How To End a War: Win. Happy A-Bomb Day! - Granite Grok

How To End a War: Win. Happy A-Bomb Day!

This week’s events of 61 years ago should not go unnoticed, or unappreciated. On August 6th, 1945 and again on August 9th, the United States dropped atomic bombs on Japan. Prior to that, on July 26, 1945, the Allies, in setting the conditions for ending a war that they did not start, called for the unconditional surrender of the Japanese and their military forces. Absolutely fanatical, with a declared fight to the death, the Japanese refused. Years of war, and still, they would not stop. Then the bomb fell.
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President Harry S. Truman, sworn to protect and uphold the Constitution and expected to do all possible to “provide for the common defense”, made the decision. The first atomic bomb fell on Hiroshima, Japan August 6th, 1945. In his address to the nation, Truman spoke:
“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.”
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“The Japanese began the war from the air at Pearl Harbor. They have been repaid manyfold. And the end is not yet.”
The bomb used in the attack, announced the President was
“an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East.”
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Imagine yourself to be alive at that time. Perhaps you were. I cannot believe that every American, to a person, would not have wanted their leaders to do EVERYTHING possible to end the war, and to make everybody safe. Imagine yourself a young GI at the time- twenty-something years old, training for yet more warfare. Having survived through to the end of the war in Europe, would you ultimately join those less fortunate, living only to see a later death in the Japanese theater? Imagine a young wife back in America- perhaps with children. What will happen to her husband? Where is their father? Imagine a mother. What will happen to her son? What of America’s brave soldiers? Will any survive the coming battles in the Pacific? Will they die storming through hellfire on the beach on some Pacific island, facing an enemy that will not stop? When will this war end? Then the first bomb fell.
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The Commander-in Chief, again, from his speech to the Nation (and the World):
“We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have above ground in any city. We shall destroy their docks, their factories, and their communications. Let there be no mistake; we shall completely destroy Japan’s power to make war. It was to spare the Japanese people from utter destruction that the ultimatum of July 26 was issued at Potsdam. Their leaders promptly rejected that ultimatum. If they do not now accept our terms they may expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never before been seen on this earth. Behind this air attack will follow sea and land forces in such numbers and power as they have not yet seen and with the fighting skill of which they are already well aware.”

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And still the Japanese didn’t listen. On August 9th, 1945 another bomb fell. William L. Laurence was a writer for the New York Times who accompanied the mission that dropped the bomb on Nagasaki. He writes of an exchange with one of the airmen, Sgt. Curry:
“‘Think this atomic bomb will end the war?’ he [Sgt. Curry] asks hopefully. ‘There is a very good chance that this one may do the trick,’ I assure him, ‘but if not, then the next one or two surely will. Its power is such that no nation can stand up against it very long.’”
On August 10th, Japanese Premier Suzuki accepted the terms of the Potsdam ultimatum with the condition that the Emperor Hirohito retain his throne. On August 14th, they surrendered unconditionally. By August 15th- the war was over.
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In the victory proclamation, President Truman thus spoke:
“To all of us there comes first a sense of gratitude to Almighty God, Who sustained us and our allies in the dark days of grave danger, Who made us to grow from weakness into the strongest fighting force in history, and Who now has seen us overcome the forces of tyranny that sought to destroy His civilization.”
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General William Tecumseh Sherman on war:
“Its glory is all moonshine; even success most brilliant is over dead and mangled bodies, with the lamentations of distant families. You cannot qualify war in harsher terms than I will. War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it; and those who brought war into our country deserve all the curses and maledictions a people can pour out.  If the people raise a howl against my barbarity and cruelty, I will answer that war is war and not popularity-seeking. If they want peace, they and their relatives must stop the war.”
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Harry Truman did just that: He got them to STOP THE WAR. Perhaps our current enemies might learn from this history- so that they will not be doomed to have history repeat itself…
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