[Note: My Hiroshima op-ed for the Arizona Daily Star began as an extended email debate with a valued friend, with which we need not concern ourselves here. References to previous posts are mostly self-explanatory. They are included because the arguments advanced there are common to the ongoing debate on this subject.]
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and
raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom."
- Thomas Paine, "Common Sense," 1776
Thank you all for coming today. Let me begin this discussion by stipulating that those who believe
the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were morally justified are good, kind, decent folks,
friendly to dogs and children, and generally brave, thrifty, cheerful, reverent, and unwilling to
let rain, nor sleet, nor gloom of night stay them from their appointed rounds.
Let me also note that my worthy and esteemed debating opponent (hereafter MWAEDO) is, as noted on
several occasions, one of my very favorite human beings, and a genuine delight to be with. Our
too-infrequent encounters in meatspace are among the highlights of those years in which they occur,
and his wit, knowledge and erudition make our ongoing correspondence more valuable to me than I can
say.
Let me also concede at the outset that reasonable minds can disagree on these matters; indeed, that
scholars more distinguished than ourselves continue to debate these topics, and will most likely
continue to do so long after we have returned to the dust whence we came. In part this is due to
some extraordinary gaps in the documentary record - and yet I will argue that many of these gaps are
not accidental, and that the absence of data is itself supportive of my position. That is, that if
the documentary evidence tended to support the thesis that the bombings were justified by military
necessity, it would not have been suppressed and/or altered.
However, in contrast to MWAEDO, I do not believe that those who disagree with me have deliberately
closed their eyes to history, have no reasonable way to make their case, or are indulging in
fantasy. It is worth adding, though, the views of J. Samuel Walker, chief historian of the Nuclear
Regulatory Commission, the "institutional locus of conservative, often pro-nuclear thinking:"
"Careful scholarly treatment of the records and manuscripts opened over the past few years has
greatly enhanced our understanding of why the Truman administration used atomic weapons against
Japan. Experts continue to disagree on some issues, but critical questions have been answered. The
consensus among scholars is that the bomb was not needed to avoid an invasion of Japan and to end
the war within a relatively short time. It is clear that alternatives to the Bomb existed and that
Truman and his advisers knew it."
I also want to declare at the outset that, having learned more about these matters, I now believe my
previous post of 07/05/01, "Non-Standard Version," was somewhat unfair to the memory of Henry L.
Stimson. While Stimson did sign his name to a deceptive and obfuscatory account of the decision to
use the Bomb, at the behest of James Conant and ghostwritten by McGeorge Bundy, the record shows
that he expressed misgivings at the time and later contradicted some of what was printed in the
01/47 Harper's in his name. And like all of Truman's main political advisers save one, he argued in
favor of a diplomatic solution to the war short of the use of thermonuclear devices.
In his post of 07/05/01, "One man's history," MWAEDO addresses four main topics: Estimates of
casualty figures for the invasion of Japan, the willingness of Japanese leaders to negotiate a
surrender, the political costs to the Truman administration for doing same, and the position that
annihilation of the rules of war by the warring powers nullifies the legal culpability of said
administration. I will address each in its turn; I will also discuss the arguably tangential issue
that US postwar alliances with fascist war criminals have no bearing on this discussion.
I will rely throughout on the most complete discussion available of the new evidence in this case:
The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, by Gar Alperovitz, Vintage Books, 1995. Mr. Alperovitz is a
historian and political scientist at the University of Maryland and a Fellow at the Institute for
Policy Studies, who has served as an adviser to the US Congress and the State Department. For more
than 40 years, through his doctoral thesis and the 1965 publication of his first book Atomic
Diplomacy, he has researched the thesis that the use of the Bomb was unnecessary, and returned to it
in the mid-90s when more compelling evidence came to light. The 1995 book has gone through three
revised printings and employed a small army of research assistants. Whatever else one can say about
his thesis, one cannot argue that Alperovitz has deliberately closed his eyes to history.
I obtained a copy of the book on Saturday, 07/07/01, and have not yet read it in its entirety, which
is considerable. But the source recommended by MWAEDO, < http://www.doug-long.com/ >, links to an
extended discussion of the text, including a summary of the main evidence and Alperovitz' replies to
his critics. I would encourage anyone with an interest in these matters to spend some time examining
those arguments.
The discussion of casualty estimates by Mr. Giangreco at
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/giangrec.htm is illuminating. Giangreco is clearly a
distinguished military historian; unfortunately he is not much of a diplomatic historian (in either
sense of the word). I find nothing in his discussion to contradict my assertion that no estimates
of US fatalities in excess of 63,000 reached Truman prior to his decision. The lower numbers
(25000-46,000) which MWAEDO derides as "new and improved" are available at the CIA site he offers,
< http://www.cia.gov/csi/monograph/4253605299/csi9810001.html#rtoc8 >. Of course, these are not
"new" figures; they are contemporaneous, and stand in contrast to higher figures offered after the
fact by interested parties.
Giangreco begins by noting that MacArthur's staff produced estimates of "casualties in excess of
100,000." The CIA historian MacEachin cites that as 105,050 casualties, with 50,080 fatalities.
Giangreco offers considerable context with which to consider these data. He also omits significant
context.
Here's some: Japan had no allies left standing. She faced not only US and British forces (turning
from a defeated Germany) but those of a resurgent China and a newly free France as well as the
strong possibility (later confirmed) of engagement with the Red Army. She had been suffering from an
increasingly successful naval blockade for nearly a year and had completely lost control of her
airspace. US forces were able to bomb Japanese cities with such impunity that they had begun
offering warnings in advance, something that was pointedly omitted in the case of Hiroshima.
In fact, of the seventy major Japanese cities, only four were not destroyed by aerial bombardment;
among them were Nagasaki and Hiroshima, a testament to their strategic worthlessness. But they had
been deliberately spared because Stimson feared that there would be no pristine populated areas left
on which to deploy the thermonuclear devices.
Giangreco is correct in noting that there were sufficient food supplies to prevent starvation,
particularly in the countryside - though rail links to urban areas were utterly destroyed. But the
government had just cut food rations, was processing acorns to augment falling rice supplies, and
was commencing a crash program to construct wooden aircraft lubricated by various vegetable oils.
