Events

  • March1945

    Allies begin mass bombing raids of Tokyo and other cities

  • July16

    United States successfully tests first atomic bomb

  • July26

    Potsdam Declaration signed

  • August6

    United States drops atomic bomb on Hiroshima

  • August8

    USSR enters war against Japan

  • August9

    United States drops atomic bomb on Nagasaki

    USSR invades Manchuria
  • August15

    Hirohito announces Japan’s surrender

  • September2

    Japan signs formal surrender

      • Key People

    • Harry S Truman

      33rd U.S. president; after death of Roosevelt, made decision to drop atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945

    • Curtis LeMay

      U.S. general who orchestrated brutal incendiary bombing campaign against major Japanese cities in March 1945

    The Tokyo Air Raids

    During the same months that Allied forces in Europe were closing in on Germany, Allied forces in the Pacific were closing in on Japan. In March 1945, the U.S. Air Force began a series of heavy bombing campaigns against major Japanese cities. These attacks were the brainchild of General Curtis LeMay, who headed the 21st Bomber Command. The operations used America’s new strategic bomber, the B-29, and directly targeted the Japanese civilian population in addition to industrial and military targets. The strategy was simply to destroy the Japanese will to resist.

    Many of these raids were conducted on the capital of Tokyo itself, though other cities such as Kobe were also hit. In the spring and summer of 1945, the severity of these air raids grew exponentially, some causing firestorms that produced death tolls in the hundreds of thousands. By late summer, little of Tokyo and the other targeted cities were left standing.

    The Potsdam Declaration

    Between July 17 and August 2, 1945, Harry S Truman of the United States, Winston Churchill of Britain (and later Clement Atlee, who replaced him as prime minister during the conference), and Joseph Stalin of the USSR met in Potsdam, Germany, with other Allied leaders to discuss the future administration of Germany. On July 26, the three also held a special meeting to settle on the terms of surrender for Japan in order to end the war. The agreement was set forth in a document known as the Potsdam Declaration. In short, it demanded an unconditional surrender that included the complete demilitarization of the country and the replacement of Japan’s current leadership by a “peacefully inclined and responsible government.”

    The Manhattan Project

    During the summer of 1945, American scientists succeeded in completing a working atomic bomb, which was tested a single time, on July 16, at a remote location in New Mexico. Scientists around the world had theorized about the concept of such a weapon for years, and active research on its development had been taking place not only in the United States but also in Nazi Germany, Japan, and the USSR. The American effort, which was conducted with substantial help from Canada and Britain, was code-named the Manhattan Project. Shortly after the July test, the Truman administration began seriously to consider using the bomb against Japan. Eventually, Truman made the difficult decision to do so, in spite of considerable resistance from U.S. military leaders. Despite the fact that the bomb would kill tens of thousands of innocents, Truman felt that it would ultimately save both U.S. military and Japanese civilian casualties that would inevitably result from a ground invasion of Japan.

    Hiroshima and Nagasaki

    The first atomic bomb was dropped from a B-29 called the Enola Gay on the morning of August 6, 1945, onto the city of Hiroshima. The blast obliterated most of the central city, killing 80,000 in a single moment. By the end of the year, 60,000 more victims would die from radiation poisoning, and thousands more would die in the years to come, from cancer and other long-term effects of the radiation. It is estimated that the total death toll from Hiroshima was well over 200,000.

    The immediate reaction to the bomb in Japan was one of total incomprehension. All communications with Hiroshima were lost, and rumors quickly spread that the city had vanished in some kind of cataclysmic explosion. Yet Japanese military radar had indicated that only a few isolated planes had been in the area. The Japanese would learn the truth sixteen hours following the explosion, when the U.S. government released a public statement explaining what had taken place. Three days later, on August 9, a second atomic bomb was dropped on the port city of Nagasaki with similarly devastating results.

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