UWEC
Blum, Philip James
3/5/2013
Copyright for this work is owned by the author. This digital version is published by McIntyre
Library, University of Wisconsin Eau Claire with the consent of the author.

Abstract ......................................................................................................................................................... i
Introduction .............................................................................................................................................. 1
The Dawning of a New Era ................................................................................................................... 3
Moral Capacity……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………4
American Public Opinion in the Immediate Aftermath .............................................................................. 5
Religious Response ................................................................................................................................... 6
Racial Perspectives……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………13
World Government? .......................................................................................................................... 16
Government Transgressions……………………………………….............................................................................18
The Military is No Democracy…………………………………………………………………………………….………….…………22
Racial Perspectives…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….23
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………28

Abstract
This event bound Americans together in their experience of it because it was a unique event in human history. American’s reacted to the atomic bombing with a range of emotions; some were convinced of man’s irresponsibility. They deplored its use and protested the existence of something with so great an indiscriminate killing power. Others were more optimistic, sure that man’s rational nature assured an end to war, and that the future technical improvement of nuclear energy would lead to an abandonment of coal, oil, and falling water.
Among these diverse concerns and remonstrations raised is the United States government influencing the way the story was reported in the media through censorship, journalistic preference, and wide propaganda powers. Enforced via the Espionage Act, an enormous amount of information related to the atomic bombing as well as the effects of radiation was withheld or otherwise partially explicated. i

Introduction
The American people woke up in cities all across America on August 7 th
, 1945 and read in their newspapers and were read on the radio a statement by President Harry Truman. Time
Magazine summarizes this presidential statement, “Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base. That bomb had more power than 20,000 tons of TNT. … It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe…. What has been done is the greatest achievement of organized science in history…” 1
While nobody knew the exact future power of nuclear energy, it was recognized that the atomic bomb was arguably the most important scientific achievement since fire. Humanity’s destructive capability rocketed to frightening and unknown levels.
“Now I am become death; the destroyer of worlds.” J. Robert Oppenheimer quoted the
Bhagavad Gita
2
when he uttered those immortal words at the conclusion of the Trinity Test on the Alamogordo Reservation in Los Alamos, New Mexico on July 16 th
, 1945.
3
The Trinity Test was the culmination of over $2,000,000,000 in government expenditure and in effect ushered in the nuclear age. Virtually all Americans knew nothing about the Manhattan Project or the prospects of harnessing nuclear energy at the time of the bombing of Hiroshima on August 6 th
,
1945. After learning about the nuclear bomb, some people protested in print as well as radio with soaring rhetoric, and abhorrence at the state of mankind. Many others felt quiet approval, and even optimism, citing social, religious, racial, militaristic, industrial, and scientific reasoning. People wondered what it meant for the present state of humanity, as well as the
1 “Birth of an Era,” Time Magazine, August 13 th , 1945
2 Bhagavad Vita. Chapter 11:32
3 “The Eternal Apprentice,” Time Magazine, November 8 th , 1948
1

future. Many predicted the coming of the apocalypse; after all, man had not been able to cure himself of war yet, why now? Others still were confident that atomic weapons would end war once and for all. Regardless of where Americans lived, where they worshipped, or what color their skin was, their reactions were indirectly influenced by their government as it sought to build a favorable collective memory of the development of and decision to use the atomic bomb.
The US government undertook great effort to shape and mold the reaction of the
American people to the atomic bomb. To their credit, Americans everywhere reacted with great variety, but a manipulative dissemination of information silenced academic criticism of the decision until the mid 1960s and prevented most Americans from learning the full story. The war-weary American public heard a half truth about this weapon and relevant information was closely controlled by the government. This was done in pursuit of shaping the collective memory about the end of the war, and it what light American’s would remember it in. This process was facilitated through press releases, the censure of media, and control of classified information.
Before unpacking America’s reaction to the Atomic Bomb, the lens in real time needs to be recreated while at the same time deconstructing the fog of war that permeated people’s minds.
The period between the first atomic bombing on August 6 th , 1945 and the surrender of Japan aboard the USS Missouri on September 2 nd
, 1945, contains several events that impacted
American perceptions of the last stages of the war in the Pacific. Included among these are the
Soviet invasion of the Japanese puppet state of Manchukuo, the dropping of the 2 nd
bomb on
Nagasaki, and finally the surrender. It is important to understand the war-time backdrop because these events heavily influenced decision making in the government and how people perceived the decisions.
2

Previous scholarship surrounding the atomic bomb is abound, but the real scholarly discussion began in 1965 with Gar Alperovitz’s, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb” which was the same title used by Secretary of war Henry Stimson in his defense of the decision.
Alperovitz criticized the Truman administration for inadvertently starting the Cold War by dropping the bomb. The argument is twofold in that it frightened the Soviet Union into occupying Eastern Europe as a security guarantee, and it also shut the communists out of postwar Japan. He coins the term nuclear diplomacy and his work largely frames the debate on the atomic decision.
Paul Boyer is another significant scholar in my question. Chapter 10 from, By the
Bomb's Early Light: American Thought and Culture at the Dawn of the Atomic Age is where most of the evidence for government misuse of power is found.
4
Boyer recounts instances of government control of information which didn’t allow for much information to be released.
Wartime propaganda controls of the press through enforcement of the Espionage Act forbid the publishing of individual stories of suffering Japanese. Numbers of civilian casualties were edited out and only ‘military targets’ were reported in numbers destroyed. The gruesome reality of the atomic bomb was censured in all US media, with only photos of the mushroom clouds or the destruction printed. There were no pictures of the dead bodies, or the burn victims, or the radiation victims.
The Dawning of a New Era
What Americans learned when they opened their newspapers and turned on their radios on that fateful summer morning was that this atomic bomb signified a new time. It was such
4 Boyer, S. Paul. “ By the Bomb's Early Light: American Thought and Culture at the Dawn of the Atomic Age” (NY:
Pantheon, 1985; 2nd edn. with a new introduction, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994)
3

