Atomic Bomb Dbq Analysis

The two atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima (Aug. 6) and Nagasaki (Aug. 9) totaled to almost 200,000 Japanese casualties (Document A). President Harry Truman decided to use this horrific weapon considered to be immoral despite other options to force Japan to surrender, ending the second world war. On June 6th, 1945, the Japanese War Council stated, “we shall -- thanks to the advantages of our terrain and the unity of our nation, prosecute the war until the bitter end” (Document C). Japan had no intentions to surrender until absolutely necessary. This statement is supported through when Japan surrendered. The use of a second atomic bomb was because Japan did not surrender after the first. This is why the option to only demonstrate the atomic bomb to Japan would not have worked (Document E). A demonstration would not have brought Japan to the bitter end like the two bombs being dropped on their cities did. The other options presented to Truman included a mainland invasion as well as a blockade combined with traditional bombing. …show more content…
The obvious negative effects of using the atomic weapons were the extremely high civilian casualty rate for Japan and the immorality of using such a weapon. The use of the bombs would also introduce them to the rest of the world, starting other countries race for nuclear weapons. While there were some negative consequences to using the atomic bombs, there were also negatives to not using them. Almost $2,000,000,000 were spend developing the atomic weapons (Document I). That two trillion dollars would have gone to waist if they were not used on