The blockade would have ground Japan's military and industrial capacity to a halt well before
starvation would set in, though of course no one could be sure exactly how long that would take.
Perhaps these are some of the reasons for the historic and devastating findings of the Strategic
Bombing Survey that "Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped,
even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if an invasion had not been planned or
contemplated."
General Marshall, with the sort of poetic flair to which military men are given, expected the
invasion to be "relatively inexpensive." He expected casualties to be more analogous to Luzon than
to Okinawa. Admiral Leahy, chairman of the Joint Chiefs as well as chief of staff to the president,
disagreed; he felt Okinawa was a better predictor. But note please that such views did not prevent
either man from opposing the use of the Bomb as militarily unnecessary - in Leahy's case, with
considerable vehemence. It is disingenuous of Giangreco to discuss these men's views on the invasion
without noting their views on the Bomb.
In fact, Truman's top military advisors were virtually unanimous in the view that the Bomb was not
needed to secure an end to the war without an invasion.
Presumably they were privy to the same data cited by Mr. Giangreco. He notes that assessments of
enemy strength were drastically revised on 07/29/45. He fails to note that the decision to drop the
Bomb had already been made at that point, so that this estimate could not have been a factor in that
decision. It could have been used to strengthen the rationale for that decision, both before and
after the incineration of the two cities, but there is additional context omitted by Giangreco.
The Japanese had already written off Manchuria, and, unsure of Russian intentions, had pulled their
elite units from the area lest they fall victim to the more powerful Red Army. This alone helps
account for greater troop strength in the home islands, but consider this as well: The US had by
this point intercepted cable traffic which showed the Japanese political leadership to be nearly
unanimous in believing the war to be lost, though they were hardly unanimous on how to conclude it.
Part of the argument of the hardliners in the Japanese Cabinet was that they could receive better
terms from the allies if they made a more convincing show of strength and displayed a willingness to
persevere. Hence the buildup in likely invasion routes, even as the country teetered on the brink of
collapse.
Giangreco ignores a 1946 military intelligence study which concluded that Japan had reached its
maximum troop strength on Kyushu by early August; no further reinforcements were contemplated, or
indeed possible, even in the event of an invasion. This same study concludes, like the Strategic
Bombing Survey noted previously, that Japan would likely have surrendered immediately upon Soviet
entry into the war, even without an invasion. Those casualty estimates do not take that into
account, nor could they, since only a few top officials knew for certain of the USSR's plans.
Also of relevance in terms of the decision to use the Bomb is that the invasion of Japan was
scheduled for no sooner than 11/01/45, by which point the Strategic Bombing Survey, based on postwar
interviews with Japanese leaders, calculated that Japan would have "in all probability" already have
capitulated - even without an invasion, even without Russian intervention, and most pointedly, even
without the instant pulverization of 200,000 civilians. Furthermore, November 1 was only the
scheduled date of the Kyushu landings; a full invasion was not contemplated before the following
spring, long after the 12/31/45 date by which the SBS felt surrender would "certainly" have
happened.
This raises the question of why such undue haste was pursued in early August to initiate atomic
warfare, and certainly bears on the question of what an appropriate interval might be to allow
consultations before the obliteration of Nagasaki.
It also helps explain the moral certainty of folks like Dwight Eisenhower, who flatly declared "it
wasn't necessary to hit them with that awful thing."
Note that the SBS is not revisionist data; it was released in 1946 and has formed a cornerstone of
the controversy ever since. Said controversy was, if anything, far more spirited in the immediate
aftermath than of late, when the received political wisdom tends to support the position of MWAEDO,
even as compelling new evidence tends to contradict it. That so many Americans believe as MWAEDO
does is a testament to the deception and obfuscation employed by those who were a party to the
decision, including President Truman but most especially his "conniving" Secretary of State James F.
Byrnes.
All of that said, I don't really have a problem conceding that actual casualties from an invasion of
Japan could well have been much higher than those given to Truman, or even that he might have
thought so himself. Because such a position only strengthens my case. If an invasion would be so
costly, than Truman should have actively pursued alternatives to it in addition to the nuclear
option. If the Bomb test had not been successful, he most certainly would have pursued alternative
methods for ending the war, and such options were kept open as long as there was uncertainty as to
whether the nuclear option would be available. Once it was, Truman and Byrnes showed a strong
preference for its use above less violent options, against the advice of nearly all the top military
and political advisers in the government.
With the admirable skepticism for which he is renowned, MWAEDO expressed considerable doubt about
the Japanese willingness to surrender. But in fact there is little doubt on this point among
contemporary historians (nor was there among top US military leaders at the time), and I would
encourage my respected elder to pass some of the key evidence beneath his nostrils. The evidence
shows that Japan had made several credible peace feelers, and that by the time the decision to drop
the Bomb was made, it was clear that the Emperor himself had personally intervened in support of the
peace process, and that moreover, Truman was well aware of this (note previously cited journal entry
regarding "cable from Jap Emperor asking for peace").
Furthermore, it was also clear to the US government, again from intercepted Japanese cable traffic
as well as State Department experts on Japan, that the one obstacle to an early end to the war was
the insistence on "unconditional surrender." Specifically, it was understood that a private
clarification of the status of the Emperor would be sufficient for the Japanese to accept a
surrender ultimatum, even if publicly "unconditional." There was considerable debate within the
Truman administration over providing those assurances, which, again, were to be included in the
Potsdam proclamation but were removed at the last minute.
It was also understood by Truman and his advisers that removal of those assurances meant that even
the Japanese doves would have no choice but to reject the ultimatum and fight on. Germany was
defeated and war crimes trials were set to begin. The possibility that the Emperor could be deposed
or even hanged was a very real one, and anathema to all Japanese, who regarded the dynasty as divine
in origin. It was also understood that while providing assurances would strengthen the peace faction
in Japan, omitting them would inevitably strengthen the hardliners.
This was clear from a cable intercepted 07/17/45, from Japanese Foreign Minister Togo (not to be
confused with Tojo) to his ambassador in Moscow:
"If today... the Anglo-Americans were to have regard for Japan's honor and existence, they could
save humanity by bringing the war to an end. If, however, they insist unrelentingly upon
unconditional surrender, the Japanese are unanimous in their resolve to wage a thorough-going war.
