As Albert Einstein had observed, "I do not believe that civilization will be wiped out in a war fought with the atomic bomb. Perhaps two-thirds of the people of the earth will be killed." Before the dropping of the atomic bomb President Truman should have carefully judged the cost of human life. Instead, Truman made the wrong decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki because bombing innocent civilians is a war crime and a naval blockade would have effectively ended the war with Japan.
President Truman had undeniably committed war crimes in Japan because of the bombings on civilians. Before the war, nations, including the United States had "condemned targeting civilians in bombing raids" at the Hague Convention of 1907 "by whatever means" on "undefended towns." By purposely using the atomic bomb on the innocent cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, hundreds of thousands of lives have been lost.
This image was selected as a picture of the week o...
Nagasaki, Japan. September 24, 1945, 6 weeks after...
Ground Zero marker in Nagasaki, JapanTruman's actions are no exception and he should be prosecuted to the fullest extent.
Secondly, because Japan was an island, only a naval blockade was needed to render an unconditional surrender. Since Japan was geographically isolated from their allies by the ocean, once a naval blockade had been placed, they would not be able to receive any aid. Hisatsune Sakomizu, Chief Secretary to the Cabinet of the Japanese government, observed, after the naval blockade had been placed, Japan had a horrible economy, supplies were lessening, starvation was occurring, and this weak country was ready to surrender. Clearly, there was no need for any additional damage to this fragile country.
Although mistakes may be made, decisions that may jeopardize the lives of many innocent people should be made with great consideration. Without much warning, more than 200,000 lives were lost in two days, and so, President Truman's choice to...
Truman's Decision
The author contends that in dropping the atomic bombs, Pr3esident Truman committed a war crime. The thesis that a simple naval blockade would have safely won the war is naive. The Japanese had thousands of POWs in Japan, and threatened with a blockade, they surely would have let these helpless men starve long before they gave up.
Military planners had been considering for months what would be required to break Japanese resistance, and had concluded that no option short of an invasion would be effective. While Hiroshima and Nagasaki did suffer 200,000 dead, an invasion would have cost ten times that number, so perhaps the bombing did make sense.
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