sensational news that by August 8 th
, two days after the bombing, already 97% of Americans had heard about it 5 , and naturally everybody had an opinion. The American people reacted to atomic bombings of the Empire of Japan in a multitude of ways. The foremost of these was the recognition of a new time. It was deemed the “Birth of an Era”
6
by Time Magazine, and around the nation and the world it was evident that today, was different than yesterday. It was the kind of event that typifies a global watershed moment; it was perceived universally as the final triumph of man over nature. Science had willed civilization to a place where the destructive capabilities of man far outweighed the level of moral maturity that he possessed. The Negro
Star, out of Wichita, Kansas reaffirmed the feeling of different and new eras, it states, “The
Atomic Bomb that prefaced the final outcome marked the end not only of a war but of an era.” 7
The truth of these statements couldn’t ring truer, as 1945 marked the beginning of a different kind of war, the Cold War.
This sentiment is echoed by others in New York Times as one of the many columns headlined, “New Age Ushered”
8
, with another exclaiming that humanity had reached “the age of atomic energy,”
9
. Eminent French Physicist Duc de Groglie “added that naturally this was far more important than the war or the defeat of Germany. He thought that it could be compared only with the discovery of fire by primitive man.” 10 Millions of Americans attributed great
5 Gallup Poll, “Have You Heard or Read About The New Atomic Bomb?” August 8 th , 1945 www.gallup.com
(accessed March 5 th , 2013)
6 “Birth of an Era”, Time Magazine, August 13 th , 1945
7 Ruth Taylor, “What’s Next”, The Negro Star, August 24 th , 1945. Pp. 1
8 Harold Callender, “New Age Ushered”, New York Times, August 7 th, 1945.
9 Ibid.
10 Ibid.
4

significance to this event, evidenced by their desire for knowledge even though Duke was not
American, his opinion was valued highly by a hungry public and press corps yearning to understand what this new weapon meant. People everywhere knew that they were at a crossroads in history, and American’s knew that they were at the precipice of a important time in world history.
The days and weeks following August 6 th,
1945 were witness to an American and eventual global acceptance of common atomic dialogue that we use today. Words like ‘ atomic’ ,
‘ nuclear’ , and ‘ awesome’
entered the American lexicon via popular media and government statements. The world stood witness to the dawning of a, “New Atomic Era”, as one New York
Times author put it, as the loosing of atomic fury devastated Hiroshima on August 6 th
, 1945.
That day and those that followed the immediate aftermath were filled with bewilderment for many, great lament for future wars for some, and excitement for others at the prospect of the future atomic applications and of peace.
Even more prominent in the minds of American’s was the very real possibility of ending
World War II. Germany had surrendered in May and the idea of the soldiers coming home, rationing ending, and the prospect of peace began to creep into the American psyche. Americans hoped to for the possibility to end the struggle first. First and foremost in American’s minds was, simply put, ending the war. The policy steadily pursued and perpetuated by Franklin
Delano Roosevelt, and later Harry Truman was that of Japanese unconditional surrender. This had been the truth in policy as well as propaganda. It is important to remember that Japan had been bombed, blockaded, and broken by allied forces. Its war-industry was at a virtual standstill, unable to even fuel the pathetic last remnants the Imperial Japanese Navy.
5

Moral Capacity
However, after the initial wave of peace, a much darker and more uncertain future existed in the minds of millions of Americans. A lack of faith in man’s moral maturity as compared to his scientific prowess permeated people’s thoughts. This was a wide-encompassing feeling that would persist through the subsequent events of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria, the bombing of
Nagasaki, and finally, peace. Many Americans feared the sudden and violent change that nuclear weapons represented. These fears were stoked by the “mind numbing potentialities” revealed by the War Department that, “only one tenth of 1% of the total energy potentially releasable in the splitting of uranium atoms…” 11 had been released.
Eminent French Physicist Duc de Brogile took a more measured approach. He is quoted in the New York Times as stating, “The invention of the atomic bomb is a great event for the destiny of the world, an event that in augmenting immensely the power of man also terribly increases his responsibility for the use he makes of it.” 12
Magazine articles compiled some of the more abhorrent reactions featured in a single issue of The New York Times (NYT), “It is a stain upon our nation life.” “It is simply mass murder, sheer terrorism. . . .”. “Let us . . . dump the whole thing into the Atlantic or Pacific . . . man is too frail to be entrusted with such power” 13 .
11 The Associated Press, New York Times, August 7 th , 1945
12 Harold Callender, New York Times, August 7 th , 1945.
13 “Doubts and Fears”, Time Magazine, August 20 th , 1945
6

