[41]. The outspoken Szilard was not involved in operational work on the bomb and General Groves kept him under surveillance but Met Lab director Arthur Compton found Szilard useful to have around. It came home with them in their wounds, in their memories, in their daily lifein their nightmares. Concerned with the long-run implications of the bomb, Franck chaired a committee, in which Szilard and Eugene Rabinowitch were major contributors, that produced a report rejecting a surprise attack on Japan and recommended instead a demonstration of the bomb on the desert or a barren island. Arguing that a nuclear arms race will be on in earnest not later than the morning after our first demonstration of the existence of nuclear weapons, the committee saw international control as the alternative. Whether this meant that Truman was getting ready for a confrontation with Stalin over Eastern Europe and other matters has also been the subject of debate. [31]. Why Did World War II Happen? | World101 See also Walker (2005), 316-317. The documents cover multiple aspects of the bombings and their context. Shusen Shiroku (The Historical Records of the End of the War), annotated by Jun Eto, volume 4, 57-60 [Excerpts] [Translation by Toshihiro Higuchi], Excerpts from the Foreign Ministry's compilation about the end of the war show how news of the bombing reached Tokyo as well as how Foreign Minister's Togo initially reacted to reports about Hiroshima. Join The National WWII Museum as we commemorate the surrender of Nazi Germany and V-E Day by taking a look back at the events of the year after surrender and how they shaped the modern world with Dr. Record Group 457, Records of the National Security Agency/Central Security Service, Magic Diplomatic Summaries 1942-1945, box 18. Sadao Asada emphasizes the shock of the atomic bombs, while Herbert Bix has suggested that Hiroshima and the Soviet declaration of war made Hirohito and his court believe that failure to end the war could lead to the destruction of the imperial house. For Hirohito' surrender speech--the actual broadcastand a translation--seeJapan Times,August2015. Up to 60,000 prisoners were at Bergen-Belsen when it was liberated on 15 April 1945, by the British 11th Armoured Division. Henry L. Stimson Papers (MS 465), Sterling Library, Yale University (reel 113) (microfilm at Library of Congress), Still interested in trying to find ways to warn Japan into surrender, this represents an attempt by Stimson before the Potsdam conference, to persuade Truman and Byrnes to agree to issue warnings to Japan prior to the use of the bomb. Truman was apparently not considering the fact that Tokyo was already devastated by fire bombing and that an atomic bombing would have killed the Emperor, which would have greatly complicated the process of surrender. Library of Congress Manuscript Division, Papers of W. Averell Harriman, box 181, Chron File Aug 5-9, 1945. The Soviet source reported that the weight of the device was 3 tons (which was in the ball park) and forecast an explosive yield of 5 kilotons. [1]. Maddox, 102; Alperovitz, 269-270; Hasegawa, 152-153. As the scientists had learned, a gun-type weapon based on plutonium was impossible because that element had an unexpected property: spontaneous neutron emissions would cause the weapon to fizzle.[10] For both the gun-type and the implosion weapons, a production schedule had been established and both would be available during 1945. As the news of Germany's surrender reached the rest of the world, joyous crowds gathered to celebrate in the streets, clutching newspapers that declared Victory in Europe (V-E Day). Timeline of World War II From 1939 to 1945, World War II Worksheets, Crosswords, and Coloring Pages, The Manhattan Project and the Invention of the Atomic Bomb, Biography of Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States, Why the Peninsula Is Split Into North Korea and South Korea, Relationship of the United States With Japan, Heading Toward World War II in the Pacific, M.A., Medieval Studies, Sheffield University, B.A., Medieval Studies, Sheffield University. Meiklejohn recounted Harrimans visit in early October 1945 to the Frankfurt-area residence of General Dwight Eisenhower, who was finishing up his service as Commanding General, U.S. Army, European Theater. The task of compilation involved consultation of primary sources at the National Archives, mainly in Manhattan Project files held in the records of the Army Corps of Engineers, Record Group 77, but also in the archival records of the National Security Agency. RG 77, MED, H-B files, folder no. [39], The last item discusses Japanese contacts with representatives of the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) in