Question

Had you been president truman would you have bombed Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Why or why not?

Answer 1

Answer:

I would not have bombed those cities in Japan if I were Truman.

Explanation:

Because I would follow President Roosevelt's approach to this problem, which would be a little more sympathetic to the Japanese citizens, who are not doing much wrong in their cities.

Answer 2

This is more of an opinion question, but there are two sides to the argument that should be brought to light.

Had the United States not dropped the bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the war in the Pacific would have continued as a ground war. And had this occurred, hundreds thousands of casualties would have followed on both sides, with estimates going from 150,000 to 1,000,000 on the Allied forces alone. The Japanese did not want to surrender, as they viewed it as being dishonorable. When Germany surrendered, Japan vowed to defend themselves against the U.S. and Britain.

The atomic bombs, while hotly debated, ended the war swiftly without any more American casualties. American forces dropped warning leaflets in Nagasaki and Hiroshima to try and minimize civilian casualties (see https://www.atomicheritage.org/key-documents/warning-leaflets for more details).

So, based on this information, if you were President Truman, would you have continued the ground war that would have cost countless American lives, or dropped the atomic bomb and end the war swiftly?