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- [00:00]
A
So the second he sees Kyoto, he says, no way there's any. You could put anything on there except Kyoto and I would be fine, but no way. And I am willing to go to real lengths to keep it off the list, which to me says something psychological is going on. Right.
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B
Well, there's a personal. Like, to me, there had to be. It had to have been a personal connection, like some kind of emotional thread.
- [00:23]
A
Exactly.
- [00:28]
B
You've reached American History Hotline. You ask the questions, we can leave a message. Hey there, American History Hotliners. Bob Crawford here. Thrilled to be joining you again for another episode of American History Hotline, the show with the best audience ever. I know you like praise and compliments. Me, too. Thanks so much for all your questions. Keep them coming. I'm serious. And the best way to get us a question is to visit our website. That's AmericanHistoryHotline.com that's AmericanHistoryHotline.com okay, today's question is a great one. You know, there's a lot of debate over whether or not we should have dropped the bomb on Japan. Did we save lives by ending World War II sooner? Was it immoral to unleash that type of destruction on the world? Well, today's question is a slightly different take on dropping the bomb. It's not about where we dropped the bomb on Japan. It's about where we didn't drop the bomb. This question comes to us from Jason in Tennessee.
- [01:38]
A
Hi, Bob.
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C
I've heard many times that at the end of World War II, when the US was planning on dropping the bomb on Japan, that the city of Kyoto was ruled out as a target because Secretary of State Henry Stimson had taken a trip there years before. Although there seems to be some discrepancies in the details, some people say it was a vacation or a honeymoon, and others say it was a diplomatic trip, like to know what the facts were and if Stimson really had the pull with Truman to make that change. Thanks. I'm looking forward to hearing what the experts have to say.
- [02:13]
B
Thanks, Jason. That's a great question. Joining me today to help answer the question is Alex Wellerstein, a historian of science at the Stevens Institute of Technology. Alex, thanks for joining me today.
- [02:28]
A
Thanks so much, Bob. I'm glad to be here.
- [02:30]
B
Alex, take us back to 1945. There's a group of men deciding which Japanese cities the US Would destroy with an atomic bomb. What cities are on their list?
- [02:44]
A
So the way the planning for this went, the operational where do you drop the bomb? Question what do you actually do with this weapon you've been building in war as opposed to, like, diplomatically or other ways you could regard it? This was being determined by a group known as the Target Committee. So these were military people and some scientists appointed by General Leslie Groves, who was the military head of the whole atomic bomb effort, the Manhattan Project. And their task was to essentially figure out what we should be doing with this bomb. And the way it was phrased for them was essentially they wanted it to be a spectacular explosion. It's a psychological weapon more than anything else. That's how they described it. And so they wanted to sort of showcase how powerful this weapon was. And so this weapon itself did not have the ability to go off sort of on the ground. It had to go off high in the air because it was fragile. So that meant that they couldn't target something that was small and like a bunker, like, hard. They had to target something that was large and relatively soft. They also had been bombing Japan, the US Air Forces, since March 1945, firebombing cities. So the number of unbombed targets was getting smaller and smaller. And they were very aware of this. They wanted it to be a fresh target, a target that had not been destroyed at all prior, so that this bomb's power would be showcased in this way. And they also, the weapon wasn't that accurate. So it's another reason they didn't want to aim at something small and sort of rugged is that you could miss by a mile pretty easily. And even though atomic bombs are powerful, missing by a mile will decrease the effectiveness. So they went through a. They basically came up with a list of criteria for we want a city that's about this big, about the size of how explosive it was. They want it to be unbombed. Ideally, it would be one that would, for, like, topographic, geographical reasons, would be good for hitting with this kind of weapon as opposed to, like, firebombing. So it'd be okay if it had rivers going through it, even though those work as fire breaks for firebombing, Ideally a city that everything was sort of in one place, not spread between mountains and things like that. And they gave them to the target planning people in the US Military who did all the other targeting. And they came back with this list of possibilities. And then they went through that list and looked very carefully at each option. And so by May 1945, they'd come up with this short list of what would be the best targets. Number one on the list is Kyoto. Kyoto was the Former capital of Japan. It had not been bombed during the war to any great degree. It did not originally have a lot of war industries in it, but they had been moved there as other cities got bombed, they were establishing more industries in Kyoto. They wanted a target that had some sort of military implications. Not so much because they couldn't destroy, you know, a factory without this weapon. But they wanted to be able to say, look, we were destroying military things. It's a legitimate military target. Number two on their list is Hiroshima, which is a port city and had some military facilities and industrial facilities within it. Number three is Kokura. Kokura is an arsenal. It's basically a large weapon producing factory surrounded by workers, houses. So for many, in a sense, that's their sort of ideal target. Where you destroy something that's without a question. You're aiming at a big military facility, but then also you get to showcase the damage by destroying houses and things like that. And then they also had on their list the city of Niigata and northern Japan. And so this is their list and the rationale behind that. You'll note that Nagasaki is not on this list. We can come to that. But that does not get added until later.
