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The dropping of the Atomic Bomb Was it necessary? At 8.15a.m. August 6th 1945 a US B29 bomber, called Enola gay flew over Japan and detonated an Atomic bomb. Over 80,000 people were killed by the blast. On 9th August a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. Over 20,000 were killed here. Thousands continued to die from radiation poisoning and associated deaths for years after. It has been one of the most heated debates in history as to whether the use of this weapon was necessary. Below are some arguments for and against. Clearly this debate is very complex and I have simply picked on a very narrow set of arguments. However, this page could be a starting point for you to develop your own work. What conclusion do you come to? |
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ARGUMENTS FOR |
ARGUMENTS AGAINST |
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The war against Japan had been very hard indeed. When Truman and Churchill were given news of the effects of the A-bomb on the test site of Alamogordo they came to the conclusion that this weapon would save lives. "We had contemplated the desperate rsistance of the Japanese fighting to the death with Samurai devotion...it may require the lives of a million American soldiers and half that amount of British". Winston Churchill "The target will be a purely military one and we will issue a warning statement asking the Japanese to surrender and save lives". Harry Truman
Even if you are not too sure about the honesty of the quotes above, consider the following; The Japanese had fought with immense ferocity. The war had been predicted to go on for another year or more with millions more to add to the toll. Further delay and there was a chance that German technology would develop its own atomic bomb. |
The war was almost over. The Japanese had been making moves to the Russians to sue for peace. There was really no need to use this weapon and the argument of the war continuing for another year is pure fiction. "It now became the paramount concern of the US to eliminate the Japanese before Russia joined the battle, so that the Russians could be excluded from the final eastern settlement". A.Rapaport (historian) he claimed it was fear of the Russians that made the Americans use the bomb.
The Americans were already considering the post war settlement. They had the most devastating bomb in the world and were desperate to show everyone what it was like. The bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were all about American power and little about life saving.
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