The Emperor himself has deigned to express his determination and we have therefore made this request
of the Russians."
This is exactly as Truman's advisers had predicted. As long as assurances were withheld, the
Japanese politicians had no choice in their own minds but to let military leaders continue to plan
to fight on to the death. Hence the buildup noted by Giangreco; as the Japanese military had no idea
of the existence of the Bomb, it was in their interest to make the costs of an invasion of the
homeland appear as high as they could. At the same time, US military leaders knew that without such
assurances, the choice was narrowed to an eventual invasion (barring other circumstances) or the use
of the Bomb, and they began preparing worst-case scenarios for the former (which nonetheless fell
below what was claimed after the fact).
The advice reaching Truman regarding assurances, and the calculations of the Japanese leadership on
ending the war, are inextricably linked with the question of Russian participation in the Pacific
war. We will soon return to that question, but herewith a survey of known Japanese peace offers:
As previously mentioned, the first such initiative came nearly a year before Hiroshima. On 08/11/44
the US intercepted cable traffic to the ambassador in Moscow asking him to find out if the Soviets
would be willing to assist in bringing about a negotiated peace settlement. The report for the
president and his advisors noted that this was the first such offer. On 09/26/44 reports reached the
White House of Japanese feelers through the Swedish foreign minister in Tokyo. Another cable was
intercepted 10/25/44, regarding further Japanese interest in a negotiated settlement due to the
deteriorating position of the Germans.
On 1/20/45 General MacArthur forwarded a 40-page memo regarding five separate surrender offers. On
01/30/45, the OSS furnished the State Department with a "series of reports" regarding Japanese
negotiations through the Vatican. In a foreshadowing of Nixon and Kissinger's prolongation of the
Vietnam war for political reasons, the reports show that the Japanese were offering essentially the
same terms on which the war was eventually settled in August. If these negotiations had been
seriously pursued, there would have been no battles of Iwo Jima or Okinawa, and no firebombing of
Tokyo, let alone any atomic warfare.
On 04/06/45 the Swedish foreign minister reported that "it seems probable that very far-reaching
conditions would be accepted by the Japanese by way of negotiation," noting only that "the Emperor
must not be touched. However, the Imperial power could be somewhat democratized as is that of the
English King." He assured the US that these views came from "Jap officials of very high rank."
On 05/05/45, a message to Berlin from the German naval attaché in Tokyo was intercepted:
"...since the situation is clearly recognized to be hopeless, large sections of the Japanese armed
forces would not regard with disfavor an American request for capitulation even if the terms were
hard, provided they were halfway honorable."
Note that this is the first mention of peace interest among the Japanese military. On 05/12/45 the
OSS reported that, like the German fascists, the Japanese would greatly prefer surrendering to the
Americans, rather than the Russian Communists. A week later the OSS reported numerous efforts of
Japanese diplomats in Portugal to open negotiations, and that the Japanese "declared that actual
peace terms are unimportant so long as the term 'unconditional surrender' was not employed."
A report from Switzerland on 06/04/45 again noted the interest of Japanese military leaders:
"Source is in touch with Fujimura, who is understood to be one of the principal Japanese Naval
representatives in Europe... Navy circles would be willing to surrender but wish, if possible, to
save some face from the current wreckage. These Navy circles particularly stress the necessity of
preserving the Emperor in order to avoid Communism and chaos. Fujimura emphasizes that Japan cannot
supply itself with basically essential foodstuffs."
07/07/45: "Major General Onodera, Jap military attache, stated that Japs know war has been lost...
He further stated that Emperor must be maintained in his position after the capitulation. No other
conditions of surrender were specified."
07/13/45: [Japanese representative] Kitamura indicated that he was anxious to establish immediate
contact with American representatives and implied that the only condition on which Japan would
insist with respect to surrender would be some consideration for the Japanese Imperial family."
07/16/45: "Japanese officials stressed only... the preservation of the Emperor."
All of these offers were treated with caution in the US as they could not be verified as formally
and officially authorized, though the trajectory of Japan's decline and desperation was
unmistakable. But on 07/13/45 such reservations could be swept aside after interception of the Togo
cable to Moscow:
"His Majesty the Emperor, mindful of the fact that the present war daily brings greater evil and
sacrifice upon the peoples of all belligerent powers, desires from his heart that it may be quickly
terminated... It is the Emperor's private intention to send Prince Konoye to Moscow as a Special
Envoy with a letter from him containing the statements given above. Please inform Molotov of this
and get the Russians' consent to having the party enter the country."
This is the "cable from Jap Emperor" to which Truman referred, though it was not known until 1979
that he was definitely aware of it.
Togo also cabled on 07/25/45, in response to a US radio broadcast mentioning, as Potsdam did not,
the possibility of peace on the basis of the Atlantic Charter, which stipulated the rights of all
countries to choose their form of government:
"The fact that the Americans alluded to the Atlantic Charter is particularly worthy of attention at
this time. It is impossible for us to accept unconditional surrender, no matter in what guise, but
it is our idea to inform them that there is no objection to a restoration of peace based on the
Atlantic Charter."
But this hope, like all the others, was in vain. That very day, Truman made the decision to drop the
Bomb. By this point Truman and his advisers were fully aware that both military and civilian leaders
understood the war to be lost, that the Emperor himself was personally involved in efforts to end
it, and that even slight modifications of our demands could bring about a settlement without resort
to an invasion or the Bomb. If saving lives was his principal objective, he had the means at his
disposal. Instead he specifically withdrew those assurances on which peace depended, despite the
urging of all his principal advisers save one - Byrnes.
Why he did this can be discussed later, but it's also important to remember that Truman also
specifically withdrew the indications at Potsdam that Russia was prepared to join the war. Even
after the first Bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, Japanese officials thought they had a chance of
pursuing peace through Moscow. When Stalin declared war on August 8, it did not come as a complete
surprise to the Japanese, but it did shatter the ambiguity under which they were able to pursue such
hopes. In fact, it is the testimony of the Japanese leadership that it was the Russian entry, rather
than the Bomb, which was the decisive factor in ending the war.
