The Accidental President

by A. J. Baime

  As applause and whistles filled the wardroom, Truman continued onward, intent on visiting every section of the ship to inform the crew of the bomb. All over the Augusta, the mood in those following afternoon hours soared among sailors who, for so long, had feared for their lives and yearned for their homes. The mood could be summed up in a sentence spoken by one of those sailors that afternoon: “I guess I’ll go home sooner now.”

  ///

  In Washington, assistant press secretary Eben Ayers gathered reporters working their usual White House beat. It was roughly 11 a.m. Ayers had only recently gotten his first inkling of the atomic bomb. A couple of days earlier he had been toiling in his office with the president’s correspondence secretary, Bill Hassett, when an officer from the War Department appeared. This officer was, as Ayers recalled, “somewhat excited and under some tension as he told us that an important story—a tremendous news story—was due to break within a few days.” The story regarded “a most secret thing . . . a great new bomb or weapon.” This officer gave Ayers a statement from President Truman, to be released when the weapon was used. Security was imperative, Ayers was told. No one was to see this statement until further orders.

  Now it was go time. Charlie Ross had cabled from the Augusta that it was time to release the president’s statement. Ayers had copies of it in his hand, ready for distribution. He called out to the newsmen who had gathered before him.

  “I have got here what I think is a darned good story. It’s a statement by the president, which starts off this way.” Ayers then read aloud the first paragraph: “‘Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese Army base. That bomb had more power than 20,000 tons of TNT. It had more than two thousand times the blast power of the British “Grand Slam” which is the largest bomb ever yet used in the history of warfare.’”

  Ayers continued in his own words: “Now, the statement explains the whole thing. It is an atomic bomb, releasing atomic energy. This is the first time it has ever been done.”

  One reporter yelled out: “It’s a hell of a story!”

  ///

  Aboard the Augusta, and in millions of households, Americans gathered around their radios, listening to Truman’s statement being read over the airwaves. His statement spoke of “a harnessing of the basic power of the universe . . . We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have above ground in any city. We shall destroy their docks, their factories, and their communications. Let there be no mistake; we shall completely destroy Japan’s power to make war . . . If they do not now accept our terms they may expect a rain of ruin from the air, the likes of which has never been seen on this earth.”

  Truman held a press conference on the ship, reading his statement again and answering questions about the greatest wartime secret of all. He brought up the Potsdam Declaration. “Their leaders promptly rejected that ultimatum.” He gave ample credit to the secretary of war, Henry Stimson, who had guided the project all the way, from a governmental level. Truman read his statement for newsreel cameras also, speaking soberly into the camera. “The Japanese began the war from the air at Pearl Harbor,” he said. “They have been repaid many fold.” At the same time, Prime Minister Attlee released a statement, and the War Department released its own, with an image of the Little Boy bomb and an aerial photograph of Hiroshima—how it appeared before the event. Immediately, American and British news sources began monitoring Japanese radio, where already, cryptic announcements were being made—rail service in and around Hiroshima had been canceled, and the scene in that city was under investigation.

  That afternoon a curious scene unfolded aboard the Augusta. At three thirty, less than four hours after the president received word of Little Boy, Truman and members of his party attended a boxing program on the ship’s deck, with the Gulf Stream’s warm breezes swirling their hair. A former New York stage star and current U.S. Navy mailman named Charles Purcell emceed the event. Trusty Fred Canfil acted as a referee as sailors took to the ring and hurled punches at one another. The audience roared with approval; the harder the blows, the louder the crowd cheered. At one point, one of the ring posts fell over and knocked a spectating sailor in the head, injuring him slightly. He was taken off to the ship’s infirmary.

  Truman sat watching the action, awaiting the Augusta’s arrival in Newport News, Virginia, the following afternoon. Surely the words of his atomic bomb statement were still echoing in his head—particularly his closing lines. He understood that the bomb had ushered in not just a new era of humanity’s understanding of nature’s forces but also a new understanding of humanity’s capacity for self-destruction. Maybe the bomb would win the war. But at what cost?