Polling in the Immediate Aftermath
The American people reacted to atomic bombings of the Empire of Japan in a multitude of ways. It was such sensational news that by August 8 th
, 1945 over 97% of Americans had heard about it, and naturally everybody had an opinion
14
. Optimistic scientists expressed giddy anticipation at the prospect of future applications of atomic energy; while the Vatican and various Catholic organizations deplored its use and decried it as an immoral and unthinkable option (Pope Pius XII the next day would walk these comments back). These differences were at times glaring, and at others more refined, but one thing all the stakeholders hoped for was that the atomic bomb would shorten the war. A glimpse of the American people was captured a
Gallup poll which asked, “Do you approve or disapprove of using the new atomic bomb on
Japanese cities?” 85% approved 15
. Another opinion poll similarly found 85% approval ratings for use of the bomb. In addition, 85% supported keeping secret how to make atomic bombs, as opposed to sharing them with some countries (September 1945). Also, a majority 53.5% thought we did the right thing by using two bombs on two cities
16
. Dissenting opinions advocated for not using the bomb, using it as a display on an uninhabited island, or using as many as we could before Japan had a chance to surrender. It is important to remember that this took place before the 2 nd atomic bombing as well as Japan’s surrender, it was in essence a snapshot right after the bomb was dropped, and in it we see that the vast majority of people were in support of the bombing, and keeping it as secret as possible.
14 Gallup Poll, “Have You Heard or Read About The New Atomic Bomb?” August 8 th , 1945 www.gallup.com
(accessed March 5 th , 2013)
15 Gallup Poll, “Have You Heard or Read About The New Atomic Bomb?” August 8 th , 1945 www.gallup.com
(accessed March 5 th , 2013)
16 Thomas Paterson, Major Problems in the History of World War II (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2002) pp
406.
7

Religious Response
While many American’s would eventually express objections to the atomic bombings in the subsequent years and decades, one group reacted immediately and unequivocally against the bombings--Catholic organizations and the Vatican. This is summarized well by a statement released by the Vatican Press Office on August 7 th , 1945, the day after Hiroshima. It follows:
“The use of atomic bombs in Japan has created an unfavorable impression on the Vatican.” 17
This seemingly tame response from the Vatican was buttressed by many American Catholic organizations who issued more direct protests. An excerpt from the NYT follows: “The
Catholic Progress of Seattle condemned “wholesale killing of innocent persons, non-combatants” and reasserted the old adage that, “the end does not justify the means.”
They went so far as to advocate that, “the production of atomic bombs be immediately placed under international control in order to guard against their use by any nation in future wars.” This is a surprising stance in that it directly contradicted American public opinion, which supported keeping the bomb secret at 85%
18
. This is a surprising stance given that the collective memory of the bomb does not include any dissent or protest. It is not hard to imagine the
Vatican coming out against the atomic bomb. It presented an interesting conceptual hurdle for the church and the faithful to overcome. After all, the very forces of creation that forged the universe had been unleashed onto humankind. The church’s authority in all things apocalyptic was being directly challenged. Man had wrested ‘the end’ from religion. Also, its perception
(self-imposed or otherwise) of being the moral authority in the world demanded a rebuke of the
17 The Associated Press, New York Times, August 8 th 1945.
18 Gallup Poll, “Have You Heard or Read About The New Atomic Bomb?” August 8 th , 1945 www.gallup.com
(accessed March 5 th , 2013)
8

indiscriminate slaughter of civilians. The fact that the bomb was a singular event that encompassed so much destruction added to the mystery and attractiveness of the concept of a
‘super weapon’. This is why we see the opposition with the church boil over. The concept of the bomb as a world-ender was more important than the damage done with it, as demonstrated by a lack of Vatican scolding following the Tokyo (or Dresden, for that matter) fire-bombings that killed more people in a single night that the atomic bomb at Nagasaki (70,000 to 80,000), and nearly as many as Hiroshima (120,000 to 150,000) 19 . The fact that the American incendiary bombing of Tokyo or Dresden, Germany, is largely absent from American collective memory is partly due to the singular power of the atomic bomb, and partly because the euphoria of winning the war justified the actions we had to take to earn the peace.
Every respectable man of god was not horrified by the reality of a nuclear world. The
NYT captured the views of two Protestant leaders who “urged that America in using the atomic bomb against Japan should demonstrate how our new power can be used to stop war—not merely to prosecute it.”
20
They were not alone in his perception that the awesomeness of atomic power, correctly wielded, could end war. If humans are one thing, they are rational, and no human would initiate a nuclear exchange. William Green, President of the AFL, called the bomb, “A Great Blessing” 21 and expressed his optimism at the prospect of ending war forever.
“Nothing is better calculated to prevent future wars than the knowledge of the common people in every nation of the world that now warfare may mean total annihilation.” He continues, “No dictator in the years to come will be able to persuade his people to chance that kind of retribution
19 Rauch, Johnathan. 2002. “Firebombs Over Tokyo.” Atlantic Monthly (10727825) 290, no. 1:22. Academic Search
Complete. EBSCOhost (accessed March 5 th , 2013).
20 The Associated Press, “Church Circles Protest Bomb”, New York Times, August 7 th , 1945.
21 Ibid.
9