Switzerland. [77]. We picked a couple of cities where war work was the principle industry, and dropped bombs. For background on Magic and the Purple code, see John Prados,Combined Fleet Decoded: The Secret History of American Intelligence and the Japanese Navy in World War II (New York: Random House, 1995), 161-172 and David Kahn,The Codebreakers: The Story of Secret Writing(New York: Scribner, 1996), 1-67. See for example, Bernstein (1995), 140-141. Washington, D.C., August 4, 2020 - To mark the 75th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the National Security Archive is updating and reposting one of its most popular e-books of the past 25 years. Peter Grose,Gentleman Spy: The Life of Allen Dulles(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1994), 170-174, 248-249. Beginning in September 1940, U.S. military intelligence began to decrypt routinely, under the Purple code-name, the intercepted cable traffic of the Japanese Foreign Ministry. Record Group 107, Office of the Secretary of War, Formerly Top Secret Correspondence of Secretary of War Stimson (Safe File), July 1940-September 1945, box 12, S-1, Tacitly dissenting from the Targeting Committees recommendations, Army Chief of Staff George Marshall argued for initial nuclear use against a clear-cut military target such as a large naval installation. If that did not work, manufacturing areas could be targeted, but only after warning their inhabitants. Stalin considered various dates to schedule an attack. To view all webinars and digitalprogramming visit our events calendar. Tens of thousands later died of radiation exposure. RG 77, MED Records, Top Secret Documents, File no. German forces in Italy surrender: On 29 April, the day before Hitler died, Oberstleutnant Schweinitz and Sturmbannfhrer Wenner, plenipotentiaries for Generaloberst Heinrich von Vietinghoff and SS Obergruppenfhrer Karl Wolff, signed a surrender document at Caserta[13] after prolonged unauthorised secret negotiations with the Western Allies, which were viewed with great suspicion by the Soviet Union as trying to reach a separate peace. All Rights Reserved. That evening army officers tried to seize the palace and find Hirohitos recording, but the coup failed. With direct access to the documents, readers may develop their own answers to the questions raised above. 100 (copy from microfilm). In a long and impassioned message, the latter argued why Japan must accept defeat: it is meaningless to prove ones devotion [to the Emperor] by wrecking the State. Togo rejected Satos advice that Japan could accept unconditional surrender with one qualification: the preservation of the Imperial House. Probably unable or unwilling to take a soft position in an official cable, Togo declared that the whole country will pit itself against the enemy in accordance with the Imperial Will as long as the enemy demands unconditional surrender., Naval Historical Center, Operational Archives, James Forrestal Diaries, Secretary of the Navy James Forrestal was a regular recipient of Magic intercept reports; this substantial entry reviews the dramatic Sato-Togo exchanges covered in the 22 July Magic summary (although Forrestal misdated Satos cable as first of July instead of the 21st). ], Documents 1A-C: Report of the Uranium Committee, National Archives, Records of the Office of Scientific Research and Development, Record Group 227 (hereinafter RG 227), Bush-Conant papers microfilm collection, Roll 1, Target 2, Folder 1, "S-1 Historical File, Section A (1940-1941).". Alperovitz, however, treats it as additional evidence that strongly suggests that Truman saw alternatives to using the bomb. Part II of the summary includes the rest of Togos 2 August cable which instructed Sato to do what he could to arrange an interview with Molotov. World War II in Europe Ended in 1945History's Fight Goes On - TIME At the end, Stimson shared his doubts about targeting cities and killing civilians through area bombing because of its impact on the U.S.s reputation as well as on the problem of finding targets for the atomic bomb. Hasegawa, 105; Alperovitz, 67-72; Forrest Pogue,George C. Marshall: Statesman, 1945-1959(New York: Viking, 1987), 18. Rob Citino, Samuel Zemurray Stone Senior Historian and the Executive Director, The Institute for the Study of War and Democracy. Ukraine-Russia war latest: Putin hosts girl, 8, at Kremlin in publicity Pressure from Secretary of War Stimson had already taken Kyoto off the list of targets for incendiary bombings and he would successfully object to the atomic bombing of that city. For a useful discussion of the firebombing of Tokyo and the atomic bombings, see Alex Wellerstein, Tokyo vs. Hiroshima,Restricted Data: The Nuclear Secrecy Blog,22 September 