Harry Truman: Dropping the Bomb | 5-Minute Videos 

The way that FDR kept Truman out of the loop is more proof of how bad FDR actually was.

Actually, Truman was very, very reluctant to use "the bomb," but it was a senior official in his cabinet who warned him, saying.."What happens when the american people find out you had a weapon that could've ended the war and saved millions of American lives, and you failed to use it?" That's why he dropped the bomb. He knew history would not have remembered him favorably.

I've not read anywhere that Truman made the decision lightly. He did it not only to spare American lives but also Japanese lives. Based on the rate of casualties from the invasion of Okinawa, projections for the invasion of Japan proper were for between 400,000 and 1,000,000 Allied casualties, with up to 200,000 dead. Estimates of Japanese casualties, both military and civilian (and remember that civilians were being trained to fight tanks with spears) exceeded 5,000,000 with potentially 2,000,000 dead. An alternative to invasion was to continue to isolate the Japanese home islands from any source of food or fuel from abroad and to destroy the ability of their rail system to deliver what supplies were available in country. The resulting famine might have left over 10,000,000 Japanese dead from starvation. When presented with these shocking alternative, I tend to agree with those who have said that Truman made "the least abhorrent choice".

There hasn’t been a decent Dem Prez since.

His home in independence is so interesting. When he painted his kitchen he had some paint left over so he painted the chairs and table to not waste the paint.

My main criticism of Truman is his introduction of limited war. It didn't work in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, et al. Eisenhower recognized limited war as a means for arms manufacturers to become wealthy.

Harry S Truman's decision to drop the bombs was indeed a horrible one. But the alternative was worse, and not just for us. The effect of a conventional invasion on Japan would have made the destruction of Hiroshima look like an ice cream party. And Japan would not have rebounded to become the second largest economy in the world in mere decades.

in high school we were visiting the Truman library the day President Reagan was shot. a guard in the library gave us the information about it and he said, they still didn't know if the President was still alive. there are some events in your life that make you remember where you were when you heard the news

Fun fact Truman was are only President to have fought in World War 1

Great video. Short and dense so that I want to see part 2.

How GREAT IS OUR GOD praise God praying for everyone everyday God bless you all

I can't imagine the position he was put in......but thank God we got such a capable President in him.

Over the years I've heard all sorts of debates over whether it was the atomic bomb attacks or the Russians entering the war in Asia that caused Japan to finally surrender. Actually, it was both. Look at it from the Japanese point of view. Their empire had been reduced greatly in the Pacific but they fought on. Southeast Asia was lost but the Japanese army was still strong in China and Manchuria. They were fighting fiercely in the Philippines, Borneo and Okinawa. And even though their home cities were being fire bombed to ashes, the people remained loyal and were preparing to repel an invasion. Yet no surrender. Then came the atomic bomb attacks followed immediately by the Russians' declaration of war and invasion of China and Manchuria. Those two events in quick succession combined to shock the Japanese government and the Emperor into facing the reality that they were done and if they fought on, their country and culture would disappear. Funny thing is that as powerful as the atomic bombs were, fewer people died in them than in the fire bombings of Tokyo and other cities. MacArthur said it best: "The only good that can come from war is it's swift conclusion." Japan qas beaten, but they waited too long to accept it.

Wow fantastic instructional piece!

I wasn’t aware that one who had not graduated from college or Law School could become a County Judge.

You dropped the bomb on me, baby… you dropped the bomb on me Truman as the Gap Band.

The Truman Show was great

Truman was a true American.

President Truman is one of few finest if not the finest president America ever had

Excellent, Excellent, Excellent!

Investigate waste and incompetence in the war effort? Those concerns are long gone.

This question is one where reality took a back seat to fallacy. Being that hindsight is 20/20 "intellectuals" have loved to ask the students this very question. Since October 7th 2023 the answer is that a well entrenched Force, fighting with resources, without rules and using tunnels and civilians as protection can hold of a numerically Superior and equipped of assaulting troops. Any victory would be a very costly one. Gaza is 140 sm with fewer people but Tokyo is 847 sm with at the time 3 1/2 million. America and it's allies could have suffered casualties hundreds of thousands if not a million.

prager u...a wonderful angel among us...thank...love...

Wishing everyone a blessed happy mother's day praise God praying for everyone everyday God bless you all...

