Why hiroshima and nagasaki and not tokyo

That was when Nagasaki was added to the target list instead of Kyoto. But Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not military targets either. As we know today, hundreds of thousands of civilians, including women and children, were killed. And while Kyoto may have been the most famous cultural city, the other cities also had valuable assets. It is known that Mr Stimson visited Kyoto several times in the s when he was the governor of the Philippines.

Some historians say it was his honeymoon destination and that he was an admirer of Japanese culture. But he was also behind the internment of more than , Japanese Americans because, as Mr Stimson put it, "their racial characteristics are such that we cannot understand or trust even the citizen Japanese". That may be partly why another man took the credit for saving Kyoto for many decades. It was widely believed that it was the American archaeologist and art historian Langdon Warner, and not the controversial Secretary of War, who advised the authorities not to bomb cities with cultural assets including Kyoto.

There are even monuments to honour Mr Warner in Kyoto and Kamakura. Hiroshima: The bomb that changed the world. Find out what happened in the hours before the bomb was dropped.

Was it right to drop the bomb on Hiroshima? But not only did President Truman apparently care little about Japan's cultural assets, he also described Japan as "a terribly cruel and uncivilized nation in warfare," calling the Japanese "beasts" who deserved neither honour nor compassion because of the attack on Pearl Harbour.

These kinds of remarks have resulted in speculation that the US dropped atomic bombs on Japan, not Germany, because of racism - that using the weapon against white people might be seen as more of a taboo than on the Japanese. Officially, Stimson seemed contradictory and muddled. However, he insisted it must be a military target.

Stimson persuaded himself that this meant a military target. A slightly surreal atmosphere lingered, as the men reflected on what they had done. The president felt refreshed after hosting the prince regent of Iraq at a state dinner a few nights earlier. He had spent Memorial Day on the presidential yacht, cruising the Potomac, playing poker, and approving his speech for the San Francisco Conference on the creation of the United Nations, then in session.

But the fate of individual cities was still being decided. That month, Stimson asked Groves—then in his office on a different matter—whether the target list had been finalized, and was disturbed to see Kyoto at the top of the list.

Again, he ordered it struck off. Groves fudged. They irked him, these meddlesome politicians: The destruction of Kyoto was his to decide; he felt a sense of proprietorial control over how the bomb should be used.

Hiroshima was not nearly so satisfactory in this respect. A clear-weather report for August 6 made Hiroshima the preferred target on the list that day. Seventy years ago, the first atomic bomb fell on the city. Skip to content Site Navigation The Atlantic. Popular Latest. Somes sources : Source 1 Source 2 Opposition of american military Debate sources Source 5 As you will see, the main reason Japan was pursuing the war, was because the americans offered peace terms that was knowingly unacceptable to the japanese.

The sources you quote don't seem to support the assertions in your answer. They do not support all my assertations. But they do not invalid them. What you may find dubious is that my sources offers plurality of points of views.

You may disagree with my conclusion, there is a debate. I will add a few more ressources particulary on the military pointlessness. Personnaly, I think this is a war crime. And it was done for political reasons. I guess, we just don't understand each other. I was speaking of the debate between historians about "Why Japan has surrendered". Any way, I added some sources to my answer. And if you do your own researches you may find plenty of sources explaining this far better than me.

I understand this can be a touchy subject. So I won't spoke further about it. I understand your position, but I think that the answer as framed is actually an answer to this question , which was deemed to be off-topic, rather than this one. This is a good point; the dropping of the bombs had objectives greater than the end of WWII, and this had an influence on the choice of city.

It would help your argument if you stated this at the beginning. Masao Rossen Masao Rossen 1. It's very difficult to understand what you're trying to say here, for example, I've no idea what you mean by "Ame phy". You should also include references to support your assertions. Vincent Sun Vincent Sun 1 1 1 bronze badge. Wrong, casualty count was not a primary consideration.

Destruction of resources of military values factories, port facilities, warehouses was far more important. And besides that, the cities were chosen because they had not yet been bombed, allowing good bomb damage assesment of the experimental nuclear weapons to help validate the theoretical yield and other effects. Hi, and welcome to History. Thanks for your calculations, sorry it's being downvoted. While your calculations may be correct, there would need to be historical evidence that these calculations influenced the decision, preferably with sources.

This sort of answer might be better for Worldbuilding. Featured on Meta. Now live: A fully responsive profile. How should we recognize our anniversary? Linked Related Hot Network Questions. Question feed. History Stack Exchange works best with JavaScript enabled. According to Truman and others in his administration, the use of the atomic bomb was intended to cut the war in the Pacific short, avoiding a U.

It Kick-Started the Cold War. The center area where the bomb struck in Nagasaki, photographed on September 13, The two shacks in the foreground have been constructed from pieces of tin picked up in the ruins. Despite the arguments of Stimson and others, historians have long debated whether the United States was justified in using the atomic bomb in Japan at all—let alone twice. Byrnes argued on August 29, , and had reached out to the Soviets to see if they would mediate in possible peace negotiations.