for aggression.” It would seem that Green was correct in his analysis, and his recognition of the concept of Mutually Assured Destruction illustrates today his accurate forethought. The atomic bomb didn’t end war as some had hoped, but it ended war as people knew it. Total war became a thing of the past, but a new kind of war replaced it, the Cold War.
The Osservatore Romano, official Vatican City Newspaper, also expressed misgivings about the bomb. A published report of President Truman’s announcement was followed by an editorial in which Leonardo da Vinci’s plan for building a submarine was analogized to the building of the atomic bomb. The editorial begins, “Our thoughts turn to what is told of
Leonardo. He planned a submarine, but he feared that man would not apply it to progress, namely to the constructive uses of civilization, but to its ruin. He destroyed that possible instrument of destruction.” 22
This line of logic follows the same path that countless dissenting
American’s would employ; that man’s moral maturity was quickly falling behind that of its scientific understanding and that the power to end civilization was too great. The editorial continues, “This incredible destructive instrument remains a temptation.” 23
This very grave concern was echoed by several Catholic organizations in America, most of whom protested the bomb and its use as patently unjustifiable.
It should not be assumed that Catholics were the only Christians to object. Protestant
Methodist Bishop G. Bromley Oxnarn, Lawyer Foster Dulles spoke for the Federal Council of
Churches in protest of the bombs use, “”If we, a professedly Christian nation, feel morally free to use atomic energy in that way, men elsewhere will accept that verdict, the stage will be set for
22 The Associated Press, “Vatican Deplores Use of Atom Bomb”, New York Times, August 8 th , 1945.
23 Ibid.
10

the sudden and final destruction of mankind.” 24
Time Magazine also made known the opinion of, “Dr. Cecil Hinshaw, president of William Penn (Quaker) College at Oskaloosa, Iowa…” who
“described atomic bombing as a “barbaric, inhuman type of warfare. . . . Its use is unjustified.” 25
Clearly there were many in the spiritual community who objected to the use of the atomic bomb.
There were others however who did not foresee the end or completely protest its use. For instance, The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr. G. F. Fisher, was not afraid of “endless destruction.” Instead, he was more optimistic and predicted that, “In time this discovery will immensely increase the ease of human life.”
26
The archbishop sees the bomb in a larger context, and urges patience for its full potential to be utilized. His optimism proved reliable, as nuclear power generations accounts for a sizable percentage of world energy consumption.
By the middle of 1945 it seemed that the end of the war was within reach, but many in the military expected the conflict to last well into 1946, as evidenced by Hanson W. Baldwin longtime Military Editor of the New York Times, who was more modest in his reaction and predictions. He conceded that, “The result is unpredictable because the forces unleashed yesterday are outside human experience.” He is wary of the future and of global perceptions of
America and its people, “Americans have become a synonym for destruction. And now we have been the first to introduce a new weapon of the unknowable effects which may bring us victory quickly but which will sow the seeds of hate more widely than ever. We may yet reap the whirlwind.” This opinion was espoused first by Gar Alperovitz, who asserted that President
Truman inadvertently started the Cold War by dropping the bomb and scaring the Soviet Union
24 “Doubts and Fears”, Time Magazine, August 20 th , 1945
25 Ibid.
26 Ibid.
11

into occupying Eastern Europe as a security guarantee.
27
This statement is one of caution and prudence, and Mr. Baldwin finishes on a positive note, “Atomic energy may well lead to a bright new world in which man shares a common brotherhood, or we shall become—beneath the bombs and rockets—a world of troglodytes.”
28
This stark contrast between a utopian world free of war and an apocalyptic future captured the dichotomy of the American reaction.
Racial Perspectives
African American’s shared their Catholic Americans counterpart’s reaction in that both groups reacted in moral terms. An article from the Philadelphia Tribune presented the reaction,
“The announcement of the possession and use of an instrument sufficient to wipe out an entire population shocks the sensibilities of normal-minded people. Lodged in the hands of evil men, this power may destroy civilization.”
29
This article touches on the ability of the American public to conceptually grasp what the atomic bomb meant. Speculation was rampant and the only sure thing was that this weapon was incredibly destructive could end humanity. The underlying ignorance to the science and reasoning behind use of the atomic bomb were constraints that every American faced. The African-American community was no exception to this lack of access to information and reacted the same way the rest of American’s did; divided. Mrs.
Edwina T. Glascor was featured in an article in the Philadelphia Tribune in which she expresses her fear and uncertainty:
It is terrifying. Terrifying even though man now sees an entirely new scientific era unfolding in which the energy of the sun will be harnessed—terrifying because its explosive charge, which is probably no bigger than a baseball, does the damage of twenty-thousand tons of TNT—terrifying because this
27 Gar Alperovitz, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb and the Architecture of an American Myth” (New York:
Random House, 1995), pp 633.
28 Baldwin, W. Hanson, New York Times, August 7 th , 1945.
29 Rhodes, E. Washington, Philadelphia Tribune, August 11 th , 1945
12

atomic bomb has theoretically multiplied the destructive power of the American fleet of Superforts at least two thousand times—yes, but terrifying most of all because progress in human relations has not kept pace with progress in the physical world.”
Edwina laments similarly that human relations are fractured and broken as science marches on indiscriminately. It is not
A. L. Morgan, vice president and manager of the Apex News and Hair Company begins with a common opinion, “If it is as deadly as they say it is, I disapprove of its use. Why did we stop using poison gas? Because we said it was inhuman. The same thing goes for the atomic bomb.” 30
This paradigm is echoed by Arthur Brown, who is described as a ‘bootblack’, “This bomb should be outlawed. It should go in the same class as poison gas.” 31
Two others queried expressed moral outrage at the consideration of its use. Therese Winner, a stenographer had this to say, “The Japanese are human beings just as we are. The use of the atomic bomb would be the most barbaric act ever committed by anyone. I cannot conceive of its contemplation by civilized minds. And we say the Japs are inhuman!” 32
This is not a unique reaction, to see issue with the beginning of America’s dominance coming mired in ugliness. William Eady, a chef aimed for a more measured path with a civilian qualifier, “I disapprove of the bomb being dropped among innocent people , especially on children. If the Japs had their soldiers separated from the women and kids, some sense could be seen in using it.” Most of the public however was in agreement that the bomb should be used to shorten the war. Among the various endorsements of nuclear energy describe it as, “One of the greatest inventions in history. Of unquestioned value in its usage against Japan, use it!” “It’s great! If it will shorten the war, I’m for it!” “I am very
30 Rhodes, E. Washington, Philadelphia Tribune, August 11 th , 1945
31 Ibid.
32 Ibid.
13

