Overall, the work is worth reading and is recommendable for students and scholars with interest in the Truman administration, atomic warfare and weapons, the second world war, relations between the US and the Soviet, and those curious of knowing the reasons that led to Truman’s decision to use two atomic bombs on
President Harry Truman was a successful president by definition. He was thrust into power as the thirty-third president of the United States after the rapid decline of President Theodore Roosevelt's health. This paper is organized around several major successes of President Truman, but mainly focusing on his twenty-one point plan of reform, also known as The Fair Deal, and the Manhattan Project. In regard to Richard Neustadt’s terms, a president should be evaluated on his or her ability to persuade. Put simply, it does not matter if any adversaries disagree if you are able to persuade them otherwise.
Exigence: Truman focuses on details that you wouldn’t think he would focus on such as the description of the town. The main focus I think Truman focuses on is the background of the murderers such as Dick with his car crash that his father believed was at fault for him committing these crimes. Truman spends a lot of the book focused on Perry’s past with his alcoholic mother and mentally abusive father and the abuse he endured as a child especially in the children’s home by the nun he makes it a prominent factor of the murder. As Dr.Jones believed these experiences lead Perry to killing without motive.
President Truman and the rest of the political party were hoping that the atomic bomb would be America’s trump card while dealing with war. Germany was the main target that the United States wanted to hit but they have already surrendered so the only target that was left was Japan. Albert Einstein had written President Roosevelt to let him know that there was a nuclear chain reaction had a great potential for mass destruction. President Truman and the rest of the political party were hoping that the atomic bomb would be America’s trump card while dealing with war. Germany was the main target that the United States wanted to hit but they have already surrendered so the only target that was left was Japan.
What Should Truman Do? - Vice Pres. Barkley You are Vice President Alben Barkley. In a moment, you and President Truman will be hearing from a committee of advisors regarding how America should end the war with Japan. As each advisor presents, take detailed notes on what they are recommending.
The reason they say that Truman decided to drop the atomic bombs was so that they could try to get ahead of the Soviet Union. Gar Alperovitz is one of the most popular advocators for this reason. He stated that Truman dropped the bombs to demonstrate the power of America, and so that Russia could not enter the war to get new territorial acquisitions. If the Soviet Union was allowed to enter the war, then they could get some of the Japanese assets in China, which would have favored Russia greatly. Alperovitz’s conclusion was that Truman did this “to convince the Russians to accept the American plan for a stable peace”(Harry).
Document 26.3 titled, "The Truman Doctrine" was published in Washington D.C. by the Government Printing Office in 1963 (Document 26.3, pg. 574). In this document, President Truman appeals to congress (the audience) for Greece and Turkey to prevent the spread of communism in the two nations. The post World War II doctrine, announced on March 12th, 1947 was an American foreign policy used to prevent the spread of Soviet Imperialism that would soon become one of the foundations of the U.S containment policies (Twentieth Century World, pg. 242). This action can be viewed as a possible declaration of the Cold War and can be seen in the sentence, ”The controversial Truman Doctrine, as it came to be called, committed the United States to an active
“In 1994, the Soviets tested an atom bomb of their own.” (History.com Staff, "Cold War History"). This act caused President Truman to spend more money on the army and defense of the United States and panic and hysteria spread to the minds of the people of our country. “...and the world lived under the threat of thermonuclear war for the first time.” (History.com Staff, "Soviets explode atomic bomb").
While this may be true of a president’s duties to their country, morally, Truman still should have weighed the potential damage the bombs would cause on a global scale. Knowing that the United States, a dominant nation, could conquer the Japanese with ease, he should not have used a weapon of mass destruction on the innocent citizens of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The defense used this repeatedly to support their claims and offered no variation to their rationalizations of Truman’s actions. I feel that in this case, the defense team did little to truly justify the dropping of the atomic bombs. In essence, the ineffectiveness of their argument and their hackneyed statements used to explain the president’s actions did not provide enough evidence to clear his name and wash his hands of
The U.S. carelessly made decisions about the atomic bomb and how it would be used. The United State’s main focal point was to assure that Japan will surrender but the U.S. never thought about the outcomes and how it would affect Japan. Doc A states, “Truman believed that it was his duty as president to use every weapon available to save American lives.” This reveals how the president selfishly made this decision thinking only about his nation’s safety while not even considering the lives that would be deeply affected in Japan. Document A again explains how American officials were already debating on how to use the atomic bomb without even knowing how this powerful bomb would work.
He wanted to end the war before the Soviet Union had a chance to intervene. However, President Truman stated in his diary that he only wanted the bomb to be used on military targets. He believed that the United States had a moral obligation to take the moral high ground (Dannen,
New to the presidential office, Truman was presented with the decision of whether to drop the atomic bomb, a choice that today is viewed as controversial, but which at the time was well-received by an American population tired of war. The unexpected death of beloved president FDR placed a difficult burden on Truman to fulfill the expectations of the public when he was inadequately prepared or informed. Thus, he refrained from interrupting the existing plans put into place by the predecessor he admired so greatly, and allowed the momentum of the atomic bomb to continue. Additionally, the amount of resources devoted by the American and British governments to the development of the atomic bomb made Truman reluctant to halt the operation at its
With this bomb we have added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing power of our armed forces. In their present form these bombs are now in production and even more powerful forms are in development.” (Truman 1) By educating the audience, the audience can understand and have more knowledge about why the dropping of the atomic bomb was necessary for society and other countries. By stating repetition and tone, Truman can back up his claim that the atomic bomb saved more lives and shortened the
Despite the slogan proclaimed in Truman's speech about "the US support of free people in their struggle against armed minorities or external pressure,"(Containment and the Cold War: American foreign policy since 1945, the US support was, depending on the region, more or less. In addition, it should be noted that the permission of these free peoples to use military force to protect their freedom was not always asked. In general, it should be noted that Europe was the priority region for deterrence policy. From the point of view of strategic and economic importance, Europe stood in the first place.
This way, the Potsdam conference began two days after the latter was successfully tested on July 15th 1945. At Potsdam, Truman mentioned to Stalin that USA had “a new weapon of unusual destructive force” (Zhukov, 1971). Despite this, Stalin did not doubt the nature of the craft and its diplomatic weight at the conference was not the one expected (Dobbs, 2013). It appeared at Potsdam that the atomic experience was not enough.
