JAPAN: Hiroshima and the Bomb

Stephen Read comments:

"The Trinity test explosion was July 16, 1945, more than two months after Germany's surrender. I do not believe that decision-making analyses properly highlight the rapidity of the events that followed. I am not qualified to judge the merits of the belief that an invasion would cost up to 1,000,000 US casualties, but in the summer there were deep concerns about morale and the possibility of mutinies in the reassignment of combat divisions from Europe to the Far East.

The Los Angeles County Medical Association's monthly newsletter published a reminiscence relevant to the Japanese perceptions about the bomb. They portrayed a serious deficiency in information about Hiroshima reaching high levels of government-- obviously infrastructure was ablated, Japan had become familiar with devastating air raids, and there was little awareness that this represented a new type of weapon.

The article went on to attribute to one of Hirohito's personal physicians, who happened to live near Hiroshima and who was among the first Japanese to recognize the novelty of the weapon (he had an appreciation of nuclear physics and learned that there was high radiation at the site), with conveying to the Emperor the import of the event. Hirohito was then credited with impressing on the government the enormity of the destruction they faced and the importance of surrender.

To the extent this scenario is accurate, of course, the Nagasaki bomb was substantially irrelevant. How much other input was available, either through internal Japanese analysis or via indirect channels, would also obviously bear on this question. It is also quite likely that the US had only a very vague idea about the structure of Japanese government decision-making and few links."

Ronald Hilton - 8/17/00