Was America Justified in Dropping the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945?
Essay by deakie1 • May 16, 2016 • Term Paper • 733 Words (3 Pages) • 1,960 Views
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Was America justified in dropping the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945?
On August 6th 1945 at 8:16 am (Japanese time) the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, killing over 135 000 people. Before the bomb was dropped the Allies (Britain, France, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, India, Soviet Union, China and United States of America.) were all fighting against the Axis Powers (Germany, Japan and Italy). The United States of America were never officially a part of WWII but after Japan bombed Pearl Harbour (which killed over 148 000 people) the United States of America entered the war and fought back against Japan.
During the war Japan “accidentally” bombed Pearl Harbour which at the time was part of Hawaii which was in the south of America this killed over 148 000 people which means the bombing at Pearl Harbour killed 13 000 more innocent people than the bombing at Hiroshima did. After the bombing at Pearl Harbour the US wanted a quick and easy ending to the war, they had two bombs newly created and they figured that Japan would have to surrender which would be an end to the Second World War. America thought that the bomb would stop all the suffering and kill less people than the war would do if it carried on. They all knew that if the bombs weren't used then they would be pointless. Many people across the world agreed that the bomb was justified as it was the only way to stop the war because Japan was going to invade the US. If they didn't drop the bomb no one knows who could have won the war. The Second World War was and still is known as ‘The fight for humanity’.
The Atomic Bomb a.m. Little Boy Bomb killed thousands of hundreds of innocent people whose lives didn't need to be taken away especially children's lives. There was no way to prevent the bomb from destroying Hiroshima because there was never a demonstration of the bomb to show how much damage it was going to cause but it would have killed less if they had just dropped in on the military base of Japan instead of obliterating the whole of Hiroshima and taking more lives than needed. The Japanese were going to surrender anyway because they were running out of resources and soldiers to fight but because America and Russia did not accept a conditional surrender Japan got punished for wanting to keep their Emperor, they could have either accepted the terms or carried on fighting instead of obliterating the whole city with a bomb. The bomb was also illegal which made it even worse to use as they had already been warned that they would destroy countries because of the amount of power they stored. The bomb wasn't meant to be used to defeat Japan it was mainly to scare Russia and show the world what they were capable of.
There are many ways to look at this in a way of the bomb being justifiable. In history there are always two sides to the story so no one knows for certain whether it was justifiable or not but this is a choice you have to make by yourself. I do not think that the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was justifiable because they had no right to obliterate the city of Hiroshima just because Japan refused to surrender unless they got to keep their emperor. They set off two bombs one in Hiroshima (Little Boy) and one in Nagasaki (Fat Man). America did not know how much damage these bombs would cause because they never tested them out. I think that if they had tested them out they would never have dropped the bomb and the people and cities of Japan would not have to be ruined.
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