  “I shall give further consideration,” Truman’s statement had ended, “and make further recommendations to the Congress as to how atomic power can become a powerful and forceful influence towards the maintenance of world peace.”

  38

  TRUMAN’S CAR PULLED UP to the White House South Gate a few minutes past 11 p.m. on August 7. Waiting for him outside in the night was a small group of staffers: Matt Connelly, Eben Ayers, and Bill Hassett. “The president stepped out,” recalled Ayers, “looking fit and somewhat tanned from the ship voyage.” Truman pumped handshakes, then headed into the White House, where cabinet officials—the new faces of the Truman administration—were waiting to greet him in the Diplomatic Reception Room. The new Treasury secretary, Fred Vinson, was there, along with the new attorney general, Tom Clark, the new secretary of labor, Lewis Schwellenbach, and others. The president was exhausted—the trip had lasted exactly one month and one day almost to the minute—and he desired a cocktail.

  “Come on up to the room,” he said.

  The group followed him to his second-floor study. Truman spotted his piano. He sat down and played a few bars, then he dialed Mrs. Truman to let her know he had gotten home safely (she was leaving Independence to return to Washington the following day). By this time, the drinks were poured.

  Staffers and cabinet men were intensely curious about the Russians, and Truman regaled them with stories of Stalin’s giant limousine and Molotov’s distemper. Someone asked how much drinking had gone on at Potsdam, and Truman wove tales of the epic procession of toasts, particularly at the Russian dinner. Churchill consumed the most alcohol, but there was no excessive drinking, Truman assured everyone.

  During the whole of this conversation that night in the White House, the bomb never came up, as the subject was so raw, it seemed inappropriate in this relaxed state to touch upon it. Recalled Ayers many years later: “Now, that may seem strange—it does to me now—but I don’t think anybody mentioned it.”

  Finishing his drink, Truman came to the following conclusion regarding Potsdam: he was happy to be home, and he would be just fine, he told his audience, if he never stepped foot in Europe again.

  ///

  After weeks of inactivity, the West Wing came alive the next morning, August 8. At Truman’s 9 a.m. staff meeting, Charlie Ross handed out boxes of Russian cigarettes. The smokes were curious-looking filterless cardboard tubes with a small bit of tobacco wrapped in paper at the end. Now the bomb dominated the discussion. Truman knew that public relations would be key to how the world responded to Hiroshima, and he felt that the pope should be contacted. He had no idea how to get ahold of the Vatican, nor did anyone else present. After the staff meeting, Stimson arrived at the president’s office with aerial photographs of Hiroshima, along with further reports of the bomb’s wrath.

  From the pictures, Hiroshima was unrecognizable as a city. As Stimson recalled in his diary on this day: “[Truman] mentioned the terrible responsibility that such destruction placed upon us here and himself.”

  As for Japan, it was imperative that the situation be handled just the right way, Stimson said. “When you punish your dog you don’t keep souring on him all day after the punishment is over,” he said. “If you want to keep h
is affection, punishment takes care of itself.” It was the same with Japan, Stimson figured. “They naturally are a smiling people and we have to get on those terms with them.” Easier said than done, both men agreed.

  Meanwhile the story of the atomic bomb was just beginning to transfix the world. Over four square miles of Hiroshima was gone, from a single blast. The flash of the bomb was seen 170 miles from ground zero. Aerial photos appeared in newspapers, as did the first reports from within Japan. Tokyo radio reported that “practically all living things, human and animal, were literally seared to death by the tremendous heat and pressure.” Crewmen aboard the Enola Gay gave their first interviews.

  “The crew said, ‘My God,’ and couldn’t believe what had happened,” said weaponeer William Parsons. “A mountain of smoke was going up in a mushroom with the stem coming down. At the top was white smoke but up to 1,000 feet from the ground there was swirling, boiling dust.” General Carl Spaatz, one of the army air forces’ top officials, called the atomic bomb “the most revolutionary development in the history of the world.”