Often, when the topic of the use of the bomb comes up, there are people who interject that the use of the bomb was unconscionable. The discussion becomes a matter of people shouting numbers where one says how bad it could have been and one refusing to accept those numbers and only cite how bad it was. Into this environment, let me share a unique insight shared with me by several dozen Japanese survivors of the war: "Thank You. Thank You for using the bomb." I bring this and the elaboration when it was shared with me. I was the son of a U.S. military serviceman stationed in Japan. He believed in serving your community and felt that being in a foreign country was no excuse. I was made to volunteer at local nursing homes. While I was there, people kept thanking me. I was barely doing much, so I assumed it was Japanese courteousness. A resident caught my continued confusion. She spoke English well and explained. We spent the day with her being the translator. The Thank Yous were not to me Kevin, although they were courteous. The Thank Yous were to me the American. They were specifically about dropping the bomb. I was horrified. How could they thank me for all the death. She was kind and explained what 10 year old me did not know. Japan had entered the war with America due to its own problems. The Emperor was actually friends with a lot of American officials. Many of his Generals/admirals had gone to school in the U.S. They knew just how formidable an opponent the U.S. would be if aroused. They had no way to communicate how vast the U.S. resources were to a people who eeked their life out in the rough, tight terrain of Japan. The younger officers began to push the higher ranking officers, calling them cowards and using the Bushido Code, and the risk of loving face, to propel them to attack the U.S. Everything that the Emperor feared would happen, happened. Everything the Generals/Admirals feared the U.S. would do, it did. Japan followed the only path to victory they could see, but their drive/experience could not best the resources and innovative nature of the U.S. But the obviousness of their loss was insufficient. Their code required not just victory, but to continue even in defeat if their was a chance of harming the enemy. This mentality is what led to famous sword charges of machinegun nests once the Japanese had run out of bullets. By this point, the Japanese knew they would lose. Every Japanese knew this. And every Japanese prepared to sacrifice their lives. An American invasion would make every man, women, and child a combatant. The Americans would be required to kill every living person on the island. Every young mother was expected to kill their infant/toddler before sacrificing herself to kill at least one more American. The Japanese had not accepted losing the war, they had accepted the extinction of the Japanese genetic line. Then the first bomb fell. The devastation was beyond belief. The Japanese scientists estimated that it would have taken more TNT then used in the war to date. A few scientists noted some professional writings that an atomic bomb could do this, but would require all the Uranium in the world. The U.S. warned that they could do it again. The Japanese decided to call the U.S.'s bluff. And the U.S. did it again. They told Japan they could do this all day. The Emperor, who embodied the Japanese spirit, could not violate their code. He could not do the same thing the Koreans had done and surrender when they could still fight. He could not cause Japan to lose face like that. But the bomb changed that. The Americans could hurt Japan without Japan having a chance to hurt the U.S. back. In this case, the Bushido Code says that a Wise Man will see the wisdom in surrendering. Japan could finally surrender. Truman did not prevent millions of hypothetical deaths, he saved the Japanese people. People who had resolved themselves to a no-win position because death was preferable to dishonor, lived long lives. By the 1980s, I watched the young generation who had forgotten this as they demonstrated against U.S. military bases. But my father worked with a man who had been training to be a kamikaze pilot when the invasion of Japan began. He reiterated and confirmed that this was the reality he knew. He had dedicated his life to helping bridge his defense force with the country that had spared them without causing them to lose face. To these people, Truman would hang in their shops for all their lives. I finally knew why I could find pictures of Truman and a KFC even in remote rural Japan. Whatever else you may think of Truman's polices, this was the right call.

PRAGERU!!!!!!

It is good for people to question the act of using the Bomb. But the Japanese have no right to complain about it. After their atrocities they have no one to blame but themselves.

A great president, he was.

Fantastic insight. Avoids revisionism.

Read book about Pilot who lead attack on Pearl Harbor & visited both atomic bomb sites and lived, a Doolittle raider captured in China by Japanese soldiers & a missionary family living in Japan. The pilot said if Japan had this weapon they would have used it

Jesus Christ died for our Sins according to the scriptures and that he was Buried and he Rose again the third day praise God praying for everyone everyday God bless you All

The buck did stop with him.

What a hard action in charge of that man. Reasonable leaders wouldn't want to kill innocent people, but in this case, Americans, which were the victims, had to stop the attacker a soon as possible. Thanks for daring to do such an uncomfortable video.

Any reason why I can't comment on others asking questions PragerU? I always supported you this is the only thing we don't agree on.

Truman... I don't know. He gets a pass somehow, yet had a front row seat at a critical juncture where we could have pulled back from government consuming the society, and did not. Much of the federal follies had his fingerprints on it.