It was generally understood by Truman's advisors that two things, together or separately, were
likely to end the war without an invasion or use of the Bomb: clarification of our policy on the
continuation of the Imperial dynasty, and/or the entry of the USSR into the Pacific war. It was
known as the "two-step" logic, and it was argued that even a Russian declaration, followed by
assurances, or vice versa, would be sufficient for Japan to capitulate. Postwar interviews with the
Japanese leadership, both civilian and military, confirm that these predictions were accurate.
Truman not only understood these arguments, but he gave repeated indications that he was sympathetic
to them. He was approached no fewer than fourteen times on the question of assurances; ultimately
the Joint Chiefs of Staff prevailed on their British counterparts to urge Churchill to make the
case. Churchill did so, but he too was unsuccessful.
Meanwhile, the President's attitudes towards the USSR were evolving. Shortly after taking office, he
was briefed on the possibility of the Bomb, and subsequently had a belligerent confrontation
regarding Poland with Molotov, who found Truman's attitude quite insulting. This flew in the face of
FDR's longstanding policy to encourage the Russians to join the Pacific war; if such an alliance was
necessary, Truman's intransigence and aggressiveness made that more unlikely.
Later, when the Manhattan Project seemed as if it might not be ready in time, Truman reversed policy
again, and granted all the concessions he had refused Molotov in April, at considerable cost to the
Polish people. Henceforth the administration made Russian entry a priority, but with a difference.
While both Churchill and Stalin were pressing for an early three-power summit to discuss the end of
the war, Truman stalled them. The UK and the USSR hoped for a meeting in May, or June at the latest,
but Truman held out for mid-July. Ostensibly this was due to the demands of the domestic budget
process, but privately Truman was more candid: he wanted to wait to meet Stalin, he said, until he
knew whether or not the Trinity test was successful.
When word reached Truman in Potsdam that the test was indeed successful, his attitude changed once
again; he became more aggressive in negotiations with Stalin, and from that point on it was
administration policy to delay the Russian entry into the war as much as possible. Chinese diplomats
were instructed to stall the Russians in talks regarding entry into the Manchurian front.
Again, if saving lives, either American or Japanese, was Truman's first priority, he had means at
his disposal to effect that. His own advisors, decoded Japanese cables and common sense indicated
that merely announcing Russia's intentions could be enough to jump-start peace negotiations.
Instead, Truman deliberately omitted the USSR's signature from the Potsdam proclamation, thus
confusing the Japanese about Russian intentions.
Prime Minister Suzuki had been appointed in April specifically in order to pursue peace, and brought
Togo in as Foreign Minister. The latter refused to join the government until he received assurances
Suzuki was serious about pursuing peace. Cable traffic shows that the Japanese government was
extremely concerned about Russian intentions.
Technically the USSR had been neutral throughout the war; she had signed a non-aggression pact with
Japan which would be in effect through April 1946 and automatically renewed for five years
thereafter, unless one party indicated an unwillingness to renew no less than one year in advance.
Stalin did so just before the deadline, citing the Japanese alliance with Germany. From that point
on there was concerted diplomatic activity on the pert of the Japanese to nevertheless keep the
Russians from joining the hostilities, and to intermediate in pursuit of a peace agreement. The
ambiguous posture at Potsdam allowed the Japanese to continue these efforts, which intensified
thereafter, as we have seen above, with the Emperor's personal intervention.
By withholding assurances and keeping the Russian intentions a secret, Truman forced his own
military and that of the Japanese to intensify contingency planning for an invasion. On August 8,
following the Hiroshima bombing, the Japanese ambassador in Moscow met with Molotov, still in hopes
of Russian assistance in settling the war. Instead he was read a declaration of war; Russian troops
entered Manchuria the next day and swiftly cut through the Japanese forces, convincing even the most
hard-line military leaders in Japan that the cause was lost. This, they told the SBS interrogators,
was the crucial element in ending the war.
With three months to go before the earliest possible date for a Kyushu landing and more than six
months before a full invasion could begin, Truman pulled out all the stops to nuke Japan before they
got confirmation of their worst fears regarding Russian entry into the war. In so doing, of course,
he had keep the Japanese in the dark regarding both Russian and American intentions while he waited
for the Bombs to become available, and in the process many thousands of soldiers and civilians lost
their lives.
Why did he do this, against the advice of nearly all his top military and political advisors? The
answer to this is less clear than the fact that he dismissed available options for pursuing an early
end to the war. But the evidence - and the lack of evidence - points to the one advisor who argued
against providing assurances, Secretary of State James F. Byrnes. Recent historical inquiry has
shown that Byrnes went to considerable trouble to cover his tracks and obscure his role in the
decision to use the Bomb.
Byrnes was a political crony of Truman's whom the latter eventually came to distrust, correctly
suspecting that he was withholding information, blocking the views of others, and plotting behind
the president's back. Truman initially regarded Byrnes as a mentor, going back to their days in the
Senate, and relied on him from his first day in office to help make up for his own woeful
inexperience in foreign policy. In turn, Byrnes regarded Truman as a mental midget, an accidental
president and a pipsqueak to be manipulated.
In fact, Byrnes harbored a resentment against Truman, believing that it was he who should have been
FDR's last vice-president, and thus he who should have become president in April 1945. He saw his
future political ambitions as bound to his performance in the State Department, which he deduced
would depend on how he handled the USSR.
But at the time the decisions regarding atomic weaponry were made, Byrnes was Truman's closest
advisor. Even with the manipulation of information, he could not have convinced Truman,
Rasputin-like, to hold out for the nuclear option unless the president shared some of his attitudes
and assumptions about Russia. But the interaction of the two personalities was to have deadly
consequences.
The evidence shows that it was their intention to go for intensified postwar production of nuclear
arms even before the decision to drop the Bomb was made, and that along with General Groves, they
were pursuing postwar plans to control the entire global supply of uranium, if at all possible.
While they received numerous and passionate warnings that the combat use of the Bomb would lead to a
nuclear arms race with the Soviets, they chose to disregard that advice because they came to see
atomic weaponry as a kind of diplomatic panacea. Groves spoke of an American "Pax Atomica" based on
our nuclear monopoly, and rejected estimates that the Russians would have the Bomb in two to three
years. He estimated it would be more like twenty.
