The American Strategy To End The War

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02 Nov 2017

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Chloe Lan

Ms. Frankie Tsui

Social Studies

What was the American strategy to end the war against Japan and the consequences of the strategy?

World War II was the largest war in human history, but there were two countries were surprisingly involved in this Great War- USA and Japan. Both of them had their own reasons to get involved in this war. On 1941 December 7, Japan, because of their enormous ambition, attacked Pearl Harbor. For Japan’s point of view, attacking the Pearl Harbor was to show off their country’s military power, and to attack a big country such as USA would be a great target for this action. On the other side, USA was full of anger about this attack. In some point of view, USA did not need to be mad at Japan because Japan was such a small country to USA, but USA made this decision going against Japan and declared war on them, since Japan was one of the Axis Power and western countries were willing to fight with them, so this was also a good chance for USA to release their anger. For USA, Pearl Harbor was a very important military base for USA. Most of the country’s weapons, and the armies’ training were all settled up there, for example like aircraft carriers. In the Pearl Harbor attack, some of the important technological weapons were destroyed, but two of the biggest aircraft carrier left before the attack, so USA had the power to fight back. Japan, at the time, thought that they had destroyed the biggest military base of USA, and had proved how strong their military was, but they accidently lose the aircraft carriers, and made USA had the power to declare a war. For USA, this attack was an insult, and also a great chance to enter the war. On December 8, 1941, USA declared war on Japan. This was the start of the war. However in the end, USA decided to use the most horrified way to end all these, the atomic bomb. Therefore cause harsh long term effects toward Japanese citizens for generations. The atomic bomb as an unneeded action to take that there should be some other options. Therefore, USA should never drop the atomic bombs, and should look for some other options (like the following).

The first option would be to create a blockade between Korea and Japan that could make them unable to those resources. In 1876, Japanese was shipping through western Korea; however, Korea accidently saw this action as an invasion, and attacked the ships. After the attack and Japan won at last, Japan sign a treaty with Korea, which was called Japan- Korea Treaty of 1876. Korea became a half colony to Japan. Later then, in 1905, because of the left issues and effects of the Russo- Japanese war, Japan signed a treaty with Korea that Korea became a protectorate of Japan. In 1910, Japan signed the Japan- Korea treaty of 1910 that Korea became a part of Japan, in order to gain more resources and the first step conquering China. Japan was a country in the middle of the sea; therefore they need resources from other countries. Korea became the most powerful resource production for Japan. In history, Korea was always a symbol of a resource base also a treasure. Thousands of nomads or foreigners would kill for that land. Before the war begun, USA had tried to keep Japan out of this war, so USA blocked the oil supplies to Japan, which influenced Japan to attack Pearl Harbor. However, after the war had begun, USA stopped the blockade and also decided not to set any blockade, which was a bad decision. Blockade was the most normal way for countries to weaken their enemies during the war, but USA chose not to. If USA had chosen to make a blockade between Korea and Japan, in order to weaken Japan; it would be faster to end the war. The decision of dropping the atomic bomb was an awful option to make. Most of the generals would not enjoy seeing too much soldiers die for wars. If USA wished to decrease the death numbers of soldiers or citizens, they would work hard on any payment to finish the war as fast as they could, which could be the main reason of dropping atomic bomb; however, there was already no need for using. Two third of the resources of Japan came from Korea, since Korea had a great natural resource on coal, iron, and many kinds of metal. It was also named as the largest metal production in Asia. If USA decided to do a blockade between Korea and Japan, it would weaken and influenced Japan’s military power, citizen living condition, and factories production. Also, if this option had been done, this would influence many countries; USA could get more resources from Korea and gain their military and resource need, and China could get rid of those annoying invasions from Japan and focus on their own inner problems. If USA did make the blockade, the war between USA and Japan would not last for four years and also decreasing the death of soldiers or citizens. USA should have made some clever decisions to end the war, not being irritable about ending this war.

The second way is to keep fighting the war. In 1945, USA ended the war by dropping the atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. In fact, they did not have to stop the war so immediately. In 1945, President of the United State of America- Franklin D. Roosevelt- passed away in April. Right after President Roosevelt passed away, a new president had taken his place, President Harry S. Truman. However, there were many differences between these two presidents.

President Roosevelt and President Truman had two really different backgrounds. President Roosevelt was born in New York, and he studied in Harvard University and in Columbia law school. He had a strong governor background, since his fifth cousin was one of Presidents of America. Presidents and governors pay high attention on him. He was a governor of New York and also the vice President in 1920. He had led USA through difficulties that would be hard to solve, and made plans or deal for these difficulties (The New Deal). He was also the one who made the decision about declaring the war on Japan. For President Truman, he was born in Missouri and he lived in a farmer family. During World War I, he went to France as a captain at the Field Artillery. He was active in the Democratic Party afterwards, and he was a senate in 1934. He was the vice President few months before President Roosevelt’s death. Since they had these different personal back grounds, they could have different decisions or options on the same problem.