2014. With the Japanese surrender announcement not yet in, President Truman believed that another atomic bombing might become necessary. Find History on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Find History on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Find History on YouTube (Opens in a new window), Find History on Instagram (Opens in a new window), Find History on TikTok (Opens in a new window), https://www.history.com/news/new-deal-effects-great-depression. "Little Boy" weighed about 9,000 pounds and had a yield approximating 15,000 tons of high explosives. In Berlin, the Soviet forces were fighting their way through the German capital. At 02:41 on the morning of 7 May, at SHAEF headquarters in Reims, France, the chief-of-staff of the German Armed Forces High Command, General Alfred Jodl, signed an unconditional surrender document for all German forces to the Allies. Stream World War II series and specials commercial-free in HISTORY Vault. [17], Scientists and officers held further discussion of bombing mission requirements, including height of detonation, weather, radiation effects (Oppenheimers memo), plans for possible mission abort, and the various aspects of target selection, including priority cities (a large urban area of more than three miles diameter) and psychological dimension. Therefore, we are publishing an excised version of the entry, with a link to the Byrnes note. Barton J. Bernstein, Eclipsed by Hiroshima and Nagasaki: Early Thinking about Tactical Nuclear Weapons,International Security15 (Spring 1991): 149-173; Marc Gallicchio, After Nagasaki: General Marshalls Plans for Tactical Nuclear Weapons in Japan,Prologue23 (Winter 1991): 396-404. Letters from Robert Messer and Gar Alperovitz, with Bernsteins response, provide insight into some of the interpretative issues. A great tragedy has ended. Such programs certainly helped end the Great Depression, but were insufficient [because] the amount of government funds for stimulus wasnt large enough, she notes. But, as France (at American insistence) had not been invited to the Potsdam Conference, so the French representatives on the Allied Control Council subsequently refused to recognise any obligation to implement the Potsdam Agreement; with the consequence that much of the programme envisaged at Potsdam, for the establishment of a German government and state adequate for accepting a peace settlement, remained a dead letter. Frightened by the rapid movement of Soviet forces into Manchuria and worried that the army might launch a coup, the peace party set in motion a plan to persuade Hirohito to meet with the cabinet and the Big Six to resolve the stalemate over the response to the Allies. By the end of November over ten weapons would be available, presumably in the event the war had continued. (Photo from U.S. National Archives, Still Pictures Branch, Subject Files, "Atomic Bomb"), Ground Zero at Hiroshima Today: This was the site of Shima Hospital; the atomic explosion occurred 1,870 feet above it (Photo courtesy of Lynn Eden,www.wholeworldonfire.com), The mushroom cloud over Nagasaki shortly after the bombing on August 9. Thankfully, nuclear weapons have not been exploded in war since 1945, perhaps owing to the taboo against their use shaped by the dropping of the bombs on Japan. Drawing on sources at the National Archives and the Library of Congress as well as Japanese materials, this electronic briefing book includes key documents that historians of the events have relied upon to present their findings and advance their interpretations. [27], Commenting on another memorandum by Herbert Hoover, George A. Lincoln discussed war aims, face-saving proposals for Japan, and the nature of the proposed declaration to the Japanese government, including the problem of defining unconditional surrender. Lincoln argued against modifying the concept of unconditional surrender: if it is phrased so as to invite negotiation he saw risks of prolonging the war or a compromise peace. J. Samuel Walker has observed that those risks help explain why senior officials were unwilling to modify the demand for unconditional surrender. [3] By October, thousands had died in the camps from starvation, exposure and disease. [2]. [26]. Truman, already on his way to Europe, never saw the petition.