- [07:12]
B
I have to ask, Alex, was at this point, is it a foregone conclusion that we're going to drop the bomb?
- [07:20]
A
So it's a really interesting question. Nobody ever really asks that question. So it is assumed by the people who are making these plans that of course, course they're going to drop the bomb. This is partially an artifact of like, who these people are and the secrecy around it. Very few people know about this project.
- [07:38]
B
Okay, so wait, who are these people? Name names.
- [07:43]
A
Okay, so one of them is the Secretary of War who got mentioned, Henry Stimson. General Groves is in charge of the making of the bomb and things like that. You have the people who are otherwise involved in the making the bomb, prominent scientists, J. Robert Oppenheimer, for example. There's a few other prominent scientists, scientists. Truman doesn't find out about this until after FDR is dead. So this is happening. This would be pretty new for Truman. Roosevelt knew about some of this, but he's never clued in on planning. He dies before they really start the specific usage of planning. There's a committee that Stimson has. I hate these stories of committees because they sound boring. But there's two committees. There's the target committee and there's the interim committee. The interim committee has scientists, military people, Chief of Staff, General Marshall. There's. Stimson is running that that is a more policy oriented, what are we doing with this weapon? What are its implications for the future? Should we warn the Japanese ahead of time? What should we have the President say once it goes off? These are the kinds of questions they're handling. And then you have this target committee, which is this very like, at what altitude should the weapon be detonated if you want to inflict maximum damage on a certain type of target? Very technical kind of approach. These two committees are in charge of basically all of the major decisions. And Groves himself has an incredible amount of autonomy. He's the one who writes the strike order and has it issued in the name of other people. Things like this. Truman is really peripheral to all of this at this stage. He knows that this is going on, but he has delegated it, and it's not clear that he takes it that seriously. It's still very science fiction. It's still very tentative. He had literally one real briefing on the whole project, and it was maybe 45 minutes long, which is not that long. And so he is not the decision maker here. Everyone involved essentially assumes that Truman will agree with what they're doing. So it's not the story that people usually imagine where it's like a big, should we use it? Should we not? Pretty much everybody who's at that level of administration thinks, of course you're going to use it. The question is not what you're going to do with it, but what do you do after you use it? That's a really interesting question.
- [10:13]
B
So I want to get to Stimson here in a second, but I got to ask this.
- [10:17]
A
The.
- [10:18]
C
They.
- [10:18]
B
Everybody involved thought that Truman would go along is from what you're telling me, right? So why, like, was Truman a pushover or did he kind of get it? Which. Which one is it?
- [10:31]
A
It's a really good question. I. So they never. They never, like, write this down. They never talk about. So we have to imagine. We have to guess when Truman becomes president. They. Stimson is very unsure what kind of person this guy is going to be. He doesn't really know Truman. And every interaction he had with Truman before Truman became president was negative because Truman was a senator and was constantly trying to audit Stimson and was a real pain in the neck.
