The Atomic Bomb Ends the War
On April 1st 1945, the Allies invaded the Okinawa, a Japanese island, and their victory left heavy losses on both sides and proved that Japan could not win the war. On April 12, President Roosevelt died in Warm Springs, Georgia and vice president Harry Truman became nation’s 33rd president. After the Nazis surrender, the only enemy left was Japan. President Truman saw only one way to avoid an invasion from Japan. He decided to drop an atomic bomb; it was the best-kept secret of the war that President Roosevelt decided to create it as a last choice to end the war. Its first testing was on July 16, 1945 in the desert near Alamogordo, New Mexico. It gave off a binding flash which was visible 180 miles away, the bomb worked! Truman ordered another bomb to be created and when he left for Potsdam to meet with Churchill and Stalin, left instructions that the bomb was not to be used against Japan until after the Allies had agreed on and issued a declaration. The Potsdam Declaration of July 26, issued by the Allied powers and calling for "unconditional surrender," was not acceptable to the Japanese military, despite the declaration's threat that failure to surrender would be met by "complete destruction" of the military and the "utter devastation of the Japanese home land." Following ten days of Japanese silence, the atomic bomb was dropped on August 6, 1945, on the city of Hiroshima. Almost the entire city was destroyed but Japanese leaders still refused to surrender. Truman ordered the dropping of yet another bomb over Nagasaki, three days later, half of the city was completely destroyed. Finally, on September 2nd, Emperor Hirohito agreed to surrender and ended the war. By the end of the year, and estimated 200,000 people had died and both cities were left in ruins.
By Madeleine and Rafael