  Soon after Stimson’s departure from Truman’s office on the morning of August 8, the president received word from the Moscow embassy that, as of this day, the Russians considered themselves at war with Japan. The Red Army was set to push across the borders of Manchuria. Truman contacted Charlie Ross, who called reporters in from the press gallery for a quick conference. Newspapermen crowded into the Oval Office at 3 p.m., and Leahy and Byrnes also attended.

  Someone shouted, “Welcome home!”

  “I am glad to be here,” Truman said. “The finest place in the world, the United States is!” He smiled for pictures, then said, “Is everybody here?”

  “I think they’re all in, Mr. President,” said Ross. “Yes, they’re all in.”

  “I have only a simple announcement to make,” Truman said. “I can’t hold a regular press conference today; but this announcement is so important I thought I would call you in.” He paused, then said with great emphasis, “Russia has declared war on Japan! That is all!”

  The newsmen roared and applauded, then pushed out through the narrow doors as fast as they could.

  Truman spent the afternoon catching up. He signed the United Nations Charter on August 8. (On this same day, the Allies signed the London Agreement, which officially set the stage for the war crimes trials at Nuremberg.) He had been gone a long time, and with Bess also absent from the White House, he had bills stacked up on his desk, many for White House groceries. He sat at his desk writing out no fewer than a dozen checks from a special White House account he had opened at Hamilton National Bank. He owed the Metropolitan Poultry Company $5.03, and the General Baking Company $1.44. As he signed these checks, he had no idea that a new attack wave of B-29s was gunning for Japan on this day, with a second atomic bomb.

  ///

  Soviet forces reported at a million strong charged into Japanese-occupied Manchuria on August 8. Ambassador Harriman cabled to inform Truman that he had met with Stalin and Molotov regarding the details. Harriman also informed Truman that he had discussed the bomb with Stalin. The Soviet dictator admitted that his country had already been working on an atomic weapon, but “had not been able to solve” the conundrum of splitting atoms yet. The Soviets did not have a bomb, but it was only a matter of time.

  Stalin made his intentions in the Far East all too clear: he was interested in “war trophies.” Harriman reported directly to Truman: “[Stalin] indicated that some of the Japanese properties, including the shares of some Japanese enterprises, should be considered as Soviet war trophies in areas occupied by the Red Army.” Stalin was going to take possession of everything he could.

  Truman had already made up his mind: under no condition would he allow the Soviets to occupy any piece of Japan.

  On the day the Soviets attacked Japanese strongholds in Manchuria, another wave of B-29 Superfortresses pounded targets on Japan’s mainland. More B-29s flew over Japanese cities dropping leaflets, which rained down on terrified civilian populations. This paper read in part, “America asks that you take immediate heed of what we say on this leaflet. We are in possession of the most destructive explosive ever devised by man . . . We have just begun to use this weapon against your homeland.” It asked Japanese citizens to “petition the Emperor to end the war.”

  Before sunrise in the South Pacific on August 9 (it was still August 8 in Washington), a task force of B-29s took flight to deliver the Fat Man bomb on Japan. Truman was aware that a second bomb would be employed, but he gave no direct order for this mission. There was no button pushed, no paper trail that connects the president directly to Fat Man. William L. Laurence of the New York Times was embedded with a crew on this mission.

  “We are on our way to bomb the mainland of Japan,” he wrote while aboard one of the B-29s that morning.

  The weapon was loaded in the belly of Bockscar, a Superfortress named after the ship’s pilot, Captain Frederick C. Bock of Greenville, Michigan. (Bock did not actually fly the airplane on this mission, however.) Fat Man weighed 10,800 pounds, and utilized the same gun mechanism and fissile material used in the Trinity test shot in New Mexico, so there was little doubt that it would be just as explosive. The weapon was painted mustard yellow and had signatures of members of the crew that had assembled it, along with an acronym on its steel nose: JANCFU, for “Joint Army-Navy-Civilian Fuckup.” Laurence reported: “I watched the assembly of this man-made meteor during the past two days, and was among the small group of scientists and Army and Navy representatives privileged to be present at the ritual of its loading in the Superfort last night, against a backdrop of threatening black skies torn open at intervals by great lightning flashes. It is a thing of beauty to behold, this ‘gadget.’ In its design went millions of man-hours of what is without doubt the most concentrated intellectual effort in history.”