optimistic about what I read in the papers. If it is as good as they say, O.K. Use it as a weapon against Japan. I hope it will end the war!” “I hope it will end the war, it should be of tremendous importance to the world. If the Japs don’t surrender, use it.”
33
The opinions and reactions of common African American’s mirrored the countries, with most people willing to use the bomb and a few especially vocal dissenters. As Truman and Stimson cited as their reasoning, a desire to end the war was a primary motivation.
Another article questions possible racial motivations behind the use of the bomb, “There has been a great deal of speculation as to whether the atomic bomb would have been, or could have been, used against Germany. Or was this destructive missile reserved for use on the
Japanese, a dark race?” 34
The European theatre of the war ended before the bomb was tested, but this still fails to quell the question would we have used it against Germany, a white people?
It stands to reason that we would, if presented with similar circumstances surrounding invasion.
An article from the Kansas City Plaindealer by Dean Gordon B. Hancock illustrates,
“The continued and increasing multiplication of human power without changing human hearts to rightly use this power is conceivably the most dangerous thing that could happen to mortals.” 35
Just like Catholic dissenters, this article epitomizes the African American reaction as being categorized as religiously centered. It continues with the common knowledge that, “Of course such a bomb in the hands of a Christ or Christian will be perfectly safe.” 36
Incredibly, this reasoning is a mere eighteen days after the United States of America, in possession of the atomic
33 Rhodes, E. Washington, Philadelphia Tribune, August 11 th , 1945
34 Philadelphia Tribune. “A New Low in Thinking”, August 11 th , 1945
35 Dean Gordon B. Hancock, “Between the Lines”. Kansas City Plaindealer. August 24 th , 1945.
36 Ibid.
14

bomb, became the first and still only country to use atomic weapons in warfare. This perception was buttressed by either cognitive dissonance, or a thinly-veiled argument that the United States wasn’t a Christian nation run by Christian men. The article finishes with an appropriate summing up that, “Man needs help divine in order to save himself from himself.”
World Government
The case for a world government was being made in earnest by the latter stages of the second Great War, and some would argue that a semblance of one already existed, as evidenced by the agreements made at Potsdam and Tehran, in which the future of post-war Europe was decided and end war strategy decided by ‘The Big Three’ of Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill was developed. The case for the United Nations was generally agreed upon, with a coveted permanent veto distributed amongst great powers from the Old World (Britain, France) as well as the new (USA, USSR, China). This includes the illegal declaration of war on Japan by the
USSR (asked for by America), as the Russo-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact did not expire until
1946.
One citizen calls for a rather extreme solution in an editorial in the NYT. He frames his argument as follows--
“We know that if nations use this power within the atom in fighting each other we can, with new developments certain to come, destroy all animal life in a short time. Also we know that the social antagonisms—racial, national, and economic—now brewing among men shall certainly cause another war.” 2
This man is convinced that war is unavoidable and that the only path forward without nuclear holocaust is a world government. “The United Nations must have even more power over
15

all people on earth than the Unites States Government has over its people.” 37
The path that
Robert Harrow thought was necessary was that, “the United States should use all its power to obtain military and political control.” He asserts surely that, “If this is not done soon other nations will soon use atomic power themselves, and a world state will become an impossibility.” 38
Surprisingly, he doesn’t think it is achievable goal and laments that, “I do not believe that there is enough unity and will among the world’s leaders to create such a United
Nations.” 39 This is one of the more extreme reactions I found both in sheerness and severity of endorsed countermeasures. The author is essentially proposing that America dominate the rest of the world, or risk domination by it. The ignorance of people everywhere to the realities of a nuclear world and policy made for a very diverse range of opinions, with the only real guidance coming from the scientists who understood and could articulate the finer points of nuclear energy, and their government sponsors.
Chester Rowell didn’t go so far as to advocate militarily forcing a world government onto the earth, but he was for guarding the atomic secret as completely as possible, while conceding that it was an impossible task. He writes in the San Francisco Chronicle, “It is not enough to imagine that “we”—meaning the United States, or America and Britain—shall hold these new weapons, to prevent others from doing so. The scientific backgrounds cannot be kept secret.” 40
He mentions the host of previous and current who he thinks has an immediate technical head start, Russia, Germany, and Japan.
37 Ediotiral, Robert Harrow, “A Task Posed for Us”, New York Times, August 9 th , 1945
38 Ibid.
39 Ibid.
40 Chest Rowell, “Atomic Force must be Safeguarded”, San Francisco Chronicle, August 9 th , 1945.
16

