Abstract

The United States was not justified in their droppings of the atomic bomb for many reasons. The Japenese had asked the Russians to step in and stop the Americans, and they said they would surrender if they would keep their emperor. Truman decided to drop the bomb anyway, knowing the Japs were prepared to surrender. It is often hard toknow what a man's real motives are, but it is rumored that one of the reasons the bomb was dropped was to send a message to the Russians. The innocent killing of around 200,000 civilians is not justified to send a message to another country. The city of Hiroshima was picked to bomb because it had not yet been bombed or harmed and the U.S. wanted to test the power of the atomic bomb on a virgin city. There was a profound racism toward the Japanese after the bombings of Pearl Harbor, and although many say the bombings were not revenge from Pearl Harbor, one may wonder if the United States could bring itself to bombing the Germans. A second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki days later while the Japs were still trying to fathom what had hapenned to Hiroshima. They would have surrendered without the dropping of a second bomb. It was strictly unneccesary and cruel.