- [11:01]
B
And just to point out, I think Jason's question says that he calls Stimson Secretary of State.
- [11:09]
A
Secretary of War.
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B
He was Secretary of War. He was the Secretary of State for Hoover.
- [11:14]
A
Yes, exactly. Okay.
- [11:15]
B
Just want to make that clear. Okay.
- [11:17]
A
Yeah. Yeah. So when. When. When Stimson is. Excuse me. When Truman first becomes President, Stimson. Stimson's wonderful, by the way, because he kept a diary. So he dictated a diary every night.
- [11:30]
B
Gotta love people who keep diaries when
- [11:32]
A
you're doing this kind of work. Just so good. Yes, so good. And so he kept really detailed notes about what he was thinking about all of these things. He would dict them at the end of every day, and then somebody would type them up. Very helpful. Thank you, Secretary of War Simpson. But he was very suspicious. He didn't know, and the generals didn't know. Is this guy a pushover? Is he going to change things? Is he going to back down from plans we have? So just as an aside, one of the things Truman is involved in in the summer of 45 is the question about invasion. And they basically lie to Truman. They basically downplay the casualty numbers to Truman because they're afraid, probably not wrong, that if he thinks the numbers will be high, he will not approve it. And that's just an interesting dynamic. He ends up being fine with what they do, but I think it's very interesting that that's the level of uncertainty these people have with him. So basically, Truman, when he becomes President, he's mostly reassures people, I'm not changing anything. I'm just going to do what Roosevelt was doing. I don't understand all of it. I don't know all of it. I don't believe that I'm better than Roosevelt at figuring out how to win this war. And so they do get this sense. And this is also what he basically says when they give him his first briefing on the atomic bomb. He says, like, sounds like you're doing a good job. Keep at it. He doesn't say, loop me in. He doesn't say, I want to look at this closer. He basically just. He's meeting with both Stimson and Groves, and he says, okay, very interesting. Well, keep me in the loop. Right? And that's not bad. But he is so overwhelmed at this moment, and he would tell everybody, I don't know what I'm doing. Roosevelt told him nothing, Not. Not just about the atomic bomb. He didn't tell him anything about anything. Truman later said that he had about six meetings with Roosevelt after the election and that during those meetings, Roosevelt never told him anything about the war or secrets or anything. He just was not in the loop.
- [13:33]
B
It's vice president back. Like, that's. So what is. Do you have. I don't know if you have this quote at your fingertips, but what does Eleanor Roosevelt say to Truman after he takes the oath of office, like, this is your problem now, or something like that.
- [13:50]
A
If I recall, it's something like he goes to her to comfort her because her husband has just died. And she says something along the lines of, is there anything I can do to help you? And her reply is something along the lines of, you're the one who needs all the help right now. Which is pretty good. Right?
- [14:07]
B
You know? Yeah.
- [14:09]
A
So he's not that plugged in on this. And again, I would just emphasize, imagine you've just become president and you have this meeting with a general you've never heard of. Nobody has heard of General Groves. He's deliberately not well known. And your Secretary of War, who I just want to say this about Stimson, you mentioned he was previously the Secretary of State under Hoover. He is old by their standards. He is like in his 80s right now. He could probably be half of the senators. But, like, at that time, he's regarded as a really old man who has been doing stuff in the government since, I think, Calvin Coolidge. And like, in the 19th century, he was doing stuff for the government. Right. Like, he's a very. And he's basically. Everybody knows that he's on his way out the door. And he himself basically said afterwards that if he hadn't had this atomic bomb thing, which he was interested in, he would have retired. Because already almost all of his job is being done by the people working underneath him. He's not that. I mean, his diaries are great, but they're also like a very old person's diaries where it's like, worked three hours, took five hour nap, you know, took another, worked another hour, this kind of stuff. And so you're getting this guy who is in, you know, you respect him, but he's also very old. And this general you've never heard of. And they come in and Stimson's pitch to Truman is not just, we're making this weapon. That's the sort of Groves is giving you the basics, like, what are we doing with all the money version. Stimson is telling him, like, this is a super weapon. This is an entirely new relationship between man and the universe. This will irrevocably change international politics forever and history. This either will lead to an era of peace or total extinction. Now, you can, you can understand that. And also, by the way, nothing against this, but Truman is the last American president without a college education of any kind. And, you know, you get a 45 minute briefing on this, which is nothing and then about a new super weapon that is going to change. You know, Truman's response is very like, well, that's interesting, but, like, you know, let me know when you have something more concrete.