In fact, Stalin was not all that interested in the Soviet nuclear program until after Hiroshima; and
the message was unmistakable to him, given his own knowledge of how Truman had rejected more
peaceful means and rushed to use the weapon before Russia could enter the war. He knew that the
nuclear option was directed at the USSR, and in fact that is just how Truman and Byrnes saw it.
Leo Szilard and other nuclear scientists met with Byrnes to argue against the use of the Bomb:
"Mr. Byrnes did not argue that it was necessary to use the Bomb against the cities of Japan in order
to win the war. He knew at the time [May 28], as the rest of the government knew, that Japan was
essentially defeated and that we could win the war in another six months. At that time Mr. Byrnes
was much concerned about the spreading of Russian influence in Europe... [his view was that] our
possessing and demonstrating the Bomb would make Russia more manageable in Europe."
Byrnes' assistant Walter Brown reports in his journal that both Byrnes and Truman were concerned
about Japanese efforts to seek peace through Russia, rather than a more neutral country like Sweden.
He adds:
"JFB still hoping for time, believing that after the atomic bomb Japan will surrender and Russia
will not get in so much on the kill."
Truman himself wrote that in one of their first meetings after Byrnes joined his administration, the
latter told him that "in his belief the Bomb might well put us in a position to dictate our own
terms at the end of the war." Or as the president told Jonathan Daniels, a close political
associate:
"If it explodes as I think it will I'll certainly have a hammer on those boys [the Russians]."
Lest anyone think Daniels was misinterpreting Truman, the former reports that the latter inspected
his book for accuracy.
There is considerably more evidence that, far from regarding the impact of the Bomb on diplomacy
versus the Russians as "icing on the cake," Truman, Byrnes and Groves considered it their primary
motivation behind the continued pursuit of nuclear weapons production. In their calculations,
America's demonstrated willingness to use the Bomb would make her a more fearsome adversary in the
postwar period.
Given that Truman refused to provide the Japanese with a straw to grasp regarding the future of
their Emperor, that he deliberately kept secret the fact of Soviet intentions which might shock them
into ending the war, that he rushed to use the Bomb as soon as humanly possible without waiting to
see what Russian entry or other military efforts might accomplish in the three months before any
planned landings in the Japanese homeland, the evidence is clear that he and Byrnes preferred the
nuclear option. They did so because of their belief in its geostrategic omnipotence, and they found
this more important than the lives of those who perished while they stalled for time before
initiating the Atomic Age.
This does not necessarily mean that these were evil men, but that they had evolved into a worldview
and an ideology whereby American nuclear supremacy was for the greater good of humankind - a
worldview which prevails to this day among US policy elites, despite the many tragic circumstances
arising therefrom.
In this sense, it can be argued that the use of the Bomb was primarily political, rather than
military in nature. In so arguing, however, one must also take into account the argument that the
failure to provide assurances to the Japanese was a result of domestic political pressures.
MWAEDO has expressed his belief that "anything less than unconditional surrender wasn't going to fly
politically." Subsequently he asserted:
> I just don't see the logical equivalence or extension
> between being unwilling to settle for anything less than unconditional
> surrender for political reasons on the one hand, and the willingness to
> annihilate civilians for political reasons on the other.
Permit me to clarify the logic: If the result of decision (A) is the potential for political damage,
while the result of decision (B) is the annihilation of 200,000 civilians, and (B) is chosen, it
follows logically that the results of (B) are less of a deterrent to action than the results of (A).
But fortunately for Harry Truman's reputation, there is little evidence to support MWAEDO's
assumption regarding domestic political calculations playing much of a role in the decision to
withhold assurances.
To the contrary, the Joint Chiefs and other advisors worried instead that a war-weary public might
embrace Japanese offers for less than a full unconditional surrender. Public opinion surveys showed
that a majority, though not an overwhelming one, preferred to press on toward the unclarified goal
of unconditional surrender. More than a third felt that the war could be shortened by clarifying our
terms. There is no evidence that Truman or others considered public opinion much of an impediment to
a diplomatic initiative, should they choose to pursue one.
In fact there was considerable discussion in the press regarding the need to clarify terms. Time,
the Washington Post and other influential publications, ignorant of the existence of the Bomb, began
to perceive that clarifying our war aims to the Japanese provided the potential for avoiding a
costly invasion of her home islands. A State Department briefing book on 06/30/45 argued that
assurances on the Emperor would
"satisfy a growing body of opinion in the United States which is demanding that we endeavor to
hasten the end of the war in the Pacific by stating definitely our war aims."
MWAEDO also argues that
> the fact that he accepted retaining the Emperor in a thoroughly
> different role after the war puts the lie to nothing at all. By any real
> measure, the surrender was unconditional.
This is not in fact the case. As noted previously, Japan had long been offering terms on the Emperor
issue which were identical to what we eventually agreed to. As late as August 14, even after
publicly announcing an intention to surrender, Japan was still asking for those assurances. On that
date, Harry Truman finally did clarify that the Emperor would remain on the throne, and only then
did the formal process of surrender begin.
True, the Emperor did continue in a different role, but as noted, the Japanese had previously stated
that that would be acceptable. Only the continuation of the dynasty was an irreducible demand; they
would have settled for the ascension of Hirohito's infant son if that meant the divine rights of
Emperors were respected. Then, too, the Emperor's political power was not absolute before and during
the war. Cabinet decisions had to be unanimous, despite the preferences of His Majesty. Hardliners
could have scuttled the surrender, had they chosen to, by resigning from the government. Instead
they made the choice to follow the Emperor's wishes and end the war - though they were not required
to.
(This of course brings into question the whole "ferocity" issue; if they fought so tenaciously on
behalf of their Emperor at Okinawa, why would they not also lay down their arms at his command?)
True, some ten percent of the American public favored continuing the war up to and including the
total extermination of the Japanese race. But Truman paid no political price for the retention of
Hirohito. Basically he finessed the diplomatic language of "unconditional," just as he could have at
any time prior to Hiroshima. The headline in the New York Times announcing the deal read:
"GI's in Pacific Go Wild With Joy: 'Let 'Em Keep Emperor,' They Say."