When Truman became the President, there were a lot of problems waiting for him to solve. As he said "I felt like the moon, the stars, and all planets had fallen on me", in fact, there were a lot of problems left by President Roosevelt that had not been solved. However, the most important problems were solved with the largest mistake in human history. In order to end this World War faster, the United States of America used their new weapon—the atomic bomb—which had not been used before. However, the use of this bomb was not only for ending the war, it was also an experiment of nuclear weapon to America. In the museum of World War II in Japan, there are introductions about nuclear bombs that were dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Those introductions showed the two atomic bombs that dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were different by shape, by the size, or even the content of the uranium used in the bomb. These show there were other reasons of dropping two bombs besides of one. At that period, US was the first country that had created a atomic bomb, but as the scientists know that nuclear weapons would be better for not testing in states, and this bomb was mostly confused those scientist, since they had no experience; therefore they need an experiment for the bomb. Also we could tell from the different shapes and sizes that US did not know the correct amount of chemicals or the shape that would be the best for an atomic bomb, and also wanted to create the most powerful one. These all shows that Americans was taking Japanese citizens as guinea pigs for the atomic bomb, which was one of the reasons that Japanese could not forgive Americans.

At the moment when President Truman decided to drop atomic bombs, Japan was already nearly losing. Japan was the last part of World War II (Germany and Italy were all defeated) .That also shows about other European countries might not have enough resources or giving out supplies (especially Germany). Even though Japan did not want to surrender at the moment, but if America continued fighting, since the shortage of food, and without any supplies from others, these all led to the inner suffer of the country; the war would end soon. There was no need for the use of atomic bomb, and America was wrong (President Truman) for making this quick decision. Four month after President Roosevelt’s death, President Truman made the biggest decision in the history and to the country itself. However, it was a decision what should not made with quick attitude. If these atomic bombs were never dropped in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, thousands of people and long term effects would not happen in Japan, and make that many people suffer. The US government at the time knew about the effect of this atomic at the time of explosion, but not for long term. As an example, President Roosevelt knew things and the invention of the atomic bomb, but never mentioned this in public or even in the private. However, President Truman was willing for dropping the atomic bombs. Also, they had treat Japan as an experiment, since they dropped different bombs to test, which was totally awful toward the humanity. If USA never knew about the long term effects of an atomic bomb and how long "uranium" would stay in the earth, then they should never use this bomb at that moment. Also, USA still got enough military power for keep on the war, when Japan was already in a dead end that they sacrificed their own army for direct attack. USA was able to keep fighting the war but they did not, and made this disaster happen.

After the atomic bombs were dropped, the sky was covered by black clouds, because people had not drink water for a long time, as the black rain falls, people were all rising up their head and drink the rain. However, the rain was highly polluted by the radiation of the atomic bomb. People started to feel uncomfortable and weird diseases, these effects were all unable to heal. Also, the land, water, and many human needs were all polluted, so that some of their new bourns had really bad birth defects that they grown extra arms or legs, or they had cancer when they grew up. These effects influenced Japanese for years. If they chose not to end the war in such a fast decision, besides continue the war, Japanese citizens would not be suffer in the mess for a long term, and the hatred would never built up.

The third way for solving this problem is to have a direct attack at mainland Japan and capture their king—Mikado. During the entire World War II, Japan had ever been invaded, and countries like the United States of America only took away their territories. However, if America was able to drop bombs from Japan’s territorial air space, they would also be able to invaded mainland Japan.

In 1945, near the end of World War II, Japan, at a dead end, sent out troops for suicide attacks, which were called the "Kamikaze". The kamikaze was chosen randomly in the crowd. Some of them did not know their "mission" at the first when they replied. However, most people were persuaded to have this mission done, which was a sight of the great nationalism that this country had, but there should be some exceptions. In the Kamikaze, men were separated into two different groups, the boys and the schools. The boys group was mostly adults without education or graduated earlier, so they did not left any diaries about their life, or some stories they have written. The schools group, which were well educated (mostly graduated in Universities), left diaries and journals with their opinions or their life of being one of the Kamikaze. In the book of the Kamikazes, as they had written, had shown their point of view. In fact, they did not have a good treatment. For example, there is an example from the book of the Kamikaze, "After I passed the gate to the Tsuchiura Naval Air Base, "training" took place day after day. I was struck on the face so hard and frequently that my face was no longer recognizable. On January 2, 1945, Kaneko (Ensign) hit my face twenty times and the inside of my mouth was cut in many places by my teeth. I had been looking forward to eating zōni [a special dish with rice cakes for the New Year]. Instead, I was swallowing blood from the inside of my mouth. On February 14, all of us were punished because they suspected that we ate at farmers’ homes near the base to ease our hunger. In the midst of the cold winter, we were forced to sit for seven hours on a cold concrete floor and they hit us on the buttocks with a club. Then each of us was called into the officer’s room. When my turn came, as soon as I entered the room, I was hit so hard that I could no longer see and fell on the floor. The minute I got up, I was hit again by a club so that I would confess. A friend of mine was thrown with his head first to the floor, lost consciousness, and was sent to a hospital. He never returned. All this savagery was orchestrated by the corps commander named Tsutsui. I am still looking for this fellow." According to this quoits, seems that those "invited soldiers" did not have some well treatment. This could tell things about Japanese was using streak rule to train the soldiers, so they could get them ready faster, but the soldier however seems unwilling to fight. This not only a symbol of the harsh treatments done by Japanese governors, it was also a symbol how Japan’s reaction was when they were led toward a dead end of the war. Most of the soldiers were all suffering at the end of war, they all started to give up, and the military power was also put into a dead end which they had shortage issues on weapons and soldiers. For another example from the book of the Kamikaze, "I long for the day I can return to my beloved parents when my service is over. I am here far away from home. Even when I die, no one will cry for me; how lonely it is only to hear cicadas cry. No one will come to visit my tomb. Then, I am better off buried along the road, since someone might offer flowers. I don’t care which flowers they offer, perhaps camellia blooming in the wild along the road? No water is necessary, since it will rain." According to this poem, this poem summarized about the unwilling to leave. In this poem, as the soldier had described, he was very missing his homeland, and also described the react of every soldier in the end of the war, and were all willing to go home. This poem did not only show the willingness of soldier wanted to be back, it also showed that soldier started to miss their homeland. When soldiers started to missing homeland, they were also tired of being in the war, since people will not burning them nicely, they were all wishing to see their families. If soldiers were all tired of fighting, then USA lose their purpose of using a harsh ending. Straight invasion could end this war in a second, but USA had never thought about this program.

