Were the Atomic Bombs Needed to End WWII? The Debate

Were the atomic bombs needed to end the Second World War? Historians still disagree. One school argues that Japan was already beaten and close to surrender in the summer of 1945, that softer surrender terms or the Soviet entry into the war could have ended it within weeks, and that political aims, especially impressing the Soviet Union, shaped the decision. Another school argues that Japan's military leaders were preparing to fight on and that the bombs, together with the Soviet attack, broke the deadlock in Tokyo. This article sets out the first case, which a widely shared 2015 essay made strongly, checks its key claims, and explains the main counter-arguments so you can judge for yourself.

The essay this page is based on was written by the blogger behind Washington's Blog and republished by Global Research and Films For Action. Its central point is that many senior American commanders said, during or after the war, that the bombings were militarily unnecessary.

The basic facts

On 26 July 1945 the Allies issued the Potsdam Declaration, demanding Japan's unconditional surrender and warning of prompt destruction if it refused. It did not mention a new weapon, and it said nothing about the future of the emperor. On 6 August the B-29 Enola Gay dropped the uranium bomb "Little Boy" on Hiroshima. Two days later the Soviet Union declared war on Japan and invaded Manchuria. On 9 August the plutonium bomb "Fat Man" exploded over Nagasaki.

Estimates of deaths by the end of 1945 range from about 90,000 to 166,000 in Hiroshima and 60,000 to 80,000 in Nagasaki, the great majority of them civilians. Emperor Hirohito broke a deadlock in his government and announced surrender in a radio broadcast on 15 August, mentioning a new and cruel bomb. Japan kept its emperor, a point that matters a great deal in the debate below.

What senior US commanders later said

The most striking part of the argument is the list of military leaders who doubted the bombings.

• The US Strategic Bombing Survey, which studied the air war, concluded in 1946 that Japan would very probably have surrendered before 1 November 1945, and certainly before the end of that year, even without the atomic bombs, the Soviet entry or an invasion.
• Dwight D. Eisenhower, then commanding Allied forces in Europe, wrote in his 1963 memoir Mandate for Change that when Secretary of War Henry Stimson told him about the bomb in July 1945, he voiced serious misgivings, believing Japan was already defeated. In a 1963 Newsweek interview he put it bluntly: "it wasn't necessary to hit them with that awful thing."
• Admiral William Leahy, chief of staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, wrote in his memoir I Was There that the bomb was "of no material assistance in our war against Japan", arguing that the naval blockade and conventional bombing had already done the job, and condemning the targeting of civilians on moral grounds.
• General Douglas MacArthur, according to the journalist Norman Cousins in The Pathology of Power, said he had not been consulted and saw no military justification. His biographer William Manchester, in American Caesar, writes that MacArthur thought the war might have ended sooner had the US promised that the emperor could stay.
• Admirals Ernest King and Chester Nimitz both made statements after the war suggesting Japan was already defeated; Nimitz said the bomb played no decisive part from a purely military point of view.
• General Curtis LeMay, who ran the firebombing campaign, told reporters that the atomic bomb "had nothing to do with the end of the war at all." The original essay said he made this remark before the bombings; in fact it came at a press conference in September 1945, after Japan had surrendered.

Civilian officials made similar points. Assistant Secretary of War John J. McCloy, as recorded by his biographer Kai Bird in The Chairman, believed Japan might have accepted the Potsdam terms had they promised a constitutional monarchy. Paul Nitze, vice chairman of the Bombing Survey, wrote in From Hiroshima to Glasnost that he expected Japan to give in by November 1945 without an invasion. Under Secretary of the Navy Ralph Bard (spelled "Bird" in some versions of the essay) urged a warning before any use. Former president Herbert Hoover is reported to have believed that peace feelers from Tokyo could have been followed up months earlier. Intelligence officer Ellis Zacharias and Brigadier General Carter Clarke are quoted in Gar Alperovitz's The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb and other sources as calling the bombings unnecessary.

Why cities, and why without warning?