So Harry Truman is not guilty of the charge of "frying a bunch of Jap women and children to slake
the bloodlust of the voters back home." However, he is by no means proven innocent of frying a bunch
of Japanese women and children in pursuit of a geostrategic postwar rationale. And the question
which arises therefrom is: is that a war crime?
This mildly interesting thread of discussion began, you will recall, when the Ordained Faceplant
posted a bit of spam comparing US war crimes to those of Yugoslavia. MWAEDO then offered that he
agreed with the author regarding the culpability of Nixon, Kissinger and Johnson. However, he felt
that Harry Truman had committed a moral act by ending the war sooner than would otherwise have been
the case, thus saving the lives of those persons who would have died unnecessarily as fighting
continued while he had recourse to a method of concluding it.
We have examined the premise behind that assertion above. But what's also interesting about the
formulation is that Johnson, Kissinger and Nixon were simply following the logic of Hiroshima:
Compel a weaker but unyielding adversary to agree to your terms by an overwhelming application of
superior military technology. Thus you achieve militarily what you cannot (or will not) accomplish
through diplomacy.
One might argue that there is no moral equivalence between the two wars, as, unlike Japan, Vietnam
never attacked the United States. But the strategy is the same, even if the weaponry was different
(though one might also note that more than one US president considered the nuclear option against
the recalcitrant Vietnamese). And a war crime is a war crime whether the country committing it had
started the war in the first place or not. Then, too, one might argue, as I have above, that Japan
in August of 1945 was hardly an unbending opponent.
MWAEDO has also argued that the laws of war were annihilated prior to our entry into WWII, thus we
were not bound by them. Would he also argue that since laws against murder were flouted by hundreds
of lynchings in the Old South, that such laws need no longer apply? I should think not. That is, I
am absolutely certain that he believes no such thing.
Ironically, it was the brutal targeting of civilian populations which was part of our stated
rationale for said entry (and has been for virtually every war we have since initiated). Still more
ironically, we had soon perfected methods of aerial bombardment which made Guernica and Coventry
look like a genteel game of cricket. And even more ironically, while we were firebombing German
cities in order to demoralize the enemy, we somehow managed to avoid damaging the industrial
property of US-based multinational corporations located in enemy territory, a point to which I will
return below.
But the crux of the argument is that since all forces in the war targeted civilians, the targeting
of civilians at Hiroshima and Nagasaki is excused. The problem with that argument is that we did not
behave as if the war crimes of German and Japanese authorities were excused by the everybody-did-it
offense. We tried them and hanged them, and specifically prevented them from offering any of our war
crimes as evidence in their defense. Then we announced that the Nuremberg Principles were the basis
of international law by which we ourselves, as well as all other nations, would henceforth be bound.
This, of course, is part of the reason Henry Kissinger is a war criminal.
But the fact is that the laws of war were not annihilated by WWII; they were simply applied
selectively. The Geneva Conventions and other prewar treaties remained in place. And in fact, the
Japanese government, even as it surrendered, filed a protest with international authorities in
Switzerland pursuant to existing treaties:
"There is involved a bomb having the most cruel effects humanity has ever known, not only as far as
the the extensive and immense damage concerned, but also for reasons of the suffering endured by
each victim... Since the beginning of the present war, the American Government has declared on
various occasions that the use of gas or other inhuman means of combat were considered illegal in
the public opinion of civilized human society and that it would not avail itself of these means
before enemy countries resorted to them . The bombs in question, used by the Americans, by their
cruelty and by their terrorizing effects, surpass by far gas or any other arm the use of which is
prohibited by treaties for reasons of their characteristics..."
The complaint was forwarded by the Swiss to the appropriate authorities in the US, the lawyers and
diplomats in the Special War Problems Division. On 09/05/45, they recommended that no defense or
response whatsoever be offered, and that the "receipt of the Swiss memorandum be merely
acknowledged."
Well, that's all right, then. Quite the ringing endorsement of the morality of our actions.
One might argue that the Japanese had a lot of nerve filing a war crimes complaint after the Rape of
Nanking and the Bataan Death March and other such crimes. But their leaders were about to be put on
trial for their lives as a result of these actions. Did they have no right to expect equal justice
under the law?
Suppose that it was Japan, rather than the US, which first developed the Bomb, and that, in a
last-ditch attempt to prevent their collapse under the assault of our conventional forces, the
Empire of Japan dropped nuclear devices, first on Tucson, and then, not having heard a satisfactory
response from Washington within 72 hours, on Ashland. Are we to believe that, had Harry Truman
agreed to cease hostilities, that the actions of the Japanese would not have been war crimes? After
all, many thousands of lives would have been saved by preventing the US invasion of Japan.
Of course, if Harry Truman had instead pressed on and conquered Japan, whether by invasion or by
blockade and bombardment, along with the assistance of Russian troops on the Chinese front, it
strains credulity to believe that such a rationale would have been accepted for the utter
destruction of the civilian populations of Tucson and Ashland.
If the argument is that it was necessary to shock Japan into accepting our demands for unconditional
surrender, exactly where does one draw the line? If the Bomb had not been available in August, what
if we had used the biological weapons in our stockpiles, which FDR had refused to consider
employing? If they had ended the war, even with the indiscriminate destruction of civilian lives and
great suffering long after the end of hostilities, would that or would that not have been a war
crime?
Supposing that Harry Truman had decided against using germ warfare, but that instead, US forces
parachuted into Hiroshima and used flamethrowers to personally incinerate every man, woman and child
they could find? If the utter destruction of Hiroshima in that manner had allowed an early
conclusion to the war, would it then be something other than a war crime?
Allow me to quote from Philip Nobile, at
< http://www.tompaine.com/history/2000/08/01/16.html >:
"The framers of the Nuremberg Charter improvised the definition of "crimes against peace" and
"crimes against humanity," but their war crimes provision was in line with previous international
law on civilian bloodbaths:
"WAR CRIMES: namely, violations of the laws
or customs of war. Such violations shall
include, but are not limited to, murder,
ill-treatment or deportations to slave labor
or for any other purpose of civilian population
of or in occupied territory, murder or ill-treatment
of prisoners of war or persons on the seas, killing
of hostages, plunder of private or public
property, wanton destruction of cities, towns,
or villages, or devastation not justified by
military necessity.