In USA’s point of view, they would think it was not USA’s fault for sacrifice those Japanese soldiers; it was Japan’s idea of doing these. Japan could surrender before USA’s action, but they didn’t. Americans said that it was Japanese sacrificing their own people. In fact, Americans were wrong. Japan was a country with a lot of strong nationalist in their country, and they kept their ways to have a war or finish their war for thousands of years. As the diary had talked about, the soldier mention himself by saying they were describe as the "samurai" (the palace guard in Japan in the past time). Samurai was the simple of non surrender. If they ever force to surrender, they sacrifice by cutting their abdomen. This shows that how strong nationalism was in Japan. Nevertheless, America decided to just dropping the bomb and not having not even sending soldier into mainland Japan and killed thousands of people with the long term effects from their mindless action. So, therefore the third way could be the best way to finish the war of all, and without any long term effects toward innocent Japanese citizens. Lastly, there were options to end this war besides using any nuclear weapons, and USA had chosen the harshest one.

In the view of USA, they thought using atomic bombs to end this was a really good idea. They had some difficult times during the war, and most of the citizens, soldiers, and governors were all tired of this war. US still got strong military, but they all felt unwilling to fight. When Truman became the President, he decided to order the nuclear weapon in two months after he was in charge of the country. Using nuclear weapons was the fastest way to end the war, but using two at the once seemed awkward to Japanese. One nuclear weapon would be enough to made Japan surrender, therefore USA’s action of dropping the bomb had became confused to the Japanese. Even USA could oppose every option I pointed out, however, Japan had lost mostly everything, and USA did not need this kind of fast decision. The atomic bomb had cause thousands of Japanese’s death, and this was not including the number of death of the long term effects. USA had never thought of the long term effects, which made nations criticized USA after World War II, and Japanese had been through a really horrible period after the war. For these reasons, even USA was strongly agreed on this action, but people in the world could view this option in some different ways, and also thought about something different about USA.

USA used the harshest decision to end World War II, which was also surprised the entire world. USA wished to end this war in the fastest way, which was the use of the atomic bomb. However, these options would all help to end the war, and USA never thought about these. In the first option, the blockade of Korea could became a really affected action to be done, since that it could stop the control from Japan toward Korea, and stop Japan’s invasion. Chinese and Korean would also be glad to help the action, which benefit their own country. They would become one of the allies of USA. Japan would suffer on resource shortage if they lost Korea. In the second option, to keep fighting the war would be the one that USA strongly opposed on, which they just wanted to end this war faster, but this option was still better than using any kind of nuclear weapon. The area that had been polluted by radiation would be unable to use for fifty years, and this was what happened in Japan. USA could use less than a month to defeat Japan and make Japan surrender. To keep fighting the war could be a better option to do comparing to nuclear weapons. In the third option, to invade mainland and take away their king would be the best option to do. During World War II, USA had never step into mainland Japan until when they dropped the atomic bombs in the sky. If USA had done any invasion at the last, Japan would be easily defeated. To capture the king would be an extra option to do, but to take away their religious leader would make Japanese surrender in a second. Since Japan had offered those Kamikazes to sacrifice by crushing on USA ships, USA should realize that this was the last option for Japanese to defeat and to fight against. There was no need for the nuclear weapons to be involved. In conclusion, until present, after about sixty years, the only thing that Japanese could never forgive the American was the use of atomic bombs to end the war. This hatred had less for years, and still unforgiveable. If USA had never made the decision to drop the bomb, USA and Japan would create their economic relations (trading) or friendship easily, and Japanese’s hatred toward USA on the blame of nuclear weapons would never been developed.



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