  The Bockscar made three runs over its primary target, Kokura. The citizens of that metropolis had no idea that cloud cover saved tens of thousands of their lives on this morning. The pilot—Major Charles Sweeney of North Quincy, Massachusetts—turned to the secondary target, Nagasaki, arriving over that city at minutes before 11 a.m. local time. The Bockscar was at 29,000 feet when it released the bomb. A cameraman captured the blast on film, preserving this dark moment in black-and-white celluloid. There is no sound to the footage, only imagery. The blast looks as if the earth had popped like a balloon and released a belch of smoke from deep within. The mushroom cloud is all that can be seen; there is no picture of the fury below it.

  Truman later wrote of Nagasaki, “This second demonstration of the power of the atomic bomb apparently threw Tokyo into a panic, for the next morning [August 10] brought the first indication that the Japanese Empire was ready to surrender.”

  ///

  At 7:33 a.m. on August 10 in Japan, monitors recorded the following broadcast over Radio Tokyo:

  The Japanese Government today addressed the following communication to the Swiss and Swedish Governments respectively for transmission to the United States, Great Britain, China, and the Soviet Union . . . The Japanese Government is ready to accept the terms enumerated in the joint declaration which was issued at Potsdam, July 26, 1945, by the Heads of Government of the United States, Great Britain, and China, and later subscribed by the Soviet Government, with the understanding that said declaration does not comprise any demand which prejudices the prerogatives of His Majesty as a sovereign ruler. The Japanese Government hopes sincerely that this understanding is warranted and desires keenly that an explicit indication to that effect will be speedily forthcoming.

  By 9 a.m. in Washington, Truman had Byrnes, Leahy, Stimson, and Forrestal in his office to discuss procedure. The president went around the room and asked each man for his opinion. What the Japanese appeared to be offering was not unconditional surrender. As so many in the Truman administration had predicted, the fate of the emperor was the question that separated war from peace.

  Leahy an
d Stimson had no compunction about allowing the emperor to remain. If anything, he would be useful in engendering peace among the citizenry. Byrnes was less sure; he believed the United States should dictate all the terms. Forrestal brought forth the wisest plan; he suggested a reply in which the Allies could accept Japan’s terms, if these terms were spelled out further so that the Potsdam terms could be clearly accomplished. In other words, the emperor could remain if he surrendered unconditionally.

  Over the next hours Byrnes wrote out a reply while Truman attended to his usual, grueling list of meetings. The president sat uncomfortably through fifteen-minute sessions successively with Congressman Mike Mansfield of Montana, Senator Carl Hayden of Arizona, Senator Warren Magnuson of Washington, and Senator Joseph O’Mahoney of Wyoming. Truman had five-minute blocks scheduled each with the ambassadors of South Africa, El Salvador, Panama, and Guatemala, one after the other. Finally, at 1 p.m., Byrnes appeared with his draft of the reply, which Truman and Leahy tugged on while eating lunch.

  The president was nearly a half hour late for a 2 p.m. cabinet meeting. Truman took his now usual place, with his back to the windows looking out over the White House Rose Garden. Byrnes read aloud Japan’s full statement (which by now had arrived via diplomatic channels through the Swiss legation). Then he read aloud the draft reply to the Japanese. In the middle of it, he paused. Remembered Secretary of Commerce Henry Wallace, who was sitting at the table: “Byrnes stopped while reading the proposal and laid special emphasis on the top dog commander over [Emperor] Hirohito being an American. They were not going to have any chance for misunderstandings as in Europe.” The United States alone would deal with the Japanese. There would be no zones of occupation, no Soviet or British control.