Witnessing the terrible destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki may have prevented an Earth-destroying nuclear holocaust in the Cold War of the 1950s.

weeds be legals now

The ostensible purpose of this United States to drop A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was to urge Japan to accept the Potsdam Declaration or unconditional surrender. As a result, US military forces did not need to land on Japanese mainland. So a lot of American lives as well as Japanese civilians were spared. A lot of American people still believe that A-bombings are tragic but necessary evil to minimize casualties. However, leaders of both the United States and Imperial Japan knew Imperial army could not fight to the last ditch on Japanese mainland. When Imperial Navy was annihilated at the Battle of Leyte Gulf in October, 1944, Japanese leaders had to recognize that Japan`s defeat was inevitable, and their objective was to capitulate to the United States under favorable conditions as possible. Imperial Japan expected the Soviet Union to work as a mediator between the United States and Japan since Japan singed the Russo-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact. But the Soviet Union annulled the Russo-Japanese Non-Aggression Pact on August 9th, 1945 when the second A-bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, and declared a war against Imperial Japan. This was the last straw for Japan, and finally she decided to accept unconditional surrender. If Red Army did not assaulted the Kwantung Army in Manchukuo, Imperial Japan would never accept the Potsdam Declaration even if third and fourth A-bombs were dropped. The real objective of the United States to drop A-bombs on Japan was to intimidate Stalin and the Soviet Union. After World War II, it was believed that the Unites States would enter the Cold War era against the Soviet Union, and American military officers were astonished Russian aggressiveness and their excellent weapons after the fall of Berlin. So it was crucial for the United States to demonstrate their military edge to Russians. Therefore, A-bombings on Japan was unnecessary.

After having read the well research and document book "Killing The Rising Sun" there's no doubt in my mind that we had not choice but to drop the bombs.

First, I want to say: I’m a proud disabled combat veteran; so there’s my bias. Now that’s out of the way, I want to say the things PragerU “forgot” to mention. President Truman lied about his eyesight to enlist. He could have and did injure countless American lives as an officer in WWI. It is due to his lack of military knowledge that we endured countless wars during the Cold War: Korea, Vietnam, and etc. He wasn’t an effective wartime leader, and (unfortunately) PragerU HAS NOT recognized his shortcomings as well as his positive impacts in civics.

When the democrats were still Americans...

Would FDR have dropped the bomb?

This did not "start" in 1941. This "started" in the mid-19th century, when the Perry mission proclaimed the *march route* of an imperialistic nation. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perry_Expedition

Curious about what an alien would make of a society justifying a nuclear bomb attack on its adversaries

2nd, 13 May 2024

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were green and repopulated 2 years later, F nukes

One of the bests leaders in modern history.

Wasn't he a Freemason?

Wow. This is actually most of the propaganda my leftist professors in the late 1990s used to describe liberal Democrat Truman. In fact, he was weak on communism. Patton and MacArthur were right and Truman was weak. The Russians should not have been allowed to blockade Berlin or even keep troops in Germany or eastern Europe. WW2 started with Poland being invaded and we let it end with it being conquered by an even worse enemy. MacArthur would have had ALL of Korea free had Truman listened and allowed it to be fought as a war not a “police action” being scared of what China or Russia might do (who entered the war anyway and set back American liberation of Korea because MacArthur was not allowed to bomb the bridges on the border). The Left in many ways won a soft victory after WW2 which benefited the Communists and has infiltrated and brainwashed our people since. To the point where supposed conservative sources start repeating leftist narratives within 20 years. (This is not unique to history either. Look how universal healthcare, once rightly called socialism, is embraced by both parties now that it is established)

What's the point of this hagiography of Truman?

0:35 YOU DIDN'T STATE WHOSE QUOTE THE RESPONSE IS THAT'S BAD GRAMMAR

What a joke! Japan was already willing to surrender. Infact they already gave that offer to Soviets. All they wanted was emperor to be the head of the state and aristocracy largely spared from war tribunals. US used atomic bombs to scare Soviets. Even in the end, Japan surrendered only after the Americans assured the safety of emperor and aristocracy.

Why didn't you mention that Harry Truman was a Free Mason? MWB Harry S. Truman is known as one of the most dedicated men to have joined Masonry. He was a member of a large number of Orders even while serving as Senator, Vice President, and President. On February 9th, 1909, he received his first degree after petitioning Belton Lodge No. 450 in Belton, MO. While his father was not a member, both of his grandfathers were; he also had various cousins, siblings, and nephews that were Masons. MWB Truman was elected as the Junior Warden of his lodge in 1910, and became a key figure in organizing the Lodge in Grandview, MO, becoming its first recorded Master when it was formally chartered. Can you be a Christian, and a Free Mason at the same time?

Truman dropped the bomb because Eleanor very squeamish, thanks to her Darwinian and Marxian phantasms?

Yes we can sympathize with Truman's lack of preparation by FDR. And we can be glad that Wallace did not take over as Prez; he might well have sold out America to Communism instead of resisting. Even so, Truman dropped the Bomb, and America's name has been besmirched by that for ever. Was he really and credibly "advised that Japan would not surrender"? - if so, those advisors bear much blame. The reality is that with a little more patience, Japan would have surrendered without the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Then there was the USSR, poised to enter the war and grab a piece of Japan; dropping the Bomb brought a faster surrender and so prevented that. A quarter million lives, for a geopolitical gain. Truman had his merits, but was part of an evil machine.