The World War II Chronicles
Page 8
… In general, Japan will use all political means for avoiding complete defeat or unconditional surrender.
a. [It will] continue and even increase its attempts to secure complete political unity within the Empire …
b. Attempt to foster a belief among Japan’s enemies that the war will prove costly and long drawn out …
c. Make desperate efforts to persuade the USSR to continue her neutrality … while at the same time making every effort to sow discord between the Americans and British on one side and the Russians on the other. As the situation deteriorates still further, Japan may even make a serious attempt to use the USSR as a mediator in ending the war.
d. Put out intermittent peace feelers, in an effort to bring the war to an acceptable end, to weaken the determination of the United Nations to fight to the bitter end, or to create inter-Allied dissension.…
Japanese leaders are now playing for time in the hope that Allied war weariness, Allied disunity, or some “miracle” will present an opportunity to arrange a compromise peace.…
The Japanese believe … that unconditional surrender would be the equivalent of national extinction. There are as yet no indications that the Japanese are ready to accept such terms.…
Suspicious of Japanese intentions, buoyed up by the success of the Bomb, American statesmen could not get excited over such peripheral approaches to peace as were emanating from Switzerland. Per Jacobbson had come to Allen Dulles far too late in the game of high level diplomacy.
On Tinian, Crew 15, which had already emblazoned bombardier Kermit Beahan’s nickname, The Great Artiste, on the nose of their plane, flew two missions. One, on the twenty-first, was aborted due to engine trouble. The second trip was more successful. With a Pumpkin in the bomb bay, Chuck Sweeney piloted the B-29 to Japan and saw the bomb released over the Kobe marshaling yards. Sweeney performed the same evasive action practiced so often over the deserts of Utah and the Caribbean, then wheeled back toward the Marianas.
On the same day, Henry Stimson told his diary that the United States “didn’t need Russia anymore.”
On the twenty-fourth of July, Harry Truman had that thought in mind as he went up to Joseph Stalin and mentioned that America had developed a new weapon “of unusual destructive force.” Stalin seemed only mildly interested and did not ask for further details.
A day later, Henry Stimson went to the Cecilienhof Palace, a huge brownstone building set in gardens near the ruins of Berlin. There, he sat with Stalin amid the splendor of another age and discussed the roles of the two great powers. Stimson said that he welcomed Soviet participation in the struggle against Japan, and Stalin answered by saying that since both countries had worked so well together in the European conflict, he too was happy to share in the hardships of a joint effort against Japan. Both men knew that S-1, the atomic bomb, would be used shortly, Stimson through his official function and Stalin through his espionage channels. Yet both adhered to the formalities of diplomatic exchanges and parted in a cordial atmosphere, which ignored the basic fact that the monstrous weapon would alter the partnership irrevocably.
On both the twenty-fourth and the twenty-sixth, American military groups met with their Russian counterparts to plot details of Russian participation in the Far Eastern war. The meetings were friendly, free from friction, but perfunctory. The need for cooperation had dwindled to the point of absurdity.
In Tokyo, attention was irrevocably centered on Moscow. There, however, Ambassador Sato sensed the cold wind blowing from Potsdam. On July 20, he had wired Togo: “I recommend acceptance of virtually any terms.…”
Togo was extremely annoyed at his man in Moscow. He was also desperate for a channel leading to peace negotiations.
July 25, 1945 1900 hours
To: Sato
From: Togo
No. 944 (urgent, ambassador’s code.)
… Navy Captain Zacharias said on the 21st that Japan had two choices: she could either accept a dictated peace after her ruin, or surrender unconditionally and enjoy the benefits of the Atlantic Charter. We would be wrong to consider such statements trick propaganda. We must admit that they are partly intended to invite us to come to their cause.… We, for our part, are desirous to inform the United States through some feasible method that, although we are unable to accept unconditional surrender under any circumstances, we have no objection to the restoration of peace on the basis of the Atlantic Charter.