[35]. A significant contested question is whether, under the weight of a U.S. blockade and massive conventional bombing, the Japanese were ready to surrender before the bombs were dropped. If there was a misfire the weapon would be difficult for the Japanese to recover, which would not be the case if Tokyo was targeted. Vladimir Putin's latest appearance since the Wagner armed mutiny involved a girl, a bunch of flowers and his finance minister. Bix, Japan's Surrender Decision and the Monarchy: Staying the Course in an Unwinnable War,Japan Focus. To get production going, Bush wanted to establish a carefully chosen engineering group to study plans for possible production. This was the basis of the Top Policy Group, or the S-1 Committee, which Bush and James B. Conant quickly established. By the summer, once production plants would be at work, he proposed that the War Department take over the project. [46] During the meeting on August 24, discussed above, Stimson gave his reasons for taking Kyoto off the atomic target list: destroying that city would have caused such bitterness that it could have become impossible to reconcile the Japanese to us in that area rather than to the Russians. Stimson vainly tried to preserve language in the Potsdam Declaration designed to assure the Japanese about the continuance of their dynasty but received Trumans assurance that such a consideration could be conveyed later through diplomatic channels (see entry for July 24). If the Japanese decided to keep fighting, G-2 opined that Atomic bombs will not have a decisive effect in the next 30 days. Richard Frank has pointed out that this and other documents indicate that high level military figures remained unsure as to how close Japan really was to surrender. The initial report, May 1941, showed how leading American scientists grappled with the potential of nuclear energy for military purposes. Alperovitz, Bernstein, and Sherwin made new contributions as did other historians, social scientists, and journalists including Richard B. Frank, Herbert Bix, Sadao Asada, Kai Bird, Robert James Maddox, Sean Malloy, Robert P. Newman, Robert S. Norris, Tsuyoshi Hagesawa, and J. Samuel Walker.[4]. [73]. Nor does it include any of the interviews, documents prepared after the events, and post-World War II correspondence, etc. Two scientists at Oak Ridges Health Division, Henshaw and Coveyou, saw a United Press report in the Knoxville News Sentinel about radiation sickness caused by the bombings. See also Barton J. Bernstein, Looking Back: Gen. Marshall and the Atomic Bombing of Japanese Cities, Arms Control Today, November 2015. The three-part documentary event, FDR, premieres Memorial Day at 8/7c on The HISTORY Channel and streams the next day. The National WWII Museum pays tribute to the historic anniversaries, as well as the myriad servicemembers and Home Front workers who helped preserve freedom and democracy. The Allied Control Council was created to effect the Allies' assumed supreme authority over Germany, specifically to implement their assumed joint authority over Germany. Hitlers successor, Grand Admiral Karl Dnitz, started peace negotiations and on May 7 authorized General Alfred Jodl to sign an unconditional surrender of all German forces to take effect the following day. The discussion depicted a Japan that, by 1 November, would be close to defeat, with great destruction and economic losses produced by aerial bombing and naval blockade, but not ready to capitulate. [37] In the Petersberg Agreement of 22 November 1949, it was noted that the West German government wanted an end to the state of war, but the request could not be granted. The National Security Archive is committed to digital accessibility. German forces in Breslau surrender: At 18:00 on 6 May, General Hermann Niehoff, the commandant of Breslau, a 'fortress' city surrounded and besieged for months, surrendered to the Soviets. In accordance with the Treaty, occupying troops were withdrawn by that deadline. On May 8, 1945, World War II in Europe came to an end. [61]. Stimson, who later wrote up the meeting in his diary, also prepared a discussion paper, which raised broader policy issues associated with the imminent possession of the most terrible weapon ever known in human history., In a background report prepared for the meeting, Groves provided a detailed overview of the bomb project from the raw materials to processing nuclear fuel to assembling the weapons to plans for using them, which were starting to crystallize. The killing of workers in the urban-industrial sector was one of the explicit goals of the air campaign against Japanese cities. German forces in Bavaria surrender: At 14:30 on 5 May 1945, General Hermann Foertsch surrendered all forces between the Bohemian mountains and the Upper Inn river to the American General Jacob L. Devers, commander of the American 6th Army Group. An importanton-line collection focuses on the air-raids of Japanese cities and bases, providing valuable context for the atomic attacks. Later that year, the Uranium Committee completed its report and OSRD Chairman Vannevar Bush reported the findings to President Roosevelt: As Bush