- [16:19]
B
Right.
- [16:19]
A
I mean, because they are still months away from testing this thing. So I don't think he. 100%. I don't think he included it in his calculations at that point. I think it's a different sort of thing.
- [16:31]
B
All right, so let's get to the crux of Jason's question. What is Stimson's connection to Kyoto?
- [16:39]
A
So let's back up one second. So the target committee comes up with this list of targets. Kyoto is their number one. Why is Kyoto the number one? It's a big target. It meets all of their criteria as they see it. And also, and I think this is a very interesting point, the scientists on the target committee thought that Kyoto would be the best because there's. It's where all the intellectuals were. And so they would be able to understand the significance of this weapon if they saw it firsthand. And, you know, it's a very scientist view of things. And so that day they've basically gets. This is the end of May, 1945, and Stimson happens to be meeting with Groves about other stuff they're. They're coordinating on. And he says to him, do you have your targets yet? And Groves says, yeah, but I don't have the report with me. And, you know, and Simpson says, I want to take a look at your list of targets. And Groves clearly does not want to show him this list of targets. He doesn't want to do it. This is not. I just want to throw this out there because it relates to the original question, too. The Secretary of War doesn't pick targets in 1945. They get you, like, a budget, they protect you from Congress, they run the draft. Right. They are not making operational decisions. They are not making diplomatic decisions. Stimson does not go to Yalta or any other place like that. He later goes to Potsdam, and that's because of the bomb. He is not like, there's a much stricter division between a military operational approach and the office that is now. I think it's the Department of Defense still, but technically. But the Department of War, whatever it is now, and the Secretary of Defense, Secretary of War. And so him, Groves is like, this is a turf war thing. This is a. It is not your job to pick the targets. That's my job as the military guy. Your job is the big policy. I thought we had a good division here. And Stimson says, I'll wait. I'll wait for you to get that report. You should. You should order it then if it's at your office across town, I'll wait. I want to find out the targets. So finally, Groves tells him the targets. And the second that Stimson sees Kyoto on the list, he says, take that off the list. You are not going to bomb Kyoto. And Groves tries to argue with him, and he tries to say, like, but it's actually a good target. Here's why our people picked it. Like, it's like Robert Oppenheimer is one of the people who's helping choose Kyoto. It's not just military people. Like, all the committees agreed that Kyoto was the best target. And Stimson says, no, you're not going to do it. And Groves sort of implies that, like, maybe it's not up to the Secretary of War. And Stimson says, I'm going to be. This is a. Groves told it later, I'm the kingpin on this issue. I am picking this. And what Stimson then does is he goes down the hallway where General Marshall, the Chief of staff is, grabs General Marshall, pulls him in, and says, I don't want to bomb Kyoto, and don't you agree with me? And Marshall says, sure, fine, whatever. Which Groves is horrified by. It's like going to his mother or something. Or you go. You. You jump rank completely and throw Groves boss in this awkward debate that he doesn't even understand. And. And this is how Kyoto initially is removed from the list. And the interesting thing here, I'll just throw this out. It doesn't actually take Kyoto off the list. They keep it on a list of reserved targets. And Groves keeps trying to put it back on the list about a dozen times until July. So anyway, that's the sort of what is going on here. And. And this gets at your question of, like, why is. Why does he care? Why does Simpson care so much?
