countries were looking for away to end the war. The U.S. had the upper hand on the war, however, for we were attacking and the Japanese were only desperately defending and Japan was rapidly loosing. The U.S. had successfully bombed over 60 cities with conventional bombs and had a very successful sea blockade working against the Japanese. At this time the Japanese knew they were hopelessly loosing the war. They did, however, defend their country the best they could, predicting U.S. invasions and stationing large amounts of troops in these spots. Even though the U.S. saw the Japanese weakness, something drove the country to want more, an immediate end and an absolute victory.

Instead of waiting out the war, which historians say was days from being over any way, the U.S. went ahead and dropped a bomb known as Little Boy on the residential city of Hiroshima. Little Boy was the world’s first atomic bomb to be used in a battle and it had devastating effects. The bomb killed more than 200,000 people and it leveled the city of Hiroshima in seconds. As if using a weapon of such power and destruction once was not enough to make Japan surrender, the U.S. again dropped an atomic bomb on a residential area in Japan known as Nagasaki. This bomb killed less people due to a less dense area, but never the less it killed 79,000 Japanese. The Japanese Government saw the terrible devastation and with in five days they surrendered to the U.S. America proved victorious, but at what cost? Was atomic bombing really necessary to achieve these results? I, along with many others say no, the U.S. absolutely did not need to drop even one atomic bomb on Japan in order for them to surrender.

In addition to the atomic bomb many other, more reasonable, options were created in order to make Japan surrender. To better explain, it was suggested that officials from the Japanese government be invited to the U.S. to witness a testing of the atomic bomb in an area with no residency. This way the Japanese would witness the power we had and surrender knowing that they could never defend against such a horrific weapon. Another alternative was to carry out with the plan created to end the war before the U.S. obtained atomic weapons. This plan was called operation downfall and consisted of one massive blow to the Japanese army, causing it to severely weaken with being able to continue. After this happened the Japanese would naturally have to surrender and it would have had less than an 1/8 of the casualties one of the atomic bombs had. This operation was of coarse dismissed with the development of the atomic bomb, which would end the war much quicker but at an enormously higher price. All these ideas we legitimate alternatives for dropping the atomic bomb, but they were all dismissed for one excuse or another.

The atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not at all necessary. The Japanese were more or less already beaten and many other alternatives existed instead of dropping the bomb. It was entirely Americas fault for slaughtering over 279,000 people in such a cruel way and I only hope that the world has learned from our mistakes; no other atomic weapon should ever again be used against the human population.