Each year as we approach the Feast of the Transfiguration, which (sadly) shares a date with the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, there will be new reflections from military, political and moral perspectives. There are some reflections that ask the reader to ponder what was revealed/unveiled in Jesus’ transfiguration on Mt. Tabor and then ask the reader to ponder what was revealed/unveiled in the light of the atomic blasts at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. I think that is a good and holy endeavor: considering the revelation of the Divine vs. the human capacity for unleashing that which is wholly other than divine into this world. 

We have long grown accustomed to living in an era of nuclear deterrent, mutually assured destruction. I would venture to say that most days we don’t think about the arsenals, unused in the last 80 years. We are more concerned about new entrants into the “nuclear weapons club.” Those are our modern day concerns and questions.

What were the questions facing leaders in 1945 when considering the first use of atomic weaponry? A weapon that until July 1945 they did not know if one would actually work. Nor were they sure of its explosive power; and there is some indication that there was not a clear understanding of the long term effects of radiation and fallout of post-denotation radioactive materials.

I find that many who have (and will) moralize for or against the decision to use nuclear weapons will make arguments that have been frozen in amber since the 1960s. Those arguments made some 60 years ago against the weapons use were largely made by academics and others detached from the experience of the combat and its history in the Pacific. Those that supported the decision tended to be people who were closer to the grim reality of war and felt that millions of potentially lost lives were saved the day the bomb dropped. It is now 80 years later.

When the war in the Pacific concluded, America moved on to enjoy a time without war. Soldiers, sailors, and airmen returned home and did not talk about the war. Detailed history of war planning and execution remained classified and would remain so for another 50 years, until 1995. Not just Allied documents but also Japanese war plans, reports, orders, directives, and more. The War Tribunals revealed atrocities and crimes, but not overall planning – especially that associated with potential allied invasion of the Japanese home islands. In addition, war diaries and journals of Japanese soldiers, sailors, airmen, leaders and diplomats were available and translated many years later, even as the collection of war reminiscences expanded. The reminiscences tended to be written as that generation reached retirement – those fortunate enough to have survived the war to reach retirement. 

In the early 1960s, before these histories, documents and reminiscences became available, new voices arose from the ranks of society that were largely sheltered from service and combat. Of those who had experienced combat, few went on to become men of letters, ethical theorists, professors of contemporary history, or of international law. The arguments that began to arise in the 1960 were advanced in academia by solid historians such as Gar Alperovitz (b. 1936), Martin Sherwin (b. 1937), Barton J. Bernstein (b. 1936) and Lloyd Gardner (b. 1934) all of whom offered critiques of the decision to use atomic weapons. A summary of the bases of their objections might be simply described as:

• Moral: killing tens of thousands of civilians non-combatants violated just war principles and humanitarian norms.
• Military necessity: Japan was already militarily defeated and seeking ways to surrender – and even more so after Soviet entry into the war.
• Alternative strategies: the U.S. could have demonstrated the bomb’s power or modified unconditional surrender terms.
• Geopolitical motive: apart from the goal of ending the war in the Pacific, the bomb was a signal to the USSR.
• There was a lack of consensus among some U.S. military leaders who, after the war, voiced opposition or skepticism about use of the bomb.  

A contemporary of these historians was Herbert Feis (b.1893). While, in general, he held some of the same objections, pointed out the paucity of historical records available to historians in the 1960s and criticized their work on that basis. He was critical of offering as history what were largely undocumented views, memories, and such.

My point is this: the five objections outlined above became the views/objections that have been “frozen in amber” ever since, unaltered by the release of historical documents. For example, the assertion that “Japan was already militarily defeated” is one without meaning in light of the post-1995 historical record. The question facing the leadership in 1945 was more: “The Japanese can not win the war, but they are not defeated. There is a demonstrated culture of fighting to the end with no surrender. Japan has militarized traditional non-combatants. Invasion of the home islands will bring about massive deaths on all sides” … and more. What the leadership had available to them that was not available to the 1960s historians were decrypted messages from the ULTRA (Japanese military code) and MAGIC (Japanese diplomatic code).

The release and declassification of war documents, the availability of translated Japanese war documents and war diaries, and the release of personal documents of Emperor Hirohito upon his death in 1989, all provided a wealth of information that has shed new light on the last four of the objections. But, what remains is still “Moral: killing tens of thousands of civilians non-combatants violated just war principles and humanitarian norms.”

I have a sense that the “decision” to use the atomic bomb was already presumptively “decided” well before August 1945. By the July 16, 1945 Trinity test in the Jornada del Muerto (Path of the Dead) desert in New Mexico, the USS Indianapolis (CA-35) had already set sail from San Francisco on the way to Tinian Island to deliver the weapons that would ultimately be dropped on the Japanese home islands. If I get that chance I may write up my notes on what led me to think that – and it is not an original thought.

But the arc of this series is not about the use of atomic weapons. The series will (attempt to) explore a “what if.” What if the bombs were not available/developed by the second half of 1945 and were not deemed to be ready for us in the foreseeable future? What then? 

What were the choices remaining for the Allies regarding the war in the Pacific? Because what still faced leadership is: “Moral: killing tens of thousands of civilians and non-combatants violated just war principles and humanitarian norms.” That was certainly a question facing planners of any potential invasion of the Japanese home islands. But the numbers involved in the Pacific Theatre of Operations (PTO) were already well past tens of thousands of civilians before 1945. 

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) and Yad Vashem, Israel’s official memorial to the victims estimates 6 millions Jews were killed in the Nazi Holocaust. That is a number that should horrify anyone. But to give context, the War in the Pacific and East Asia had already resulted in 20-30 million deaths of civilians. In the last 12 months of the Pacific war, approximately 1 million civilians died in Japanese-held Vietnam (French Indo-China). This was only one of the countries occupied by Japan. Others include China, Taiwan, Korea, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, Indonesia (Dutch East Indies), Malaysia and Singapore, Brunei and Borneo, Hong Kong, parts of New Guinea, the Marshall Islands, Truk, Palau, the Marshalls, and other Micronesian islands.  What would be the civilian death toll as the war dragged on past August 1945? Would it be another 18-24 months? Did the American public have the resolve to support operations in the Pacific given the war in Europe ended in May 1945. 

The war with Germany ended with the invasion of the German homeland and its unconditional surrender. Invasion and unconditional surrender would seem to be part of the Allied vision to ensure neither German or Japanese militarism ever arose in the future.

I should point out that in the aftermath of the war, the extent of civilian deaths in the European Theater of Operations became known to the American public. There were approximately 15 million civilian deaths with an estimated 10 million in Russia and 3 million in Poland alone. 

In the face of such numbers, the world was well past any humanitarian norms and “proportional response” seems like a luxury for “ivory towers.” In the context of the summer of 1945 what was a path forward to stopping the war in the Pacific in the face of the historic reality of the militarism and colonial ambitions of the nation of Japan – when atomic weapons were not available?

This series is not aimed at concluding with “the atomic bomb was the lesser of all the evils about to be faced.” It is intended to hopefully provide a correct historical understanding available to the 1945 leadership who faced the impossible task of ending a war and not repeating the armistice of 1919 that became the next war. 

If one holds that war is never justified, then these posts will likely make little difference. If one holds to the Catholic just war theory and doctrine, these posts will likely lead one to consider the moral question in the context of the “what if” there was no atomic bomb. What next?

For this series, “what’s next” is a brief post on why I am interested in the topic.

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Image credit: various photographs from Naval Aviation Museum, National World War II Museum, and US Navy Archives.