died from the two bombs (screen 1). Even now people are still dying from the effects of theAtomic Bomb(Why, screen 1).One aspect that is under big concern is whether droppingthe bomb or an invasion would have taken more lives. Onesource that gave estimates of an invasion stated, “In ameeting on 18 June the Joint War Plans Committee gave Trumanprojected death rates ranging from a low of 31,000 to a highof 50,000” (Goodman, screen 6). This number was much lowerthan predictions from other sources. A.C. Snow, a News andObserver editor, wrote, “The invasion was expected to be theArmageddon of World War II some historians project that a million or more lives would have been lost” (screen 1). President Truman and Secretary of War, Henry Stimson, saidthat dropping the bomb was a military action that avoidedthe loss of many lives in the upcoming invasion of Kyushu(Goodman, screens 1-2). During the war the Japanese werekilled twenty-two to every one American, so if the invasionwould have taken place with these numbers the bomb savedmany lives (screen 6),On the side of President Truman’s decision to use thebomb to end the war was the fact that far, far morepeople, civilians and military would have been killed onthe Japanese mainland than died from two atomic bombsdropped on Japan. (Snow, screen 1)Little Boy and Fat Man seem to have saved many more livesthan would have been lost in another invasion.The United States believed that they could destroyJapan’s combat capabilities and force them to surrender. Truman told us the plan in his statement,We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly andcompletely every productive enterprise the Japanese haveabove ground in any city. We shall destroy their docks,their factories, and their communications. Let there beno mistake; we shall completely destroy Japan’s power tomake war. The Japanese turned down the July 26ultimatum to end the war and save the war, s...
