Dropping The Atomic Bomb Essay, Research Paper
The Decision to Drop the Bomb
It is August 6, 1945. The place is Tinian, an island speck in the South
Pacific. At 2:45 a.m. the evening quiet is abruptly interrupted by the roar of a
B-29 bomber as it rumbles down the runway and disappears into the night.
Special bombing mission # 13 is underway. A single B-29, nicknamed the Enola
Gay, embarks upon a mission which will change the course of history. The Enola
Gay will drop the first atomic bomb in history.
It was a Monday morning in Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Families were
eating breakfast, children were preparing for school, and work at the factories
was about to begin. The distant throb of an airplane engine caused little concern
in the city. Japanese children had become accustomed to daily flight by weather
and observation planes. At exactly 8:16 a.m., what had been a peaceful Monday
morning was suddenly transformed into a nightmare of death and destruction.
Over 100,000 Japanese people died as a result of the atomic bomb. This cold
statement of fact conveys little real meaning until it is put into the words of
school children who survived the atomic bomb. Children who may never see
their parents or never be able to enjoy their childhood because they will spent
the next couple of years in the hospitals recuperating from third degree burns
and when they grow up they will finally realize the harmful effects they have
suffered because of the radiation they acquired from the explosion. Their
children may be born with cancer themselves and die before they are mature enough to enjoy life to the fullest, they may never have their own kids they may
not even fall in love for the first time. As sad as this sounds a man is lucky if he
even survives the horrible blast. Most of the innocent civilians were hit with a
blas
to sooth their burns not knowing that the water was radioactive and it hat
reached boiling point.
Can such a brutal attack be justified and was the atomic bomb the final
answer to the problem? These are some of the questions that have not yet been
answered and may never be answered. One of the reasons why the bomb was
unjust and cruel was because Japan was already defeated before the bombing,
an effective sea blockade and the successful bombing of military sites gave the
US a clear victory. A surrender would have taken place shortly without the
atomic bomb being a factor. There would have been no need to invade the
Japanese mainland and the bomb would not have significantly shorten the war
and it would not save enough lives to justify its use.
Another point brought up in this debate is if Japan was fairly warned and
given a chance to surrender. President Truman had failed to warn the Japanese
that they would be attacked with an atomic bomb and thus gave them no
opportunity to surrender until the bomb was dropped. The bomb could have
been dropped in an unpopulated area to demonstrate its power, such a
demonstration would have convinced the Japanese to surrender without
needless bloodshed and long-term suffering.
This unjustifiable slaughter of innocent civilians will forever be remembered as one of the darkest days in US history. To this day innocent
people who wanted a good life are suffering from the long term effects of this
deadly bomb. Some still do not see the costly effects of this bomb and that is
because they never had such a mass tragedy and such a great loss of human
life happen to them, they never had to watch their children die helplessly in front
of them as they had no way to help them and all they could do is WATCH.