Pros of Dropping the Atomic Bomb

Pro’s of Dropping the Bomb

The pros for dropping the bomb are that the war ended faster when Japan saw how devastating the atomic bomb was. The atomic bomb leveled both Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If the United States had not dropped the atomic bomb on Japan, then the United States would have been forced to invade Japan, which was making preparations for the invasion. The thought process with dropping the bomb was that it would save hundreds of thousands of American soldiers lives. With dropping the atomic bomb, the United States had to be the one’s making the atomic bomb. So even though many lives were lost in using this weapon, with the United States developing it first, this helped in preventing other nations developing it first, which may have led to an atomic bomb being used on us. Many Japanese civilians were reported starving to death and this was a result of the Japanese Army taking all of the food, leaving little left for regular families. By dropping the atomic bomb, there was the tragedy of civilians dying, however with a drawn out war with Japan, how many of those civilians would have died from starvation? Would it have been more than the casualties lost by the atomic bomb? Another pro was that after dropping the atomic bomb, all POW soldiers were released from Japan! With the atomic bomb, The United States would become a superpower. The United States had always tried to keep peace, and having the atomic bomb gave it the leverage needed, as other nations saw the devastation created by this weapon, which ha led to negotiations and peace talks rather than war.

My Opinion

My opinion is that I am in favor of the atomic bomb being dropped on Japan. This was a tough decision to make in using a bomb that causes so much devastation and death. I used the internet and read a book and had talks with family members to try to understand what was happening during this time in the world. By saying I am in favor of dropping the bomb is not saying I am in favor of killing innocent people, but at the time, President Truman had to make a decision and chose to save American lives. It is easy to say that this is not the right decision, but it is my opinion that you can’t make a simple judgment on whether the atomic bomb should be or shouldn’t be dropped in 2010, because you have to go with what people knew then and what was going on in the war in 1945. What we know has actual fact is, on August 6, 1945, a 8,900 LB atomic bomb named Little Boy was dropped on Hiroshima and killed between 90,000 and 165,000 people. On August 9^th, a 10,200 LB atomic bomb named Fat Man was dropped on Nagasaki and Killed between 60,000 and 80,000. The number of people that were killed over just three days was shocking. I talked to my family about how many people died from dropping two bombs. What I remember from that talk that helped me in trying to figure out if I was in favor of dropping the bomb or not was something my Dad asked me. He said with the research I would have to make my own decision, but sometimes we have to step back and look at it from the outside. This bomb was created for use in 1945. He asked me, what if we had the bomb for use in 1941, when the United States was pulled into the war. How many civilians and soldiers were killed in the war up to the point of the United States deciding it was going to drop the atomic bomb? Would you drop the bomb in 1941, killing the amount of people that was killed in the dropping of 1945, if you knew it would end the war and you would prevent possibly millions of people dying in a drawn out war? Would you cause devastation to an area so bad that it becomes unlivable for many years to come? People have to make their decisions on what they research. With this website, I am just showing why my side of the debate is in favor of dropping an atomic bomb. Seeing how fast Japan surrendered after using the bombs, made me think of what if we had the bombs in 1941. According to the Hitler Historical Museum (1996-1999), an estimated 56,125,262 civilians and military lost their lives in World War II. If using the bomb in 1941 would have prevented losing that many people then I am in favor of dropping the bomb. Also understand that I am discussing dropping an atomic bomb in the 1940’s and not launching a nuclear missile in 2010. With other countries having some of the same weapons, there doesn’t seem to be any kind of winner if everyone is launching nuclear weapons at each other. The decision is hard to have to pick a side of something so bad. If your for it, then a lot of people lose their life and the land is devastated. If your against it, then the possibility of losing countless American soldiers is there to deal with.