Among the uncertainty that went along with the dawning of a new era, there existed another current of thought in
American’s minds. Citizens and scientists were curiously peering into the prospects of future atomic applications. Even amidst all the doom and gloom expressed by those pessimistic about the future there was just as much if not more optimism about the future.
This illustration is titled,
48-Hour Effect on
American Industry. In it we see atoms and nuclear energy becoming a central component of our popular and political culture. The author creatively imagines the ways change had come to everybody from lyricists and dentists, to automobile engineers and
Hollywood.
Figure 1
17

The possibilities put forward by imaginative American’s ranged from atomic powered aircraft 41 to the assertion that oil, coal, and wind would inevitably become obsolete. President
Truman himself summed up the present situation albeit in more realistic terms, “Atomic energy cannot now be produced on a basis to compete with coal, oil and falling water. There must be a long period of intensive research.” He also commented in his diary, “It is certainly a good thing for the world that Hitler’s crowd or Stalin’s did not discover this atomic bomb. It seems to be the most terrible thing ever discovered, but it can be made the most useful.” 42 Even the president is uncertain about the ultimate good atomic weapons will bring to the world, but if they had to be brought in, it should be by us. But how long this period would last and what fruits it would produce was heavily speculated at the time. This speculation is evidenced by Figure 1.
Government Transgressions
The United States Government actively worked to keep certain information about the atomic bomb from the public. This is evidenced partially by the August 20 th
issue of Life
Magazine in which multitudes of full-page photos had been published. Pictures of the atomic destruction wrought upon Hiroshima and Nagasaki were easy to obtain for the journalists at Life and elsewhere, but pictures of the human toll were nowhere to be found.
41 The Associated Press, “Atomic Plane Engine Distant, Scientists Say”, New York Time, August 8 th , 1945
42 Diary of Harry S. Truman, April 25 th , 1945
18

The mushroom clouds over
Hiroshima (left) and
Nagasaki (right). These photos ran in full pages
Figure 2
As Lifton and Mitchell correctly point out, the Life Magazine spread and all American media contained no photographs of any, “injured Japanese...no doctors and nurses treating the ill and wounded, no funeral pyres, [and] no one in mourning.”
43
The government’s liberal jurisdiction through the Espionage Act allowed it to control the flow of critical information, certain photographs, and journalists’ stories indirectly or otherwise. It sought to portray the bombing as having as little human effect as possible. They did this by describing the blast not in lives ended or civilian casualties garnered, but in tons of TNT.
This may seem like a justified course of action; this weapon could not be easily proliferated, and certain controls were placed on it following Soviet acquisition of the bomb in
1949. The government used this reasoning as justification to essentially suppress any information or reporting that it deemed in violation of the Espionage Act. This information control didn’t stop with journalists, or newspapers, it went after scientific research also.
Dr. Harold Jacobson made the explosive claim in a newspaper wire service that was reported the New York Times that “Japanese visiting the Hiroshima ruins would be in danger for
43 Lifton, Robert J. and Mitchell, Greg. “Hiroshima in America: Fifty Years of Denial” (New York, G.P. Putnam’s Sons,
1995): 3-8.
19

seventy years. Dangerous radiations would continue around the bombed city for that long.”
44
A single day later, the Department of War Information received a statement in which Dr. Jacobson renounced what he had said and the article from which I’m learning of this came out. The article began with a framing statement by the America’s most recognizable atomic scientist, Dr. J.
Robert Oppenheimer. The article beings: “Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, director of the vast research project that developed the atomic bomb, today said there was no reason to believe the bomb explosion over Hiroshima left any appreciable radioactivity on the ground.” 45 The same article continues with a printed retraction by Dr. Jacobson:
“1. It should be clearly understood that my connection with the ‘Manhattan Project’ [the code name for the atomic bomb work] was in a minor official capacity.
2. Naturally the material in this story represents my opinions, rather than confidential information.
3. I find that as a result of later information eminent and qualified scientists connected with the project do not agree with some of my opinions.
4. I am surprised and pleased to learn that the results of the July experiment in New Mexico indicate that only minor amount of radioactivity are present after the explosion and that these quickly disappear.
5. To my knowledge, the manufacture of atomic energy in the United States has been skillfully planned and provided with such efficient safety precaution that there is no danger to any of the employees on the
‘Manhattan Project.’”
Even to the uncritical reader, this sudden and radical shift in opinion demands attention.
The New York Times reported, “Dr. Jacobson was questioned for several hours yesterday by
Government agents, including special agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and a spokesman said later that he was ill and upset by the furor his article had engendered.” The FBI spokesmen continued and said that “there was no question, as reported earlier in the day, of Dr.
Jacobson’s renouncing his earlier statements as having been written by someone else.” 46
This
44 “70 Year Effect of Bombs Denied”, New York Times, August 9 th , 1945
45 Ibid.
46 Ibid.
20

blatant attempt to silence a scientist’s opinion on the effects of radiation smacks of an Orwellian state in many aspects. The United States government clearly and intentionally refuted what a scientist had thought with a statement by the ‘head scientist’, and then interrogated Dr. Jacobson with F.B.I agents for ‘several hours’, after which this aforementioned retraction was written and published. As we know today, the after effects of a nuclear explosion include much higher rates of radiation where the explosion occurred. This over the years in turn transfers to higher cancer rates, as evidenced by a study published in the Radiation Research Volume, which claimed that,
“
The total increase over the natural cancer rate was 9 %, spread over 40 years.”
47
This fact was established long after the explosions partly because of the decades of research required by the study. That being said, radiation theory, case studies, and empirical evidence all pointed to a significant correlation between radiation and cancer rates. This isn’t to say that the government was willfully misleading the American people about cancer rates because it wanted to keep information about cancer controlled. It is to say that what is being asserted that is Dr. Jacobson was opinionated, and that it worked against the interests of the government. The government didn’t know what radiation did, but it was not going to construct an image and collective memory of the bomb that was as favorable as it was patriotic.
The Military Is No Democracy
In reality, the upper echelons of the military were by no means universal in their support of the atomic bombings, or in agreement as to the casualty estimates that an invasion of Japan would entail. Casualty estimates made for Operation Olympic vary wildly. 34 th
President of the
United States Dwight D. “Ike” Eisenhower states in his book Mandate for Change:
47 “The Radiation Research Volume”, Volume 146. 1-27. 1996
21

