Dropping the Atomic Bomb
On the early morning of December 7, 1941, the Japanese without any formal warning attacked Pearl Harbor. It was an American port in the Pacific, which sheltered most of America's pacific naval power. The Japanese had an idea that a war could be won by attacking the enemy before actually declaring war. Many unsuspecting military personnel and their families were killed on that morning. The name Pearl Harbor is a name for "Japanese quilt and shame" ("Hiroshima 1945" 3). To redeem itself on August 6, 1945 at 8:15 AM, America dropped "a bomb called 'Little Boy' weighing more than four metric tons" (Engelhardt 76) on Hiroshima, Japan, causing mass destruction. The names Hiroshima and Nagasaki are names for "American guilt and shame" ("Hiroshima 1945" 3), but for good reasons. The Japanese were being "'repaid many fold'" for attacking "without warning at Pearl Harbor...[for starving]...[beating] and [executing] American prisoner of war" Truman said ("Hiroshima: Harry Truman"). People often look to the "ashes of Hiroshima and Nagaskai" (Engelhardt 75) to find the answer to why the bomb was dropped, but "the real answers lay in thousands of graves from Pearl Harbor to Normandy and back again" (Engelhardt 76). President Truman was
A large amount of money and energy went into the manufacturing of the atomic bomb or A-bomb. The A-bomb was the very latest development in the long history of destructive technology. It took the "construction of a virtual city in an American desert, two billion dollars of government funds, years of intense work by an army of scientists and technicians to create, produce, and deliver" this tremendous explosive device (Engelhardt 76). If the American people would have known that two billion dollars of their tax money was used to build such a weapon, not used to destroy the enemy, and even more American lives were lost, then the American people would have started to second-guess their government's leadership abilities. The question in many Americans' minds would have been why was such a destructive weapon built in the first place? Scientists and other officials would not build such a device just for sheer amusement. And these scientists did have a reason for building such a massive bomb. If the United States did not build the atomic bomb, then the Germans would have beaten them to the punch. Inventing the bomb first "was a matter of avoiding [their] own possible destruction" ("Hiroshima 1945" 3). The United States had to be the first to develop the bomb because they are the peace-loving country. They would use to bomb to end the war, not cause more terror, like the Germans. The development of the bomb and the funds used for its development were justified by President Truman's detonation of the bomb. Not only did the atomic bomb end the war more quickly, bit it also saved countless American and Japanese lives. In several battles before the bombing, numerous lives were lost. On the night of March 9-10, American aircraft struck Tokyo with incendiary bombs and napalm containers. An estimated, 170,000 residents were killed in "a fiery vortex that reached 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit" and left over one million homeless ("Hiroshima" 383). Another battle that was very devastating was the battle for Okinawa. When the eighty-two day battle was over on June 29, 1945, "110,000 Japanese troops had died...and 100,000 civilians were killed" ("Hiroshima" 383). There were more civilian deaths in both battles alone than "in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined" ("Hiroshima" 383). The overall American casualties at Okinawa were almost 50,000, "the highest ever in taking a Japanese island" ("Hiroshima" 383).
Some common words found in the essay are:
President Truman, A-bomb A-bomb, American Japanese, Pearl Harbor, Furthermore Truman, II Japanese, Hiroshima Nagasaki, Attack Force, Harbor American, President Truman's, atomic bomb, hiroshima 383, president truman, hiroshima harry truman, american lives, 1945 3, hiroshima 1945, hiroshima harry, harry truman, bomb dropped, pearl harbor, hiroshima 1945 3, drop atomic bomb, shame hiroshima 1945, american lives hiroshima,
Approximate Word count = 1643
Approximate Pages = 7 (250 words per page double spaced)
|
