In President Truman’s address to Congress in 1947, the Truman Doctrine, he talks about how the Greek and Turkey countries economies are failing and need aid from the United States to obtain economic stability. In the Truman Doctrine, Truman asks Congress for $400 million to send to aid Greece and Turkey. Truman considered this necessary because the weak governments could be overthrown, possibly by communism. The Doctrine was primarily directed against communism, which Truman feared would spread if either country were overthrown. Truman was smart to take the precaution of preventing communist spread.
Therefore, the US created unconditional terms of surrender, knowingly going against the Japanese ethic of honour and against the institute of the emperor, whom most Americans probably wanted dead. Consequently, the use of the atomic bomb became a way to avenge America's fallen soldiers while also keeping the USSR in check in Europe. The Japanese civilian casualties did not matter in this strategy. Also, it did not prevent the Cold War, as the USSR was just a few years behind on a-bomb research. At the time, revenge, geopolitics and an expensive project that could not be allowed to simply rust away, meant the atomic bomb had to be hastily deployed “in the field” in order to see its power and aftermath – though little was known about radiation and its effects on humans.
The most notable change I believe was the increase of defense spending, which helped fuel the economy and pay for the cost of research to build nuclear weapons, jet plains, satellites, and consumer goods that were often the side products of military research. (Nash 648) Atomic nuclear weapons were first developed by America after Roosevelt had heard that the German’s were researching on making an atomic bomb. The first and only time there was a nuclear war started when America bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. America had boomed Japan to put an end the war, at the end of World War II America was the only country who had nuclear war power. In response to the bombing of Japan, the Soviet Union and Communist China developed their own nuclear weapons.
After multiple ideas along with deep thought, Truman along with the chiefs decided the most efficient, least costly and less bloody approach would to be dropping the atomic bombs on the Japanese home land. The essay states “evidence points to the conclusion that he acted for the reason he said he did: to end a bloody war that would have become even bloodier had invasion proved necessary” pg 175 Readings in United States History. The writer’s purpose of this essay is to educate the readers about the difficulty of this decision. I believe the writer did a fine job explaining the whole process. The Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombing are two greatly important milestones in the United States history, and the essay “The Biggest Decision: Why We Had to Drop the Bomb,” by Robert James Maddox is a perfect essay to be read over and discussed in a class like this.
August 6, 1945 and August 9, 1945 were days in history like no other. Only one country in history has ever used an atomic bomb against another nation; the United States of America. Code named the Manhattan Project, the atomic bombs were being developed to use against Japan towards the end of World War II. The United States was completely justified in dropping the bombs on Japan. Japan was near defeat, but many question how close Japan was to surrender (Jennings).
Jorge Luna February 23, 2013 Period: 1 U.S Foreign Policy Change between 1920-1941 From 1920-1941 the United States foreign policy changed from being a strict isolation and neutrality policy to a more liberal policy because of the circumstances and tensions of the future world war two. This new change in the policy allowed America to help its allies and keep America safe from the totalitarian dictators of its time. In 1918 after the First World War ended, the United States created a foreign policy in which they stated that they weren’t going to help in any way any nation at war. Many of the reasons were because of the economic depression that was going on also, because the people of America didn’t want to go to war again. For a few years America tried to isolate itself from the rest of the world trying to ignore the fight leading up to World War Two.
The bombing of Hiroshima, and later, Nagasaki were not justifiable military acts but war crimes. One of the major arguments about the bombing of Hiroshima had been whether the Japanese would have surrendered without the atomic bomb or not. President Truman said the atomic bomb was necessary to make Japan surrender quickly and prevent both more American and Japanese casualties. Others believed that there was no need for the use of the atomic bomb. The United States Strategic Bombing Survey issued in July 1946 declared “Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945 and in all probability prior
Fritz Kellerman Kyle Anderson History 1351 3 May 2011 Final Identification Truman Doctrine- The Truman Doctrine was a policy made by Harry Truman. The policy said that we would give military support to Turkey and Greece to prevent them from falling to the soviets. We would end up spending over 400 million dollars on them. Congress approved the money but not the military support. A few years after the fact, both countries would join NATO.
Truman started at the bottom in terms of what strategy to take in this war. As mentioned in his speech, The Truman Doctrine, his plan of economic aid was to financially support Greece and Turkey to help them stop communism from expanding to other areas (Truman). Through his efforts in military aid, we became allies with Greece by helping them with their military (Truman). Truman created the United Nations to protect us from communism so communists had a bigger force to get through and keep communism out of the US as part of his military use.(Truman). These ideas are just the start of how the United States would deal with the Soviet Union and
The decision to drop the atomic bomb on Japanese citizens in August, 1945, as a means to bring the long Pacific war to an end could be justified-militarily, politically and morally, by such points as follow suit (The National Security Archive). The goal of waging war is victory with minimum losses on one's own side and, if possible, on the enemy's side. No one disputes the fact that the Japanese military was prepared to fight to the last man to defend the home islands, and indeed had already demonstrated this determination in previous Pacific island campaigns (Sherrow 56). A weapon originally developed to contain a Nazi atomic project was available that would spare Americans hundreds of thousands of causalities in an invasion of Japan, and-not incidentally-save several times more than that among Japanese soldiers and civilians (World War 2 Database). The thousands who have died in the bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were far less than those who would have died in an allied invasion, and their sudden deaths convinced the Japanese military to surrender (The National Security