"...in [July] 1945... Secretary of War Stimson, visiting my headquarters in Germany, informed me that our government was preparing to drop an atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who felt that there were a number of cogent reasons to question the wisdom of such an act. ...the Secretary, upon giving me the news of the successful bomb test in New Mexico, and of the plan for using it, asked for my reaction, apparently expecting a vigorous assent. During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of
'face'. The Secretary was deeply perturbed by my attitude..."
48
The Supreme Allied Commander of European forces was no disgruntled non-commissioned officer, he was a prominent American official and future president. Dwight Eisenhower’s reaction to the decision to use the bomb was a good illustration to show how far apart the pro and con opinions were.
Undersecretary of the Navy Ralph Bard also objected to the unannounced use of the atomic bomb. He stated, “Before the bomb is actually used against Japan that Japan should have some preliminary warning for say two or three days in advance of use.” Citing as his reasoning for giving the Japanese a 48-72 hour warning is “The position of the United States as a great humanitarian nation… 49 ” This sentiment of seeking to preserve the United States’ goodwill globally echoes If nothing else this statement provides the proof that widespread agreement throughout the military on the decision to drop the bomb is a falsehood. Former President
Herbert Hoover also weighed in, and wrote to Army and Navy Journal stating on August 8, 1945,
48 Dwight D. Eisenhower, Mandate for Change, 1953-1956: the White House Years (New York: The New American
Library, 1965)
49 Ralph A. Bard, “Major Problems in the History of World War II” (New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2002) pp
403.
22

after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, that “The use of the atomic bomb, with its indiscriminate killing of women and children, revolts my soul.” 50
While the opinions of the current Allied Commander in Europe and past President
Hoover were significant, the most significant opinion was obviously that of the President
Truman. He began his defense of the bombing in a statement that was picked up by most worldwide media, stating that, “We have used it, in order to shorten the agony of war, in order to save the lives of thousands and thousands of Americans. We shall continue to use it until we completely destroy Japan’s power to make war. Only a Japanese surrender will stop us.” 51
This public statement reflects the unconditional surrender policy that Truman and the administration he’d inherited had been following. Contextually it’s important to remember that President
Truman had received World War II in its last violent convulsions, and his focus was on ending the conflict on American terms. Any major deviation from the unconditional surrender terms would have invited partisan calls of appeasement and threatened Truman’s reelection.
In “The Decision to Use the Bomb” former Secretary of War Henry Stimson defended the decision as one of necessity made in the fires of war, stating in his conclusion to the American people flatly that,
“The face of war is the face of death; death is an inevitable part of every order that a wartime leader gives.
The decision to use the atomic bomb was a decision that brought death to over a hundred thousand
Japanese. No explanation can change that fact and I do not wish to gloss over it. But this deliberate, premeditated destruction was our least abhorrent choice. The destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki put an end to the Japanese war. It stopped the fire raids, and the strangling blockade; it ended the ghastly specter of a clash of great land armies.” 52
50 Gar Alperovitz, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, pg 635.
51 The San Francisco Chronicle (San Francisco), 9 August 1945. P. 1
52 Henry Stimson. “The Decision to Use the Bomb”. Harpers Magazine . February 1947.
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This article appeared in Harpers magazine in early 1947 and abstinently defends the decision made by Roosevelt, Truman and their advisors. Stimson’s article and its main caveat, namely that Truman had avoided more than 1,000,000 American casualties, is responsible for the basis that would form the collective American memory of Truman’s decision and that it was a sound one and the least abhorrent choice
53
. This clash between popular perception and scholarly discourse has clouded the argument, however. The article in Harpers has created a
“…consciously and artfully constructed history of the decision.
54 ”
Undersecretary of State Joseph Grew issued this nicely worded retort to Stimson’s defense of the decision that appeared in Harper’s, “...in the light of available evidence I myself and others felt that if such a categorical statement about the [retention of the] dynasty had been issued in May, 1945, the surrender-minded elements in the [Japanese] Government might well have been afforded by such a statement a valid reason and the necessary strength to come to an early clear-cut decision.” The Undersecretary is restating a point that many in the military and government made, that Japan had been defeated and that to inflict nuclear war upon them was both inhumane and completely unnecessary. Their position had already become strategically hopeless following Saipan and Okinawa in early 1945.
The United States Strategic Bombings Survey, released in 1946, asserted that Japan would surrender “certainly prior to December 31, 1945, and in all probability prior to November
1, 1945…” This assertion found its way into the USSBS and subsequent scholarly debate by way of a man named Paul Nitze, who served as a Vice Chairman on the report, and, as is pointed by Robert Newman, “was firmly committed to the ambition of the Army Air Corps to establish,
53 J. Samuel Walker, “History, Collective Memory, and the Decision to Use the Bomb,” Diplomatic History: 320
54 Ibid.
24