"N.B. "Military necessity" is a term of art referring to emergency battle conditions in which armies
and navies are permitted under the laws of war to do terrible things to civilians and P.O.W.s --
soldiers during retreat, when taking or keeping prisoners would endanger operations, and when
submarines abandon survivors floating at sea to avoid attack. However, the term does not apply to
atrocities planned in advance thousands of miles from the front."
Now, military necessity is the key phrase here. I have already noted above that Truman's top
military advisers were virtually unanimous in their belief that the use of the Bomb was not
justified by military necessity. >From the Navy: Admirals Leahy, Nimitz, Halsey, Wagner, Radford and
Strauss, along with Chief of Naval Operations Ernest J. King. From the Air Force: Generals Arnold,
Eaker, LeMay (!), Spaatz and Chennault. From the Army: Generals MacArthur, Fellers, Bonesteel,
Clarke, Marshall, Bradley and Eisenhower. You can read quotations in support of this assertion at
< http://www.doug-long.com/guide1.htm >.
Most of these professionals did not offer similar objections to the destruction of cities in
Germany, or even to the firebombing of Tokyo. But when it came to using horrendous and
indiscriminate weapons of mass destruction on a defeated adversary, that's where they drew the line.
If an action causing massive destruction of civilian life is not justified by military necessity, it
is by definition a war crime, whether it speeds the end of the war or not. Given that there were
other methods available for speeding the end of the war, the trial of Harry Truman would have been a
most interesting one, with the testimony of all those gentlemen noted above.
Such a trial might have been expected to consider a few other questions:
Given that Japan had lost control of its airspace to the extent that the US felt safe in giving
advance warning before destroying cities by conventional bombardment, was the surprise nature of
the attack on Hiroshima justified by military necessity? General Marshall certainly didn't think
so. He argued strenuously for warning Japan about the capabilities of the Bomb, and for
demonstrating its use on a strictly military target if it was to be used at all. Marshall clearly
felt that none of the four cities selected as targets were remotely military in nature.
So the prosecutors in the Truman trial would also have to consider the defendant's claim that
Hiroshima was a military target. In my opinion they would have swiftly found that the defendant was
lying through his teeth. As previously noted, the fact that Hiroshima had not yet been destroyed by
conventional bombardment indicates that it had little strategic value. There were, in fact, some
war-related industrial plants within the city. In fact, the Interim Committee, which helped make
targeting decisions, recommended that "the most desirable target would be a vital war plant
employing a large number of workers and closely surrounded by workers' houses."
If you leave out the "vital" part, this has some resemblance to the city of Hiroshima, though the
statement is in itself a chilling documentation of intent to commit war crimes. But in point of
fact, the actual Ground Zero chosen was the exact center of town, which would cause maximum civilian
death and destruction, but left the war-related plants on the outskirts of town relatively
undamaged. Less than one percent of the casualties in Hiroshima were military personnel; in the case
of Nagasaki, that figure is less than one one-thousandth of one percent.
So the Truman Tribunal would also have to consider, even in the unlikely event the defendant were
somehow acquitted on charges of the wanton destruction of the city of Hiroshima, whether the
destruction of Nagasaki was an even greater offense against civilized human society.
My view is clear: both acts were war crimes. But if you like, there are exacerbating circumstances
in the case of Nagasaki. The Japanese War Council was sitting to discuss surrender at the very hour
the second bomb was dropped. And they did in fact decide to surrender on the 10th, so if the Bomb
had not been dropped in such haste, it might well have been canceled. The idea that a large nation
with a devastated infrastructure should conclude that momentous a political decision in two days is,
at best, a little impatient.
In fact, those advisors who counselled Truman that a modification in terms regarding the Emperor
would likely have provided an early end to the war also counselled that five or six weeks should be
allowed in order for the Japanese to process the decision. One might argue that more haste was
warranted in August of 1945, but at what interval would our alacrity have become unreasonable? What
if we bombed Nagasaki 48 hours after Hiroshima? Or 24 hours? Or twelve? Would it been a war crime if
we gave them two hours to make up their minds on the morning of the 6th? Wasn't their course clear
in any case?
In fact, the destruction of Hiroshima was was so utter and complete that it prevented information
from reaching the decision-makers in a timely fashion. Survey teams from the doomed city were
reporting to the Cabinet on the day Nagasaki was incinerated.
Secondly, the Nagasaki device, the Fat Man, was far more destructive than the Little Boy which nuked
Hiroshima. Only the fact that it missed its target by several miles prevented far greater loss of
life.
Third, the reason it missed its target is that the pilot disobeyed orders in order to make sure the
Bomb was dropped. A fuel pump had failed, so the plane had less range than usual. Orders were,
because the Bombs were in scarce supply, that none should be wasted by relying purely on radar, lest
they miss the heavily populated areas (!). The intended target, Kokura, was socked in, and the pilot
decided to press on to Nagasaki, the second choice. But that decision meant that he had to drop the
Bomb no matter what, since he didn't have enough fuel to get back to base with such a heavy payload.
Even though Nagasaki was cloudy as well, he spotted a break in the clouds and decided to drop his
nuke right there, which turned out to be well off the intended spot.
It seems clear that the pilot, perhaps under the orders of General Groves, was going to drop a nuke
on some city that day whether he could see what he was doing or not. Is that more or less of a war
crime than following orders and saving the Bomb for later?
One other thing: Truman never explicitly ordered the second bombing; he left it up to Groves, who
was hot to trot out the second, bigger nuke. After Nagasaki, even though Japan had not yet
surrendered, Truman then ordered an indefinite halt to any further nukings in order to give them
time to do so. He did not say that another day or two would be plenty of time. Although he did order
one last conventional bombardment of Tokyo to provide a "grand finale" to the war, apparently
finding himself not yet satisfied with the grandeur of his actions.
If you ask me, and I suppose a case could be made that you did, by ordering the wanton destruction
of two cities not justified by military necessity, without warning, and after rejecting more
peaceful methods for settling the conflict in question, by his actions the defendant Harry Truman is
guilty of two counts of war crimes.
