Should We Have Dropped The Atomic Bomb On Hiroshima And Nagasaki

Should We Have Used The Atomic Bomb On Hiroshima and Nagasaki Ever since August 6th, 1945 we have been questioning ourselves on the decision that Harry S. Truman made to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This resulted in the surrender of Japan and finished the Pacific Ocean Theater of World War ll. It is said that Truman wanted to end the war quickly without American casualties, for the Allies just defeated the Axis powers. Truman before ever using the atomic bombs said in response to a Georgia Senator, who suggested to use as many atomic bombs as possible,
“I know that Japan is a terribly cruel and uncivilized nation in warfare, but I can't bring myself to believe that because they are beasts, we should ourselves act in that

Truman had other options than the atomic bomb and one of them is Operation Downfall a.k.a the invasion of Japan. Operation Downfall would have been a go if we never used the atomic bomb. Invading Japan would’ve been lunacy because America just finished defeating Nazi Germany and would have to know invade Japan with an exhausted military. Japan would also be a difficult country to invade due to their code of honor. “Japanese soldiers brought antique samurai swords into battle and made suicidal “banzai” attacks according to the Bushido principle of death before dishonor or defeat.” (history.com). This meant that most every soldier and citizen of Japan would have fought to their death. Militaryhistorynow.com stated “Both sides braced for heavy casualties. The U.S. military, expecting resistance by a “fanatically hostile population,” made preparations for between 1.7 and 4 million casualties with up to 800,000 dead. Between 5 and 10 million Japanese deaths were projected.” This being compared to the highest estimate of Japanese killed by the atomic bombs, which is 226,000 from blast and radiation, shows the ginormous gap between the number of those killed by the bomb and the number of those who could’ve been by the invasion. Although it still killed some people and citizens in the end it did save many lives on both

surrender of the Bataan Peninsula on the main Philippine island of Luzon to the Japanese during World War II (1939-45), the approximately 75,000 Filipino and American troops on Bataan were forced to make an arduous 65-mile march to prison camps. The marchers made the trek in intense heat and were subjected to harsh treatment by Japanese guards. Thousands perished in what became known as the Bataan Death March.” (history.com).
The Japanese promised not to treat the American POWs poorly, but that wasn’t the case. They starved, were beaten, and killed by the Japanese or disease. These are the three best examples of Japan’s vilesy that support the atomic bombs being used as payback. A common rebuttal is that Truman should have chosen to use the atomic bombs in unpopulated areas to scare the Japanese into surrendering. As Richard Overy believes “...it was clearly not moral to use this weapon knowing that it would kill civilians and destroy the urban milieu.” While this would be a good idea if it were have to work since there would be little to no casualties, but Japan would not of surrendered. Evidence for this is after the first bomb which was dropped on Hiroshima, a populated city with around 350,000, but that still didn't urge the Japanese military to surrender or deter them. America decided to drop another one on Nagasaki a few days later, which also is fairly populated at around 240,000. Even After the second bomb on Nagasaki, Japan still wasn’t