- [20:20]
B
This is American History Hotline. I'm your host, Bob Crawford. Today my guest is Alex Wellerstein, a historian of science at the Stevens Institute of Technology. We're talking about whether or not one man's honeymoon or whatever may have spared the ancient city of Kyoto from being destroyed. Remember, send us your questions about American history to americanhistoryhotline.com that's americanhistoryhotline.com Back to the show. Okay, so let's kind of drill down on this. This honeymoon aspect of this. Like, because there's also this murky quote from Stimson saving Kyoto. Was he a Japanophile?
- [21:08]
A
So Stimson had been to Japan. He had been the Governor General of the Philippines at one point, and even before that, he had gone on a sort of tour of Asia to sort of learn the politics. This is.
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B
Sir, was he in the Philippines during the Taft administration?
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A
I don't remember what administration.
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B
Oh, my gosh. Like, this is how far back this guy goes.
- [21:35]
A
Yes, he. He is. And so he believes that he understands the Japanese better than a lot of other people in Washington at that time. Now, whether he does or not is. Is. I don't know. Right. I mean, who really understand anything. But. But he definitely felt that he knew these people and their culture and the kinds of things that would annoy them or bother them or horrify them and things like that. So he was trying to give lots of guidance towards the end of the war because he didn't necessarily think that the people in the State Department were always aware of Japanese culture. And he believed there were sort of bad stereotypes like the fanatical Japanese. He didn't think that's how they really were. At least the people at the top, the elites and things like that.
- [22:23]
B
I guess we need to recognize here that this is a period of America where in American history when there were internment camps.
- [22:33]
A
Yes.
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B
So what did Stimson feel about that? How did Stimson feel about those?
- [22:38]
A
That's an interesting question. I have no idea what he thought about internment camp.
- [22:41]
B
He didn't write about it.
- [22:43]
A
I haven't read it. I figured.
- [22:44]
B
Yeah, right. So some people actually believe another man played a hand in saving Kyoto from the atomic bomb. It was an American archaeologist and art historian named Langdon Warner. Who was he?
- [23:00]
A
Langdon Warner was, if you've seen the movie, like Monuments Men. Those came out a few years ago. There was a commission developed by the US Military to avoid destroying cultural monuments in Europe. And I think Warner was connected with this commission. It's so you don't, like, accidentally destroy Notre Dame or something like that while you're trying to wage this military campaign, because there was a sense that preserving these cultural heritage was. Was to some degree desirable. And Warner was connected with those people. Warner had nothing to do with Kyoto, which he himself was very clear about throughout his life. The idea that he had anything to do with it was something that the Japanese came up with independently because they noticed that Kyoto had not been destroyed. And I don't think at that time that they came up with this. They had as much access to American sources about this because it's really clear that it's Stimson. And the fact that it was Stimson who did it was pretty clear even in the 1940s. This was discussed at times. But the Japanese developed this idea that it was this guy Langdon Warner. And they told. They. Actually, he. Langdon Warner got word of this, and he would tell them, I had nothing to do with this. And they would say, oh, he's so humble. And, you know, they just couldn't be disabused. And I will say, I went to Japan about a decade ago. I went to Kyoto, and I had people there ask me about Langdon Warner. And I was like, no, he had nothing to do with it. They were.
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B
And.
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A
And they really. And I was like, oh, my God. Like, this is an interesting. It must. Part of it must be a language barrier or something, because, like, this is very clear that there's no historical question that it's Stimson and not Langdon Warner. Warner has just nothing to do with this, which is fine. He did lots of other things.
- [24:54]
B
So when it comes down to the moment of. Or the. You know, when it's locked in, like, did Truman have a final say over the targets?
- [25:08]
A
So here's. Let's back up just very quickly. Why is Stimson doing this? Why does he care? I don't know. Nobody knows. I'm not sure he knew. But I think the interesting thing here is that it's instinctual. So the second he sees Kyoto, he says, no way there's any. You could put anything on there except Kyoto, and I would be fine, but no way. And I am willing to go to real lengths to keep it off the list, which to me says something psychological is going on. Right.