Only one other question remains to be discussed in this brief sketch of the relevant issues: Since
World War II was a total war, who are we to judge the actions of its participants from our ivory
tower?
Well, one might note that there was hardly a shortage of contemporaneous observers willing to make
judgements, many of whom found the actions discussed above to be reprehensible (see opinions of
military participants mentioned previously). But another point to be made is that we have great deal
more information available to us now than did most folks at the time.
In my 07/05/01, I noted, just in passing:
> And just as we did with Germany and Italy, we went on to work with many
> of those same "extreme militarists" in the Fascist government in order to
> build our global capitalist empire in the Cold War and beyond. Funny how
> things work out sometimes.
MWAEDO responded:
> who the spooks in the OSS chose to associate with after the war,
> though no doubt a tragic and ongoing chapter in this nation's history, has
> no bearing on the discussion here.
In one sense, that's perfectly true, and if I could simply accept that then we could all go home
now. But in another sense, it does bear on our discussion here, because our spooks didn't wait until
the war was over to associate with fascist war criminals. Allen Dulles, the future CIA Director and
Warren Commission member, was secretly negotiating with Nazis in Switzerland (many of whom his Wall
Street law firm had represented before the war) behind FDR's back, and when Stalin got wind of that
(after FDR's death) one might argue that it helped to shape the current of the postwar world.
If it was clear to the Japanese that their cause was lost, it was also clear to the Germans early
on; many analysts felt their situation was hopeless as soon as the US enetered the war. According to
Kurt Reiss in The Nazis Go Underground, the German general staff began meeting in 1943 to discuss
postwar planning, particularly the preference, noted above, to surrender to the US rather than the
USSR. It seems clear in hindsight that the US and UK were willing to let Hitler and Stalin bleed
each other's armies for several years before contemplating an invasion of Europe; the wartime
correspondence of the Big Three leaders shows considerable consternation from the Russian leader at
what he perceived as stalling from his allies. When in 1945 German forces, pursuant to discussions
with Dulles, began redeploying to slow the advance of the Red Army. Stalin's suspicions were
confirmed.
The mainstream press is only now beginning to address the extent to which US multinationals like
Ford, GM, Standard Oil and IBM continued to do business with the Axis war machine during the war,
and the exemption of their European properties, noted above, from the general policy of Total War.
Much of this was discussed in Charles Higham's groundbreaking books American Swastika (Doubleday,
1985) and Trading With The Enemy (Delacourt, 1983). Some of this information was known at the time,
as in George Seldes' biography of Mussolini, Sawdust Caesar (Harper Bros., 1935) or his
indispensible Facts and Fascism (In Fact, 1943).
While the war was still raging in the Pacific, Nazi intelligence chief General Reinhard Gehlen was
in Fort Hunt, North Carolina negotiating an unprecedented secret treaty with the US government. This
made Gehlen our sole source of intelligence in Eastern Europe for nearly ten years, during which
time he helped to exacerbate tensions between the US and the USSR; under the terms of the treaty, if
Gehlen found a conflict of interest between his obligations to the US and his allegiance to Germany,
he was free to put the interests of his home country first.
Meanwhile, as Joe McCarthy howled about a network of Soviet spies which never numbered more than a
few hundred, thousands of expatriate Nazis were entering the United States, where they were to play
a not inconsiderable role in our political system which continues to this day. One might recall, for
instance, the minor controversy over Nazi war criminals in the 1988 campaign of the father of the
the current occupant of the White House.
And what, you may well ask, does any of this have to do with the discussion at hand? Simply this: it
illuminates the degree to which postwar geostrategic considerations bore on the decision to wait for
the atomic bomb to end the war, rather than relying on a Soviet declaration of war or other methods
available earlier. Truman, Byrnes and Groves clearly saw the bomb, among other things, as a
powerful instrument of diplomacy, and made decisions based on that belief. Alperovitz and others
provide far more evidence for this assertion than I am able to review here.
One might argue that their antipathy to the USSR was fully warranted, or one might argue that it
became a self-fulfilling prophecy, particularly due to the use of the Bomb. And that's why our
associations with fascists become relevant. It brings up the question of what our war aims really
were, which had to be a factor in the use of the Bomb.
It takes nothing away from the so-called Greatest Generation to observe that their monumental defeat
of armed fascism was also a struggle of competing colonial powers for dominance of the postwar
world. It does take something away from them to say that in that postwar world they then embraced
armed fascism in pursuit of strategic dominance in the economic sphere.
In the case of Japan, she sought her own economic sphere of influence in the prewar world, and the
US and UK waged economic warfare to prevent her from doing so. Then she waged military warfare to
establish her own colonial presence; many of her conquests initially welcomed the departure of
European colonialism, though they swiftly realized that Japanese colonialism was no better.
What's ironic is that after we had militarily defeated the Empire of Japan, we then rehabilitated
her fascist war criminals and politicians in pursuit of establishing an economic sphere of influence
for our new junior partner in the Pacific. To that end we installed a brutal kleptocracy in the
Phillippines, sponsored the killings of nearly a million civilians in Indonesia, installed a
military client regime in Korea, which we occupy to this day, and of course, waged thirty years of
war against the people of Vietnam to prevent them from establishing the government of their choice.
Thus is the world made safe for democracy.
In light of that, it's exceedingly difficult for me to believe that saving lives was the principal
motivation for the use of atomic warfare. As the saying goes, your mileage may vary.
In presenting these arguments, I have endeavored to mitigate the anticipated objection that their
sheer length makes rebuttal fruitless. I hope that by breaking them up into their constituent parts,
I might help facilitate consideration of each issue in due time. I of course encourage that as much
time be taken as is necessary, even if that should delay a prompt reply for a period of weeks or
months.
Given that scholars more learned than ourselves continue to debate some of these issues, I don't
entertain hope that I might have persuaded MWAEDO of the worth of my argument based merely on this
abbreviated presentation. I would, however, dare to speculate that my dear and valued friend might,
in his wisdom, perhaps concede that I have not deliberately closed my eyes to history, and that I do in fact
have some sort of case to make. If I can achieve that, then I feel my efforts here have not
been entirely in vain.
Thank you all for coming, and please drive safely.