emphasized, the U.S. findings were more conservative than those in the British MAUD report: the bomb would be somewhat less effective, would take longer to produce, and at a higher cost. [71]. [23][25], Channel Islanders were informed about the German surrender after: At 10:00 on 8 May, the Channel Islanders were informed by the German authorities that the war was over. [66]. The First Nuclear Strikes and their Impact, XI. The Secretary of War, Mr. Stimson, and I weighed that decision most prayerfully. Documents 67A-B:Early High-level Reactions to the Hiroshima Bombing, Gaimusho (Ministry of Foreign Affairs) ed. In the East, the war ended when Japan surrendered unconditionally on Aug. 14, 1945, signing their surrender on Sept. 2. For on-line resources on the first atomic test. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. World War II Fort Belvoir,Virginia, 1941 . In an unprecedented series of trials, a new meaning of justice emerged in response to war crimes and crimes against humanity committed by both the Germans and the Japanese throughout the war. On 27 April 1945, as Allied forces closed in on Milan, Italian dictator Benito Mussolini was captured by Italian partisans. As the news of Germanys surrender reached the rest of the world, joyous crowds gathered to celebrate in the streets, clutching newspapers that declared Victory in Europe (V-E Day). That there may be a difference between the two sources becomes evident from some of the entries; for example, in the entry for July 18, 1945 Brown wrote: "Although I knew about the atomic bomb when I wrote these notes, I dared not place it in writing in my book., The degree to which the typed-up version reflects the original is worth investigating. American forces withstood the full might of what was left of Germanys power but lost approximately 20,000 men in what was their deadliest single battle in World War II. On April 21, 1946, two political parties united, creating a single, dominant party in what became East Germany. [7]. It is 28 inches in diameter and 120 inches long. [40]. [2] In early April, the first Allied-governed Rheinwiesenlager camps were established in western Germany to hold hundreds of thousands of captured or surrendered Axis Forces personnel. Bernstein (1995), 146. Herbert P. Bix,Hirohito and the Making of Modern Japan(New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2000), 523. After Suzuki gave the war party--Umeda, Toyoda, and Anami--an opportunity to present their arguments against accepting the Byrnes Note, he asked the emperor to speak. [78]. Magic summaries for post-August 1945 remain classified at the National Security Agency. What Is the Origin of the Term Holocaust? For more on the debate over Japans surrender, see Hasegawas important edited book,The End of the Pacific War: A Reappraisal(Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2007), with major contributions by Hasegawa, Holloway, Bernstein, and Hatano. The American island hopping campaign had destroyed key Japanese installations throughout the Pacific while allowing bypassed islands to wither on the vine. Gaimusho [Ministry of Foreign Affairs], ed., Shusen Shiroku [Historical Record of the End of the War] (Tokyo: Hokuyosha, 1977-1978), vol. General Douglas MacArthur had been slated as commander for military operations against Japans mainland, this letter to Truman from Forrestal shows that the latter believed that the matter was not settled. This update presents previously unpublished material and translations of difficult-to-find records. August 4, 2015 A few months after the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, General Dwight D.Eisenhower commented during a social occasion how he had hoped that the war might have ended without our having to use the atomic bomb. This virtually unknown evidence from the diary of Robert P. Meiklejohn, an assistant to Ambassador W. Averell Harriman, published for the first time today by the National Security Archive, confirms that the future President Eisenhower had early misgivings about the first use of atomic weapons by the United States. The Sunday Read: 'A Week With the Wild Children of the A.I. Boom' [38]. On the morning of August 15, Hirohito broadcast the message to the nation (although he never used the word surrender). With Prime Minister Suzuki presiding, each of the ministers had a chance to state their views directly to Hirohito. In keeping with General Groves emphasis on compartmentalization, the Manhattan Project experts on the effects of radiation on human biology were at the MetLab and other offices and had no interaction with the production and targeting units. It was a decision to loose the most terrible of all destructive forces for the wholesale slaughter