after the war, a large, independent air force.” 55
This conflict of interest, as Newman and others argue, established motive for Vice Chairman Nitze to omit certain findings and to pervert others, all whilst operating under the claim that they were, “based on a detailed investigation of all the facts, and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved.” This was in fact a bold faced lie, “Nitze wholly misrepresented the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders”, as Robert P. Newman points out.
56
Several Japanese leaders were “entirely unrepentant, and even bragged about how they would have destroyed the first invasion forces.” 57
Imagine if it was portrayed and accepted that a single bomb, flown from a single plane, proved decisive in ending the greatest conflict on the 20 th
century. On what basis could the formation of an entire new branch (and the funding that came with it) of the armed forces such as the United
States Air Force be argued?
The logic that Newman and others employ is sound; however, it was not an unpopular position to take that the atomic bomb had not been the deciding factor in the war. Multiple highranking military officials held that it was their branch or their area of command that had broken the Japanese’s backs. Morton points to, among others, Admiral Nimitz (Commander of the
Pacific Fleet) and Major-General Claire Chennault (Wartime air-commander in China). Both of whom argued that it was not the atom but, but conventional means, specifically naval bombardment (Nimitz), or the Soviet entry into the war (Chennault) that proved decisive in obtaining a surrender. We see a divided military, fighting over recognition and post-war
55 Robert P. Newman, “Hiroshima and the Trashing of Henry Stimson,” The New England Quarterly, Vol. 71, No. 1
(March, 1998): 6
56 Ibid.
57 Ibid.
25

funding, as well as over morality, which is a far different reality from the conformist picture painted.
The Soviet Union began its pincer offensive along the Manchurian front two days after the atomic bomb was dropped. It is my assertion that the prospect of a quick end to the Pacific theatre on American terms forced the Soviet Union’s hand. They had agreed at Potsdam that they would enter the war in the Pacific three months after the capitulation of Nazi Germany. It had been only two months of general feet-dragging by the Soviet Union before they realized that the war could end without many of the potential spoils of the Pacific theatre secured. The best case scenario included the Soviet’s committing a joint invasion of Japan with the United States, after reasserting its old interests in Korea and Manchuria. This is one of the outcomes weighing of Truman’s mind, that Japan could either end up as Germany did, partitioned between victorious powers, or Japan could end up under complete American control creating a bulwark of democracy from which future US interests in the Pacific could be pursued.
The article is similar to others in that in frames the discussion in very broad religious terms. It also seeks to depict this time period, “not merely the end of a period of destruction, but the beginning of a period of construction.” It elaborates that, “We must level this pathway into a road upon which human beings of all creeds, all races, all tongues, enough though they start at different places and move at different rates of progress, may march along, in full stature and dignity of free men—to a goal of peace and security.”
58
This depiction is concurrent with almost every other American, in the idea that now was different. However, it was different in its emphasis of equal opportunity, and the American Dream. The author also talks about the
58 Ruth Taylor, “What’s Next”, The Negro Star, August 24 th , 1945. Pp. 1
26

shrinking world, and the growing importance of globalization by stating, “We have learned that our world is but a succession of small communities, all linked together, all interdependent, like parts of a great chain.” 59
This penchant to view the bomb as a major combined step towards peace and freedom for the defeated peoples of Europe and Japan as well as those domestically without freedom was widespread among racial minorities.
African Americans also reacted with pride at the knowledge that, “America’s leading colored scientists, among them a young wizard of mathematics, helped construct the deadly atomic bomb.” This ‘young wizard’ of whom the article speaks was Dr. J. Ernest Wilkins, who was ‘borrowed from Tuskegee’ where he had been teaching mathematics 60
. Young, intelligent, and patriotic African American scientists and mathematicians were held up as models by the
African American community to emulate. African Americans portrayed and reacted to the atomic bombing in profound religious, moral, and practical ways. They saw it like so many others did in terms of eras and religion. They were proud of the contributions and sacrifices that their community had made for the war and made them known in the print media.
Conclusion
The American people were fairly uniform in their response to the general questions surrounding the bomb. 85% of them supported the utilization of it as well as keeping it secret as long as possible. Those who did object objected loudly and with firm moral convictions. The arguments for and against the use were molded by the government, perhaps successfully so to paint the bombing with a veneer of morality. People were worried about the uncertain future and the untested nature of humanity in this new technology that would come to dominate everything
59 Ibid.
60 Kansas City Plaindealer. Race Scientists Aided in Study of Atomic Bomb. Volume 47. Issue 34. Page 2
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from foreign policy, to power generation, to how wars are fought, and how fleets are powered. It signified a new time in which a new world was ripe for the making, in an American image. The
American Empire that we see today is a direct descendent of the systems and alliances set up after World War II. The bomb in concert with a mostly undamaged economy led to America achieving and retaining the preponderance of power. This prospect and goal was by no means lost on the people of 1945. The two opposing views either saw the use of the bomb as morally reprehensible and inhuman while others were less willing to cut the Japanese a break. They cheered its use and advocated using more of them until the Japanese capitulated.
The significance of my research is evidenced by the lack of scholarly work surrounding ordinary peoples reactions. Most of the argument is focused on what the government did or didn’t do and its focused well after the event actually occurred. I show what the government knew and what is argued its motivations were. The American reaction to the atomic bomb is an incredibly defining American moment and what people thought correlates to modern policy and is essential to understanding American behavior.
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