- [25:38]
B
Well, there's a personal. Like, to me, there had to be. It had to have been a personal connection, like some kind of emotional thread.
- [25:46]
A
Exactly. So he definitely had been to Kyoto and he had a nice time. This is in the 1920s. It was not a honeymoon. He'd gotten married, like, 30 years earlier, but it was a sort of trip around Asia. We know even what hotel he went to, and he had a nice time. I feel like that hotel ought to put a plaque up saying, this hotel may have saved Kyoto. Who knows? But the interest. So there's a really interesting article. There's a guy named Otis Carey who tried to figure this out, I want to say, in the 60s or something like that, 70s. And one of the ideas he put out, which I find interesting. So the Stimsons did not have children. They would. They were very wealthy you know, elite types, but they never had kids of their own. And they would do this thing where when they wanted to travel, they would take a sort of like, surrogate child with them, a ward. Right. So they would sort of have these. These young people who they became close to and treated sort of like children. And one of these people. Yes, exactly. And so one of these people was very interested in Kyoto and was very interested in Japan. And so Kerry argues, maybe this is about that. I think, personally, I will just put out. Stimson did not like the bombing of Japan at all, any of the bombing of Japan. He was against the firebombing. He's one of the only people in the Roosevelt and Truman administrations who tried to rein that in. And he had no ability to do so because, again, that's a military decision, not a policy decision. And I sort of see this as. He definitely liked Kyoto. He understood its importance in the sort of. As this old capital of Japan, this old center of Japanese culture. They couldn't save Tokyo. It was destroyed at this point anyway. I feel like it's one of these. You can't save them all. And he also knows that cities are going to be destroyed with the atomic bombs. He thinks that's for the greater good, but he's not happy with it. And I do. I think in some sense this is his moral reconciliation. Like, I'll save one really nice place, and maybe that will offset all of the, as he saw it, all the evil they were doing, because he didn't like the Japanese government, he didn't like the German government, but he did feel that the destruction of cities was this sort of moral evil that he really disliked having to be part of in any way. And he did try to rein it in, and he got sidelined by the military every time.
- [28:12]
B
So when we think you're saying that at this point, the Secretary of War. At this point it was the Secretary of War didn't have a say over targeting.
- [28:24]
A
None at all. No operational decisions.
- [28:26]
B
So it makes only logistics flash in my mind. Robert McNamara, 20 years later in Vietnam, who was, to my understanding, was very involved in the operational planning of the Vietnam War. What happens in the interim? Is Stimson a step towards that? Is he like. Is he riding the line? And does he. Because he intervenes, we believe, on behalf of Kyoto. Is that this moment where that position begins to change and grow?