As Sato read this telegram in Moscow, an American cruiser, the Indianapolis, stood in Tinian Harbor unloading components of the uranium bomb. Before Sato replied to the cable, the Allies issued the Potsdam Declaration, a last warning to the Japanese Empire.
The month-long meeting in Potsdam closed with the issuance of an ultimatum that promised the Japanese complete destruction unless they surrendered. The communiqué was dated July 26, just before Clement Attlee had been elected British Prime Minister and had arrived back in Potsdam to replace Churchill.
When the declaration was being drafted, Secretary Stimson took great pains to insist to Truman that the Japanese people be reassured of the continuation of the dynasty under Emperor Hirohito. As a student of Japanese affairs and a former resident of the Far East, Stimson fully understood the importance of the Emperor in Japanese life and feared that they would balk at any surrender terms which reflected adversely on the Ruler’s position. He knew that certain elements in the American Government were vociferous in their stand that the Emperor must go. In particular, Harry Hopkins, Roosevelt’s chief adviser, and Dean Acheson, Undersecretary of State, held apparently strong feelings against the retention of the Imperial Household.
President Truman maintained a flexible attitude toward the Emperor. Both he and Byrnes feared public opinion in the United States would reject any “appeasement” at this stage. Therefore, they felt that the question of Hirohito’s future role should be held in abeyance as a bargaining feature of any forthcoming negotiations with the Japanese. Neither was stubborn with Stimson about the issue, but they ordered the provision struck out of the Declaration of July 26.
On July 27, in Tokyo, the Japanese cabinet sat down to study the document transmitted from across the world.
Attention focused on topics related to surrender terms:
Point Six:
There must be eliminated for all time the authority and influence of those who have deceived and misled the people of Japan into embarking on world conquest.…
Point Seven:
… points in Japanese territory to be designated by the Allies shall be occupied to secure the achievement of the basic objectives we are here setting forth.
Point Eight:
The terms of the Cairo Declaration shall be carried out and Japanese sovereignty shall be limited to the islands of Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku and such minor islands as we determine.
Point Nine:
The Japanese military forces, after being completely disarmed, shall be permitted to return to their homes with the opportunity to lead peaceful and productive lives.
Point Ten:
… stern justice shall be meted out to all war criminals, including those who have visited cruelties upon our prisoners.…
Point Twelve:
The occupying forces of the Allies shall be withdrawn from Japan as soon as these objectives have been accomplished and there has been established in accordance with the freely expressed will of the Japanese people a peacefully inclined and responsible government.
Point Thirteen:
We call upon the Government of Japan to proclaim now the unconditional surrender of all Japanese armed forces, and to provide proper and adequate assurance of their good faith in such action. The alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction.
“Prompt and utter destruction” had little meaning at this point to the men in Tokyo whose nation was being destroyed daily by fire raids and who could not possibly have construed the threat to mean imminent use of an atomic bomb. The points included in the Declara
tion contained nothing surprising to the Japanese cabinet; the terms were what they could expect. What the Potsdam paper did not cover was what the men in Tokyo most wanted clarified: the future status of their Emperor.
Rather than make a decision on the Declaration, Japan preferred to wait for some progress in Moscow. When reporters asked Premier Suzuki for a reaction to the Allied message, he meant to tell them that the Government would “withhold comment” on it for the time being. Unfortunately, he used the word mokusatsu to describe his attitude. In Japanese, mokusatsu means “take no notice of, treat with silent contempt, ignore.” The news agencies broadcast it just that way. After the damage was done, Suzuki reinforced the meaning by repeating it two days later at a press conference. This time he had little choice because the military had demanded that the cabinet stand firm against Potsdam. The Allies were told that the ultimatum was not worthy of comment.
The blunder in Tokyo went uncorrected by any official. Foreign Minister Togo concentrated on Moscow, where his ambassador, Sato, realized that Tokyo was out of touch with reality. Sato hastened to warn Togo that “there is absolutely no necessity for him [Stalin] to go out of his way and conclude an agreement with Japan now.”