of human beings. Frank, 258; Bernstein (1995), 147; Walker (2005), 322. How many people died during World War II? Adolf Hitler committed suicide on April 30, 1945, and the war in Europe ended on May 8. The documents can help readers to make up their own minds about long-standing controversies such as whether the first use of atomic weapons was justified, whether President Harry S. Truman had alternatives to atomic attacks for ending the war, and what the impact of the Soviet declaration of war on Japan was. This personal account, written on Tinian, reports his fears about the danger of a nuclear accident, the confusion surrounding the Nagasaki attack, and early Air Force thinking about a nuclear strike force. [3]. Information from the late John Taylor, National Archives. Hiroshima - view of Hiroshima Castle and surroundings; For example, the governing clique that supported the peace moves was not trying to stave off defeat but was seeking Soviet help to end the war. [64]. Alperovitz, 281-282. At the beginning of the discussion, Eisenhower made a significant statement: he mentioned how he had hoped that the war might have ended without our having to use the atomic bomb. The general implication was that prior to Hiroshima-Nagasaki, he had wanted to avoid using the bomb. Arguing that continuing the war would reduce the nation to ashes, his words about bearing the unbearable and sadness over wartime losses and suffering prefigured the language that Hirohito would use in his public announcement the next day. Record Group 165, Records of the War Department General and Special Staffs, American-British-Canadian Top Secret Correspondence, Box 504, ABC 387 Japan (15 Feb. 45), George A. Lincoln, chief of the Strategy and Policy Group at U.S. Armys Operations Department, commented on a memorandum by former President Herbert Hoover that Stimson had passed on for analysis. Meanwhile, junior Army officers plotted a coup to thwart the plans for surrender. The material reproduced here gives a sense of the state of play of Foreign Minister Togos attempt to secure Soviet mediation. It included the phrase "All forces under German control to cease active operations at 2301 hours Central European Time on May 8, 1945. [39] In 1951, many former Western Allies did end their state of war with Germany: Australia (9 July), Canada, Italy, New Zealand, the Netherlands (26 July), South Africa, the United Kingdom (9 July), and the United States (19 October). The Japanese, realizing that the War was nearly lost, turned to their most fearsome weapon in their attempts to stop the American advance: The Kamikaze. Togo asked Sato to try to meet with Soviet Foreign Minister Molotov as soon as possible to sound out the Russian attitude on the declaration as well as Japans end-the-war initiative. The George Washington University At the time of the first report, various methods for producing a chain reaction were envisioned and money was being budgeted to try them out. The Japanese Search for Soviet Mediation, VII. On 30 August, the Control Council constituted itself and issued its first proclamation, which informed the German people of the council's existence and asserted that the commands and directives issued by the Commanders-in-Chief in their respective zones were not affected by the establishment of the council. Washington, D.C., August 4, 2020 To mark the 75th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, the National Security Archive is updating and reposting one of its most popular e-books of the past 25 years. [65], Clemson University Libraries, Special Collections, Clemson, SC; Mss 243, Walter Brown Papers, box 68, folder 13, Transcript/Draft B. In all, more than 3,000 volunteers, many famous stars among them, had welcomed and entertained nearly four million servicemen and women. 2023, A&E Television Networks, LLC. A weeklater, on Aug. 15, Japan announced its intention to surrender. were the atomic strikes necessary primarily to avert an invasion of Japan in November 1945? [40], L.D. According to Merkulov, two fissile materials were being produced: element-49 (plutonium), and U-235; the test device was fueled by plutonium. The 509th Composite Groups cover story for its secret mission was the preparation of Pumpkins for use in battle. Stimsons diary mentions meetings with Eisenhower twice in the weeks before Hiroshima, but without any mention of a dissenting Eisenhower statement (and Stimsons diaries are quite detailed on atomic matters). As indicated by the L.D. How Did World War II Actually End? - WorldAtlas After German dictator Adolf Hitler's suicide and handing over of power to grand admiral Karl Dnitz in May 1945, Soviet troops conquered Berlin and accepted surrender of the Dnitz-led government.
