The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb

Rating:
Summary: Missing an important point.
Review: Alperovitz's conclusion is wrong, and his argument is unscholarly. Overlooking most of the evidence that contradicts his conclusions, the author fails to do anything other than offer long high-school type essay to a non-academic audience. This is not the book for anyone wishing to learn more about why Truman decided to use the atom bomb.

Rating:
Summary: The Momentum of Martial Logic
Review: Although the issue remains controversial it is important to consider the historical background given here for the decision to drop the bomb. After the account here it is impossible to take conventional wisdom for granted here. 'What might have been' has been rendered implausible by a series of mental images of the 'fanatic homeland defense' scenario, which was never tested and under suspicion of being wrong. Indeed, the available facts show that diplomats at the time expected Japanese surrender without the atomic option. To say nothing of the reservations of the scientists involved. If Admiral Leahy and Eisenhower saw fit to break ranks here in the years after the war, we can be sure something is awry here. This book amply shows the what's what. Very important case, and the manipulation of the 'myth' is as upsetting as the details of the emergence of the decision.

Rating:
Summary: slanted but still enchanted
Review: Gar Alperovitz builds a strong case that the atomic bomb was not militarily necessary to end the war in the Pacific, but was used to advance American diplomatic and political interests in the post war period, especially with respect to the Soviet Union. In particular, the apparent reluctance of military leaders to use the bomb is most interesting.

Of equal interest is the implicit suggestion that the after-the-fact efforts to justify the bomb's use and mute public criticism began a fifty year pattern of government secrecy, deception, and propaganda which threatens the democratic process even to this day, and that the cold war was arguably triggered by U.S. efforts to make the Soviet Union more "manageable" during the summer of 1945.

Finally, I was impressed that the author was far less judgmental than he could have been. I expected a political diatribe when I started this book. Instead, I encountered a well researched objective analysis of original source material. Where evidence was missing, conflicting, or subject to varying interpretations, the author said so.

Rating:
Summary: This guy did his homework
Review: Of the many books that are on the subject of the atomic bomb, this one to date is the most insightful i have read. This book will make you think about the american situation at the end of WWII. Not only what is at stake, but the options to Truman at the time are covered. It might surprise you that the last thing that was on the american leaders' mind was an invasion on Japan minor scheduled for spring 1946. Fact is that they were close to surrender already and knew the end was near. The book will take you through hundreds of documents backing up what i just wrote. The actual dropping of the bomb is just history....why did we choose to drop it is the real question. These are the hardest questions to answer but need to be approached if we are to ever apply it in a world I feel is more unstable now than ever. The decision in 1946 affects us even today. Read this book.

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Summary: Second-Guessing History
Review: Second-guessing history is always a dicey business, full of "what-ifs" and wild speculation. However, as Alperovitz makes clear, there were several viable options to ending the Pacific War that were both more humane and likely to succeed.

1. Demonstrate the Atom Bomb on an uninhabited atoll, as recommended in the Franck Report by a committee of scientists working on the Project

2. Make a small concession to Japanese pride/saving face and allow the Emperor to retain his throne in a total, but conditional, surrender (which they had already proposed)

3. Allow a few extra days for Japan to react to the entry of the Soviets into the war. It is now known that overtures to a settlement had been relayed to the British Foreign Minister.

Any one of these options would be more likely to succeed than a full-fledged armed invasion of the home islands, which had been proposed as a military disinformation but wasn't being seriously considered. As such, it backfired horribly by strengthening Japanese resolve.

Instead, the hawks and, for lack of a better term, "military-minded" advisors to new president Truman recommended a full use of the weapon. As a result, the United States is still the only nation on earth to have used Atomic weapons in war -- twice -- and against unarmed civilians. Not a very proud legacy.

Their reasoning, with the hindsight of fifty years, now seems sadly small-minded:

1. To justify the expenditure of $2 billion on a weapon originally designed in competition with the now-defeated Germany

2. To intimidate the Soviets into accepting American hegemony.

Experience bore out the Franck Report's prediction that the second goal was unattainable, and its further prediction that a ruinous nuclear arms race would result. The recommendations and predictions of some of the world's smartest people were thrown out by military advisors (specifically James Byrnes, who refused to even share the report with Truman), considering himself better equipped to understand human nature and thus shape history for all of mankind.

Whether "revisionist" or second-guessing, Alperovitz makes a compelling case for better options dismissed, and the tragic legacy of military hubris.

Rating:
Summary: The David Irving of Hiroshima
Review: This book has no real evidence, and it has wild theories about who was involved in this "cover-up." The book would be laughable to Oliver Stone! Truman himself destroying and altering documents?