Sato was a prophet, crying vainly across the mainland of Asia to his superiors at home.
In Potsdam, Harry Truman reacted predictably to Suzuki’s “mokusatsu.” He allowed the atomic bomb mission to proceed according to schedule.
Secretary of War Stimson agreed. Noting regretfully that “we could only proceed to demonstrate that the ultimatum meant exactly what it said,” Stimson concluded that for such a purpose “the atomic bomb was an eminently suitable weapon.”
By the end of July, enough fissionable material had been transported to Tinian by plane and by ship to kill every living thing on the island. It was stored in heavily guarded Quonset huts, and scientists and weapons specialists such as Doctor Ramsey and Captain Parsons were frequently seen going in and out of the restricted buildings.
On July 31, a message was sent from Tinian to Washington: “Lemay needs eleven hours more which would be August 1, 1000 hours E.W.T.” After that the bomb would be ready to drop over Japan. Truman had insisted on giving Japan several days to reply to the surrender demand. That time was about gone.
FIVE
The Little Boy
On August 4, seventy men of the 509th filed into a briefing hut on Tinian and sat down to watch a movie. Seven crews saw a colossal fireball rise up from the floor of the New Mexican desert and turn darkness into day. Awed by the pyrotechnics and power, they realized instantly the reasons for their peculiar training routine. One bomb, steep turns; their questions were answered by the film shot only nineteen days earlier.
Captain Parsons gave a speech in which he outlined the significance of the new weapon. He avoided using the word “atomic” as he told the men the bomb would be detonated in the air, that its full destructive effect was not known, that airplanes near the explosion would have to be extremely careful not to fly near the cloud rising from the burst. When Parsons mentioned the term “radioactivity,” some of the listeners blanched as they connected it with another term, “sterility.”
Tibbets then discussed the procedures for the first flight. He went over the air-sea rescue plans, the schedule for takeoff, routes and other aspects of the mission. Then the seven crews filed out of the hut into the bright sunlight of Tinian knowing that the next few days would see remarkable moments in the history of the world. Though the words atomic bomb had not been mentioned, the privileged group that had witnessed the movie knew that something horrendous was about to happen to the Japanese.
On Sunday, the fifth of August, scientists began the job of packing the Little Boy for shipment to Hiroshima. Two pieces of the deadly metal U-235 were delicately positioned at opposite ends of the cylindrical casing. A charge of cordite was placed behind one of them. On command it would blast this piece of uranium toward the other section with the velocity of a .45-caliber bullet. When the two collided, the temperature over Hiroshima would become that of a sun. All these calculations had been worked out at Los Alamos by minds normally devoted to peaceful pursuits.
On the sixth of August, Colonel Tibbets led the way to Japan with the Little Boy tucked inside the bomb bay of the Enola Gay. Chuck Sweeney and Crew 15 flew The Great Artiste nearby as an instrument ship. In its rear section, three scientists occupied a section set up as a darkroom. George Marquardt commanded the third plane, Number 91, equipped with cameras.
At 7:30 A.M., in brilliant sunlight, they sighted the Japanese coast. Claude Eatherley, flying as weather scout over the primary target, radioed back that conditions were perfect.
Tibbets called Sweeney: “Chuck, it’s Hiroshima.”
The planes turned toward the Initial Point for the run to the city. Underneath, the mass of Shikoku Island was a dark green. There were only a few clouds in the sun-drenched sky.
The placid Inland Sea appeared below and then the coastline of Honshu. Tibbets turned west at a point sixty miles from the target and shortly thereafter Hiroshima lay exposed and beautiful under the B-29’s. Sweeney and Albury could even see in the center of the city the old castle that served as Japanese Army Headquarters in the area. The men in The Great Artiste kept reminding Beahan to yell when the Little Boy fell from the other B-29 because Sweeney needed every second of time to bank away safely.