Some officials who accepted using the bomb wanted it used differently. Lewis Strauss, an aide to Navy Secretary James Forrestal, later said he had proposed a demonstration over an unpopulated forest near Tokyo so Japanese observers could see its power. General George Marshall, according to contemporary notes, suggested first striking a purely military target and then warning civilians to leave industrial areas.

A group of Manhattan Project scientists led by James Franck made a similar case in the Franck Report of 1945, submitted to the government's Interim Committee, which advised the president. (The essay says it went to the "secretary of defense", a post that did not exist until 1947.) The scientists warned that a surprise attack would cost the United States world support and set off an arms race. Albert Einstein, whose 1939 letter helped start the bomb programme but who did not work on it, later said most scientists had opposed sudden use.

Target choice is also debated. The Target Committee picked cities that had been left largely untouched by conventional raids, partly so the bomb's effects could be measured. Kyoto was removed from the list at Stimson's insistence because of its cultural importance. Hiroshima did contain military sites, including the headquarters of the Second General Army, but most of the dead were civilians.

The Cold War explanation

If the bombs were not needed, why use them? Historians in the "revisionist" school, led by Gar Alperovitz, argue that diplomacy towards Moscow played a major role. The Potsdam conference had ended in mutual suspicion, Soviet armies held much of Eastern Europe, and some of Truman's advisers hoped an atomic monopoly would give the US leverage. In 2005 New Scientist reported that historians Peter Kuznick and Mark Selden argued Truman's main motive was to limit Soviet expansion in Asia. Journalist John Pilger made a similar case in The Guardian in 2008.

Timing feeds the suspicion: the bombs fell just as the Soviet attack was due. Historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa goes further and argues that the Soviet declaration of war, not the bombs, was the decisive shock, because it ended Tokyo's hope that Moscow would mediate a softer peace.

The case on the other side

This is where the 2015 essay is one-sided. It says historians agree the bomb was not needed, but the scholarly picture is more divided than that.

• Tokyo was deadlocked. Even after both bombs and the Soviet invasion, Japan's six-member Supreme War Council was split three to three, with the army leaders insisting on conditions beyond keeping the emperor. Only Hirohito's personal intervention broke the deadlock, and some officers then attempted a coup to stop the surrender broadcast.
• Japan was planning a decisive battle. Richard B. Frank's book Downfall uses decoded Japanese communications to show the military was massing troops on Kyushu for "Ketsu-Go", a plan to inflict losses so heavy that the US would offer better terms.
• The Bombing Survey has critics. Several historians argue its "no bomb needed" conclusion went beyond its own evidence and assumed that devastating firebombing and blockade would have continued, which would also have killed huge numbers of civilians.
• Memories shifted. Some later statements by commanders are not matched by what they said or wrote in 1945. For example, notes by Stimson's aide record the meeting with Eisenhower without mentioning a protest, and historians such as Robert Maddox question how accurately later memoirs reflect wartime views.

Even J. Samuel Walker, often quoted on the "bomb not needed" side, wrote in 2005 that the controversy was certain to continue, framing the real question as whether the bomb was needed to win quickly on terms acceptable to the US.

Common myths on both sides

• "The bomb saved a million American lives." That figure appeared after the war. Planning estimates in 1945 varied widely, and some were far lower, though others were also very high.
• "Japan had already offered to surrender." Japan was seeking Soviet mediation and some leaders wanted peace, but there was no formal offer the US could have accepted before August.
• "Everyone in the military opposed it." Many objections were voiced afterwards. In 1945 itself, no member of the Joint Chiefs formally advised Truman against the bomb.

Weighing the evidence

What is clear is that Japan was militarily beaten by summer 1945, that its leaders were divided on how to end the war, that US officials knew the emperor question mattered, and that alternatives such as a demonstration, a warning or clearer terms were discussed and set aside. What remains disputed is whether any of those alternatives would have produced a surrender as quickly. Reading the primary sources each side cites, rather than any single essay, is the best way to form your own view.

Sources: Original essay by Washington's Blog, via Global Research and Films For Action; Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Wikipedia; Debate over the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Wikipedia; Richard B. Frank, Downfall (Penguin Random House).

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