More than half of a decade after the United States of America dropped the Atomic Bomb on two cities in Japan in 1945, there is still an enormous debate over it. The decision to drop the Atom Bomb created a huge impact on Americans and forever changed the way that other nations view the United States. Gar Alperovitz’s book, The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, discusses many viewpoints of people involved with the decision before and after the bomb was dropped. This book makes it very apparent that there were many more sides to this huge decision that what most books tell. Some of the main arguments in Alperovitz’s book about the decision to drop the Atomic Bomb include whether or not it was really necessary, why an attack on civilians, and how does the United States justify using the Atom Bomb if they are against the notion of using chemical weapons. At the time the United States decided to drop the bomb, many felt that Japan would surrender within days; others felt it would be months. After the defeat of Germany, the war was near its end. Either way, surrender from World War II was in the near future.
The decision to drop the A-Bomb on the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan were first made because Hiroshima was consid

The use of the Atomic Bomb was not a wise long-term decision in diplomatical, political, and ethical terms. Internationally and domestically this was a bad choice because it brought the United States into the Cold War with Russia for about the next forty years. The Cold War put the United States into a world power stalemate

immediately after World War II. Decades were spent on the brink of war fighting about world power and communism. If the dropping of the Atomic Bomb never happened, the whole situation quite possibly could have been avoided. World power would not be such a problem and there would not be such an emphasis on who is the stronger nation. Politically, the dropping of the A-Bomb brought out an inhumane side of leaders around the world. Ethically, it was wrong to drop the bombs. How is it right to kill thousands of innocent civilians? People that did not parish fought to recover from severe physical and mental impairments. Many even were diagnosed with cancer from the strong radiation of the bombs. Why didn’t the United States think about the long-term effects, instead of acting so abruptly?

Though Arnold felt the dropping of the bomb was unnecessary, he felt there were political implications in the decision and he did not feel it was the military’s job to question it. Among some of the Air Force leaders, Major General Curtis E. LeMay said, “the atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war at all.” (Page 335).