August 6th, 1945 marks the beginning of a new age: the nuclear age. President Truman had just been appointed President after the death of F.D.R in april of 1945, and the Japanese army was not willing to back down . Truman would have been notified of the Manhattan Project, a nuclear arms development that included Albert Einstein, the day he entered office. Thus, President Truman had just under 6 months between the learning of the U.S.’s atomic bomb and his decision to employ it. Between the nearing invasion of Japan, accompanied with the high death toll; and the Japanese instillment of no-mercy , Truman’s decision can be justified and labeled as as one of homage to his country, and the dead men who fought for the allied cause. “Downfall,” codename …show more content…
Effectively, the speech laid end to world war 2. The interesting aspect with the speech is that, verbatim, the word “surrender” is not found. The Japanese idea of not surrendering can even be found in a surrender speech. This no-mercy ideology evolves from the Bushido Code, a code created by the Samurai Class in Feudal Japan that lays guidelines to the way a warrior must fight. In the Bushido Code were several virtues: bravery, justice, courage, respect, honesty, wisdom, and honor. Because of the way that current emperors and military leaders looked into the past for answers, the Bushido Code remained alive and well in the minds of the Japanese. They felt that if they were to surrender, they would be dishonoring the Code. They believed wholeheartedly that dying and losing was far better than being alive and losing. This allowed for the brutality of the Japanese army, one example being the kamikaze attacks, a suicidal attack achieved by crashing your plane into enemies. Because of the attitude of no-surrender that was instilled in the minds of japanese soldiers and leaders, American leaders saw no alternative. Truman was left with two options: To lay ends to the war with the most powerful bomb man had ever seen, effectively ending the war and saving lives, or invading Japan and witnessing multiple casualties from both sides. In the end, Truman did what he thought was best with the knowledge he had at the time: dropping the