- [29:03]
A
That is such a good question. I give you two thumbs up for hitting on that theme, because it's a very subtle one. So one McNamara is this transformational Secretary of Defense. So he is what we think of as, like, the modern Secretary of defense. It's McNamara. But you are completely right that the atomic bomb becomes that wedge issue because. And it becomes that wedge issue in part because of this Kyoto thing. Is the atomic bomb a military weapon, or is it a political weapon? And this Kyoto issue ends up getting at the heart of exactly this question. It's Stimson saying, this is actually a political thing, not a military choice. The military saying, I'm sorry, this is a military choice. And this is. So let's come back to that. Let's put a pin in that for one second. So what happens? Groves continues to try and put Kyoto back on the list. Every time he talks to Stimson, he. He asks if they can make Kyoto a target again, which Groves later claims Stimson did not mind. I cannot believe that. I cannot believe that at all that Stimson did not mind. Groves kept trying to reinsert this city that Simpson had very clearly said he didn't want to destroy as the top target. And the last version of this happens in July 1945. By this point, Truman is at Potsdam. Stimson is there with him. Stimson is only there because of the atomic bomb issue. He was not otherwise invited. And Truman basically said, oh, it'd be nice if you were around, could give me advice on this. So he arranges his own transportation and gets there. Truman is meeting with Stalin, Churchill. It's a big deal. One of the. So they test the bomb in July 1945. Now, Truman is very interested in the bomb. He is fascinated by the account of the test. It also comes at a time when Truman is feeling like he doesn't have a lot of leverage. And suddenly he has all this leverage. So he is. The bomb for him now takes on this incredible significance. And he's really glad Stimson is there, because Stimson is his sort of communication about the bomb. One of the messages that Stimson gets at Potsdam is from his assistant in D.C. who says, by the way, Groves would like to put Kyoto back on the list, just in case it's, like, necessary. And Stimson, I think, correctly. They are forming the final list at this point, correctly sees this as a threat. And so what he does at Potsdam is go to Truman. So this is where Truman comes into it. Truman is not involved in any. Any operational decisions at all. He is told to one degree or another what the plans are, and he's basically not interfering. And now you've got this guy coming into Him. And we have two accounts of this. We have Stimson's account from his diary, and Truman at Potsdam keeps a little journal. And we have the little journal account. And Stimson basically says he goes to Truman twice and he lays out why Kyoto shouldn't be a target. And Truman agrees with them 100%. And so he wires back to Groves, I have it on highest authority you're not gonna bomb Kyoto now. Kyoto is safe. Right. Truman's account is very different. And it's fascinating because again, this is the only decision, the only decision that Truman is taking part in. He's not deciding whether to use the bomb, but he takes part in the Kyoto decision. His reply, I mean, excuse me, his version of this in his journal is that he and Stimson, is this a
- [32:37]
B
contemporary journal or is this something he writes in the future?
- [32:40]
A
He's writing it at the time.
- [32:41]
B
At the time.
- [32:42]
A
He's writing this on little pieces of paper. A whole other. Why is he keeping this little journal? Because he didn't normally keep a journal. But he has reasons for keeping track of what's going on at Potsdam because he's going to write a speech about this later and he needs material for briefing Congress about what decisions were made. And he says that they basically, he and Stimson decided that the first use of the bomb, the targets should not be women and children, but should be soldiers. And they were going to use it on a purely military target that would not be used, that even though the Japanese are terrible, the bomb could not be used on the old capital or the new, so it can't be used in Kyoto or Tokyo. I just want to throw out, like that's a very different take than I agreed to destroy Hiroshima the city instead of Kyoto the city. It's purely military. Hiroshima is 90% civilian. Right. Lots of women and children are going to die at Hiroshima. And so my argument, this is in my latest book, by the way, is that I think Truman misunderstood this conversation. The one decision he's part of, I think, and there's evidence continues afterwards for a few, even after the Hiroshima bombing, that Truman does not understand that Hiroshima is a city, that he thinks it's a military base or a military installation, something like that.
- [34:03]
B
So you're arguing that Truman's essentially misinformed.
- [34:07]
A
Well, he's definitely under informed in general. I don't think that's at all. I don't think Simpson tries to misinform him is I guess, what I'm saying. I do think that Truman walks away from these Meetings not understanding what he's done. And so the way I would put it is, I think Truman thought that he made the decision that the first use of the atomic bomb would not be on a city, that that would come later if they had to. And if you reread the initial statement by the president on the use of the bomb, which Truman didn't write, but he had seen drafts of, at no point does it say they destroy a city. It says we've destroyed a military place. We've removed its usefulness to the enemy. And then it promises that in the future, if they don't surrender, cities might be destroyed.
- [34:51]
B
So two bombs are dropped on Japan, one on Nagasaki, another on Hiroshima. I guess from what you're telling me is the Hiroshima bomb was meant for Kyoto at some point.
