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Japan and the Atomic Bomb

 

            Victory in Japan, the battle of the Pacific is over, Japan surrenders. The allied powers had already beaten the Axis powers in the European theater, all that was left was the war in the Pacific. The Allied forces made the decision to drop an atomic bomb on the island of Japan with hopes of pushing the Japanese to surrender. It did not take just one atomic bomb, but two to force the country to surrender. The Japanese could have prevented the use of the atomic bombs by simply surrendering. The war had been going on for almost six years; the American Marines fighting in the Pacific had island hopped their way closer and closer to Japan. The Americans had a foothold close enough they were able to send bombers to obliterate Japan. "On July 26,the U.S., British, and Chinese governments jointly called on Japan to surrender or be destroyed the Japanese government refused " (Coffin, Stacy, Cole, Symes).
             The United States had already been firebombing Japanese cities killing thousands of civilians. When a country is attacking cities killing mainly non-military personnel, what could have been expected when the attacking country offers a way out? All the United States did was instead of dropping hundreds of bombs to destroy a city they dropped one. The United States, British, and Chinese governments told them if they did not surrender they would be destroyed, not invaded or bombed a little, they would be destroyed. The United States was just keeping its promise when they dropped the atomic bombs on Hiroshima, and Nagasaki. Hiroshima was bombed on August sixth, and Nagasaki on the ninth. There were three days between the bombings for Japan to surrender, but they chose not to. After seeing what the United States was capable of (which was destroying a city with a single bomb) it was irresponsible for Japan not to surrender. .
             A big argument against using the bomb was that Japan was close to surrendering and would not have lasted much longer if the war had continued.


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