The funny thing is that actual history repudiates his claims. The Japanese DID NOT surrender after the USSR invasion. The Japanese DID NOT surrender after the first Atomic bomb. The military arm of the government considered a coup NOT to surrender after the second bomb. The Emperor almost agreed, but reluctantly surrendered when the Allies made a few small concessions.
This point is never directly addressed, and why you ask? Simple. Why let a little thing like actual history get in the way of a great conspiracy story?

Rating:
Summary: War and Lies Are Nothing New: What We Learn from Hiroshima
Review: This book is an anti-nuclear tirade, disguised as a legitmate history book. A casual observer, upon seeing the huge number of footnotes, might be misled into thinking this is a fair and objective analysis of the atomic bombing of Japan. But, in fact, the book is flawed in its content and logic.

The biggest flaw of the book is the total lack of discussion of any topics that go contrary to the author's anti-nuclear bias. Here are some topics that are entirely omitted by the book:
- Analysis of the casualty rate for Americans in Pacific battles
- Analysis of probable number of American casualties if the Bombs were not used.
- Details of the battle of Okinawa (just two months before the bombing, and next door to the Japan homeland)
- Analysis of the determination and resolve of the Japanese fighting forces
- Analysis of the fighting spirit of the Japanese civilians
- Comparison of the bomb's damage with other wartime casualties (Holocaust, Russians, Germans, Tokyo, WW I, etc)

The other fatal flaw with the book is the lack of logic. The author insists on treating the bombing decision as a black-and-white topic. The fact is, it was a complex decision, made by dozens of people, in a stressful and "fog of war" atmosphere. Truman had many reasons to drop the bomb, and many reasons to refrain, and the former reasons outweighed the latter.

But the author sees things in black-and-white, so he musters a few 50-year-old memos to Truman that suggest immoral reasons to drop the bomb (e.g. to prevent the Russians from getting a foothold in Japan) and concludes that this was Truman's primary motivation. The author is blinded by his bias and has lost his ability to use logic.

Rating:
Summary: Biased and inaccurate. Dont waste your money.
Review: This book is an anti-nuclear tirade, disguised as a legitmate history book. A casual observer, upon seeing the huge number of footnotes, might be misled into thinking this is a fair and objective analysis of the atomic bombing of Japan. But, in fact, the book is flawed in its content and logic.

The biggest flaw of the book is the total lack of discussion of any topics that go contrary to the author's anti-nuclear bias. Here are some topics that are entirely omitted by the book:
- Analysis of the casualty rate for Americans in Pacific battles
- Analysis of probable number of American casualties if the Bombs were not used.
- Details of the battle of Okinawa (just two months before the bombing, and next door to the Japan homeland)
- Analysis of the determination and resolve of the Japanese fighting forces
- Analysis of the fighting spirit of the Japanese civilians
- Comparison of the bomb's damage with other wartime casualties (Holocaust, Russians, Germans, Tokyo, WW I, etc)

The other fatal flaw with the book is the lack of logic. The author insists on treating the bombing decision as a black-and-white topic. The fact is, it was a complex decision, made by dozens of people, in a stressful and "fog of war" atmosphere. Truman had many reasons to drop the bomb, and many reasons to refrain, and the former reasons outweighed the latter.

But the author sees things in black-and-white, so he musters a few 50-year-old memos to Truman that suggest immoral reasons to drop the bomb (e.g. to prevent the Russians from getting a foothold in Japan) and concludes that this was Truman's primary motivation. The author is blinded by his bias and has lost his ability to use logic.

Rating:
Summary: War and Lies Are Nothing New: What We Learn from Hiroshima
Review: This classic examination of Truman's motivations in dropping the atomic bomb on two civilian cities has a fresh relevance in light of the distortion and lies which have surrounded the Iraq war. Spin and mass deception from the government in time of war are nothing new--one of the most interesting parts of Alperovitz's book focuses on how the government manipulated the media in the immediate wake of Hiroshima, as well as on the subsequent creation of the myth that the bombs saved a million American lives. As for the core argument of the book, it's pretty straightforward: had Truman offered Japan the possibility of keeping the Emperor prior to Hiroshima, a Japanese surrender would have been quite likely, according to U.S. intelligence at the time, and the war would have ended. (We let them keep the Emperor after the war eventually anyway). Likewise, even the hard-line Japanese military leaders realized the game was over after Russia declared war on Japan: if we had waited for Russia to do so, Japan almost certainly would have surrendered, especially if they knew the Emperor would be protected. We can never know how history might have unfolded if these options for ending the peace had been tried, but we do know that Truman et al did not sufficiently explore all the alternatives before dropping nuclear weapons on civilians. As Eisenhower later stated, "It wasn't necessary to hit them with that d*** thing."