At precisely 8:15 and 17 seconds Beahan shouted “Bombs away!” Sweeney pulled the plane over in a 60-degree bank and Beahan dropped a cluster of instruments on parachutes to gauge the intensity of the explosion.
The Little Boy, a black and orange shape weighing nearly five tons, fell down on the 255,000 people of Hiroshima. At an altitude of 1,870 feet, the nine and one half pounds of cordite drove the uranium chunks into each other and the equivalent of 13,500 tons of TNT exploded in the sky.
A brilliant purplish-white flash lit the interiors of the three B-29’s. Tibbets was momentarily blinded. Captain Parsons, who had daringly armed the Little Boy in flight to avoid any danger of explosion on takeoff, was staggered by the flash and the unfolding destruction.
In The Great Artiste, the film in the scientists’ darkroom showed jagged lines as the instruments, still suspended on parachutes, attested to the death of a city.
At the Japanese Naval Academy on the island of Eta Jima, nearly sixty miles southeast of Hiroshima, students in classrooms heard a dull thunder and felt an unusually warm breeze touch them through open windows.
The three B-29’s flew away from the devastation. Kermit Beahan had been so awed by the Little Boy that he forgot to turn on a tape recorder to preserve Crew 15’s comments for posterity. George Marquardt’s camera plane had photographed the boiling cloud, but only dust and smoke were visible beneath it. On the ground, more than sixty-four thousand people were dead or about to die.
Major Tom Ferebee had dropped his special bomb within feet of the prescribed aiming point. The Little Boy was released only seventeen seconds later than planned. The first atomic bomb mission was almost perfectly executed. Nothing had gone wrong.
Half a world away, Harry Truman heard the news while he ate lunch with men of the cruiser Augusta carrying the President home from Potsdam. An aide handed Truman a dispatch:
“Big bomb dropped on Hiroshima August 5 at 7:15 P.M. Washington time. First reports indicate complete success which was even more conspicuous than earlier test.”
Truman was greatly moved. The Augusta sped onward across the Atlantic while the President shared the tremendous story with James Byrnes and ordinary seamen on the cruiser.
Tokyo also had a reaction:
6 August 1945
1700 hours
From: Togo
To: Sato
No. 991 (urgent, ambassador’s code.)
It is reported that Stalin and Molotov returned to Moscow today. As we have various arrangements to make, please see Molotov immediately, and demand his earliest possible reply.
The first word was in from Hiroshima, where a strange weapon had caused tremendous damage.
Before he heard from Sato, Togo was propelled into sending another frantic cable. An eyewitness to the atom bomb had come back to the capital with a chilling description: “The whole city of Hiroshima was destroyed instantly by a single bomb.”
7 August 1945
1540 hours
From: Togo
To: Sato No. 993
Regarding your No. 1519. The situation is becoming so acute that we must have a clarification of the Soviet attitude as soon as possible. Please make further efforts to obtain a reply immediately.
Sato answered within hours:
7 August 1945
1950 hours Moscow
8 August 1945
1200 hours, Ministry of Foreign Office, Tokyo
From: Sato
To: Togo
No. 1530 (urgent, ambassador’s code.)
Regarding my No. 1519. As soon as Molotov returned to Moscow, I requested a meeting. I also asked Lozovsky to help arrange it. On the seventh, Molotov notified me that he would see me at 1700 hours tomorrow, the eighth.
Molotov kept his promise. At 5:00 P.M. on the eighth of August he met with Ambassador Sato and promptly declared war on the Japanese Empire.
Late that same night, in a room at Secret Police Headquarters in Osaka, Japan, two men stood over the figure of an American flyer, Lieutenant Marcus McDilda. Shot down that day on a strafing mission, McDilda had been picked up from the water and brought to shore. As soldiers marched him blindfolded through the streets, civilians closed about him and smashed him repeatedly with their fists. Bruised and bleeding, he was taken to a building where Japanese officers began to interrogate him. The pilot was asked questions about his home base at Iwo Jima. He lied consistently about the number of aircraft on the island, about other details of the P-51 fighter plane he flew.