- [35:03]
A
Exactly. The Hiroshima bomb was meant for Kyoto. That, by the way. So when they take Kyoto off the list for the final time, they want another backup target for the list. Groves goes back to his air people, says, can you just give me another place? They come back with Nagasaki. They write it in by hand on the draft order. And Nagasaki, that's how Nagasaki gets on at the last minute. Bad luck.
- [35:29]
B
So was there a city identified for a potential third bomb if Japan didn't surrender? And that would that have been Kyoto?
- [35:39]
A
So Kyoto is probably not on any target list.
- [35:41]
B
It just, it just was off the list and off the list.
- [35:45]
A
It was actually on a list of targets nobody could bomb. It was the only city on that list.
- [35:51]
B
Alex, can you plug your book for us?
- [35:54]
A
So the book is called the Most Awful Responsibility, Truman and the Secret Struggle for the Atomic Age. And it is about Truman and the bomb. And my argument, as you can already see, is that I think his understanding of the bomb has been really misunderstood. Misunderstood. Not just World War II, but afterwards he was extremely. My argument is that after World War II, he associates nuclear weapons exclusively with the killing of non combatants, women and children, as he puts it, and he sees them as essentially immoral non military weapons. And of course, this raises the question of if that's how we thought about them, what's up with World War II? And the answer is he doesn't understand that the targeting in World War II. Secondly, the other objection that immediately comes up, okay, if he didn't understand Hiroshima, what about Nagasaki? Truman did not even know the Nagasaki bomb was happening. He is not informed before Nagasaki that they have two bombs ready to go. He gets some information, but again, it's not like misleading, it's just bad. Well, it's confusing. So they tell him he asked the schedule of the bombing and, and he's given the schedule of the tested type of bomb, as they put it. And there's two types of bombs. There's a tested type and the untested type. And nobody clarifies this. And so I think Truman's failing at this moment is assuming he understands more than he does while all these other things are going on in his life. After Nagasaki, the next day he's told that they'll have another bomb ready in a week. Who, what would they use it on? We don't know. There were other targets on that list. Kokura, Niigata. There were some within the military who were pushing for Tokyo as the, the next one. There were some General Marshall who believed that maybe we should just save up a bunch of them. If, if they're not going to cause surrender, let's just save up a bunch so that when we invade we can blow some stuff up with them as part of the invasion. Right? Use three at the same time or something like that. What happens is that on the morning of August 10th, Truman is told about this next bomb being ready in a week. And he says no one is allowed to use any more atomic bombs without my permission, express presidential permission. So this is the first time that he's putting himself into that chain of command, really.
- [38:17]
B
Is he seeing film footage at this point or is he seeing the devastation or reading reports of the devastation?
- [38:26]
A
So on the morning of August 8th, so two days later, that's when the first Japanese accounts of the damage come out. It's also when the first aerial reconnaissance photos are available because the smoke is cleared to the degree that pictures can be made. And so by this point, it's clear, it's a city, it's clear. And the initial reports, they don't know how many people died. It's still actually controversial, but the initial reports are guessing that hundreds of thousands of people have died. And so this would be something unavoidable to Truman for sure. He tells his cabinet on the morning of August 10th that he had ordered that they stop atomic bombing and that he did it because the idea of killing another hundred thousand people was too horrible. And he was very bothered by the idea of, as he put it, all those kids. And so this is this linkage again between like, this is not a military weapon, this is a civilian killing weapon. This eventually turns into this idea that only the President has control of nuclear weapons. And this becomes this fork that you mentioned before between like, what's a civilian role and what's a military role and the bomb. Truman is extremely instrumental in sort of building up this idea that the nuclear weapons are not military. They are a different category altogether. And the military's quality quite resistant of this throughout his entire administration. So that's what the rest of my book is about.
- [39:52]
B
Well, we can't wait to read it. And we're going to put a link for your book in the episode description. I've been speaking with Alex Wellerstein, a historian of science at the Stevens Institute of Technology. Alex, this has been incredible. Thank you for joining us today on American History Hotline.
- [40:09]
A
Thanks so much. Happy to be here.