Rating:
Summary: Good!
Review: Through an extremely selective use of facts and a heavy reliance on opinion and speculation, this book makes the case that there was no military necessity to drop the atomic bomb - it was all the result of a conspiracy by Secretary of State James Byrnes to send a message to the Soviets. Before you start laughing, consider the book's storyline:

By mid-1945 every military and political leader knew we had won the war. The Japanese were virtually waving a white flag - sending out peace feelers and discussing how to end the war at the highest levels. All it would have taken was a flick of Truman's wrist (in the form of offering the right surrender terms) to bring peace. Many clairvoyant officials foresaw that as long as the Japanese were assured that the emperor would not be removed they would surrender in a heartbeat. Instead Truman waited until after the bombs were dropped to make this slight concession, at which point the Japanese did surrender.

Here is where the author inserts an element of mystery. There are some documents missing and others may have been altered. Every last word spoken on the subject was somehow not written down. Most surprisingly some of the politicians involved might have tried to make themselves look good to the public. He says it's all very suspicious, with the evidence we do have pointing unmistakably in one direction. The conniving James Byrnes pulled all the strings and manipulated the stuation to his liking. Deleting a couple of words from the Potsdam Proclamation made it impossible for the Japanese to surrender until after the bombs were dropped, thereby making the Soviets "more manageable in Europe".

The problem with this fantasy isn't that it's based on lies or fabricated evidence - that's a charge thrown out by the book against the U.S. Government's explanation of these events. It's that huge mountains of evidence to the contrary are either dismissed with a few easy sentences or, most commonly, ignored altogether.

Ending only weeks before the atomic bombs were dropped, Okinawa was one of the costliest battles in American history. Fanatical resistance by the Japanese led to a great desire to end the war before an invasion of Japan came about. This was an enormously important factor in the decision to drop the bomb yet the true significance of the battle is barely hinted at. In fact, you would hardly know from reading this 800-page diatribe that a war was being fought.

Like any country facing defeat in an all out war, Japan was certainly in bad shape. But like Germany before the battle of Berlin, the country was still capable of inflicting heavy losses on an invader. The peace feelers were half hearted attempts to end the war on terms favorable to Japan and were opposed by the military, which was completely in control of the country. At one point the implication is made that the so-called peace party could have easily brushed the Japanese military aside, as though there were a British style parliamentary system in place. In reality those who advocated peace negotiations were in fear for their lives. There are endless references to the MAGIC intercepts of Japanese diplomatic traffic and almost no mention of the ULTRA intercepts of Japanese military communication, which revealed only an iron willed intention to continue the war at any cost. Japanese reverence for their emperor is discussed ad nauseum but the equally prevalent bushido code, which prohibited surrender under any circumstance, is never mentioned. The unconditional surrender policy is portrayed as an impediment to peace without any attempt to explain why it was agreed upon. With the existence of a war avoided, fears of Soviet expansion are given huge importance.

After using a team of research assistants to examine thousands of pages of documents, it's utterly amazing that Alperovitz can offer no explanation of why a second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. It's portrayed as just another mystery of this complicated subject. The real mystery is how someone writing non-fiction could willfully ignore or obfuscate the basic facts behind his subject and still be taken seriously. American strategy behind using the bomb was to inflict a series of shocks to the Japanese that would convince them that further resistance would be futile. A second atomic bomb was dropped in order to give the impression that the U.S. had a large quantity of these weapons and would continue to use them until Japan was destroyed. After Hiroshima, the Japanese militarists argued that the U.S. had no more atomic bombs to use against them and that even if they did, negative world opinion would prevent another attack. The bombing of Nagasaki proved them wrong and along with the Soviet declaration of war provided the shocks needed to bring peace. These facts contradict the thrust of the book, which is clearly why they were excluded.

After the bombs were dropped the world was horrified. Some leaders expressed regrets and wished that events hadn't taken place as they did. The impression is given that these people were on their hands and knees pleading to spare the poor Japanese from this weapon, which is a total falsehood. The biggest howlers are the anti-bomb quotes from those who wanted a third bomb dropped on Tokyo before Truman overruled them. Such omissions and distortions are too numerous to catalog here.

This book is a tangled and repetitive mass of "what if" history and carefully selected quotes. It's hard to decide if it's more like an infomercial, a UFO documentary or an overzealous prosecutor trying to convict an innocent defendant. The main arguments are based solely on speculation about what might have happened given certain conditions. An objective work of history it is not.