by A. J. Baime
Still, the reply to the Japanese needed approval from Britain, China, and the USSR. Truman interjected to say that the Americans would not negotiate with the Russians on this matter. Stimson said that the Russians were likely to delay in any response to a draft reply to the Japanese, so the Red Army could push as deep into the Far East as possible before surrender was accomplished.
General Groves had communicated to the War Department on this day, saying the next bomb would be ready for delivery after August 17 or 18. But now, in the cabinet meeting, Truman said that he was ordering an end to the atomic bombing. He could not stomach the idea of wiping out another 100,000 people, of killing “all those kids,” he said to his cabinet.
As for unconditional surrender, Truman knew there was no way to please everyone. Many Americans wanted the Japanese emperor charged with war crimes and prosecuted to the fullest, as was happening with top Nazi officials. The White House mailroom was clogged with letters from citizens who hoped Truman would follow this course; they wanted to see the emperor executed. Truman had received a missive from Senator Richard Russell, Democrat of Georgia, who asked that the United States continue bombing until the Japanese “beg us to accept unconditional surrender.” Russell believed “the vast majority of the American people” thought the emperor “should go,” and that “if we do not have available a sufficient number of atomic bombs with which to finish the job immediately, let us carry on with TNT and fire bombs until we can produce them.”
(To this, Truman responded: “I certainly regret the necessity of wiping out whole populations because of the ‘pigheadedness’ of the leaders of a nation and, for your information, I am not going to do it unless it is absolutely necessary . . . My objective is to save as many American lives as possible but I also have a humane feeling for the women and children of Japan.”)
The final draft reply to Japan went out through State Department channels that afternoon of August 10 to the embassies in London, Moscow, and Chungking. It did address the issue of the emperor, reading, in part: “From the moment of surrender, the authority of the Emperor and the Japanese Government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers who will take such steps as he deems proper to effectuate the surrender terms . . . The ultimate form of government of Japan shall, in accordance with the Potsdam Declaration, be established by the freely expressed will of the Japanese people.”
The reply attempted to satisfy all those Americans who demanded unconditional surrender, while allowing the Japanese the right to retain their emperor, and thus, for peace to follow.
That night, all of Washington was abuzz. “Rumors flew, switchboards jammed, reporters chain-smoked—and the hottest story in the world, the end of the war—lay tantalizingly just out of reach,” recorded one reporter. “Head-men of the government filed in and out of the White House. Hordes of jumpy reporters milled about, waiting tensely for the word that would send them to tell the world that it was all over.”
Truman went about his business. Throughout his political career, he had shown a remarkable talent to exude poise during moments of extraordinary excitement and stress—but never more than now. As one reporter noted, he was “the calmest man in town.”
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As the world awaited news of peace, the atomic bomb loomed over the public consciousness. Citizens in every civilized country struggled to understand what the bomb was, how it worked, and what it meant for the future of humanity.
Many were insisting that these unmasked secrets of the universe were destined to change the world for the better. “The real significance [of atomic energy] does not lie in the fact that this new bomb has accomplished an almost incredible feat of destruction,” wrote Canada’s Munitions Minister C. D. Howe. The “unbelievably large amounts of energy” unlocked by atomic scientists could now be “made available for practical use.”
Others were sure that the world was coming to an end. Wrote the Reverend Robert Gannon, a religious leader and president of Fordham University, “Our savage generation cannot be trusted with [atomic science] at all. It is a triumph of research, but unfortunately it is also a superb symbol for the Age of Efficient Chaos.”
The most prevalent emotion was awe—amazement that the natural world could possess such furious powers, and that humans had figured out how to harvest them, whether for good or evil. The story of how this came about would rivet generations to come. As Truman himself said in his statement about the bomb: “We have spent more than two billion dollars on the greatest scientific gamble in history—and we have won.”
Clark Clifford, a White House lawyer and a rising star in the Truman administration, was in his office when he learned of the first atomic bombing. “My initial thought upon hearing the news,” he wrote, “was as simple as that of most other Americans: the war would be over sooner than we had suspected . . . I knew too little at first to suspect the larger truth: that we had entered an age in which warfare would never be the same—that, in fact, the development of nuclear weapons would turn out to be the most significant event of the century.”
On the night of August 10, one day after the atomic bombing of Nagasaki and just hours after the reply to Japan had been sent out to London, Moscow, and Chungking, Prime Minister Attlee and his foreign secretary, Ernest Bevin, agreed to the terms set out in Byrnes’s draft to Japan, with minor adjustments. Their communiqué arrived in Washington at 9:48 p.m. Washington time. Churchill also phoned the American embassy in London to express his approval. The following morning, at 7:35, an aide brought Truman China’s reply. Chiang Kai-shek also agreed to the wording of the document. Which left only the Soviets.
Byrnes, meanwhile, received two cables from Harriman, who had met with Stalin and Molotov in the Kremlin regarding the matter. Stalin was “skeptical” of the Japanese peace feeler, since it did not meet the terms of unconditional surrender, and “the Soviet forces, therefore, were continuing their advance into Manchuria . . . [Stalin] gave me the definite impression that he was quite willing to have the war continue.” Later Harriman cabled Truman again. At 2 a.m. Moscow time, the Soviets agreed to the terms of surrender, under one condition: “The Allied Powers should reach an agreement on the candidacy or candidacies for representation of the Allied High Command to which the Japanese Emperor and the Japanese Government are to be subordinated.”
Stalin wanted a Russian general to represent his country in the surrender process, and he wanted his country to share in the occupation of Japan, even though the Soviets had been in the war for less than one week. Harriman informed Stalin that the U.S. government would never agree to such a clause. A “most heated discussion” followed, Harriman recorded, and the Soviets backed down, approving the wording of the response to Japan. On August 11, the United States sent the finalized reply to Japan through the Swiss government. Also on August 11 Truman informed the Allies that General Douglas MacArthur would be the supreme commander over Japan and alone would represent the Allies in the surrender process.
No word arrived from Tokyo the next day—August 12, which marked the four-month anniversary of Roosevelt’s death. These four months had stunned the world. The New York Times on August 12: “Victory was already assured when President Roosevelt died. Since then two of the mightiest empires of the world have collapsed. History has recorded the decline and fall of empires before, but never with such rapidity. During these four months events that once covered years, even centuries, were consummated in weeks and days . . . Surely the revolutionary changes wrought during this period are such that it is safe to say that a new era in mankind’s history is beginning.”
But what kind of world would this new era usher in? Even before Japan replied to the new surrender demands of August 11, new threats of war surfaced in the East. In China, communist forces were taking advantage of Japan’s collapse. Communist troops under Mao Tse-tung were demanding that Japanese troops surrender to them, so that they could acquire the Japanese weapons. Truman’s ambassador to China, Patrick Hu
rley, warned the president that, if this were allowed to occur, a “fratricidal war” in China “will thereby be made certain.” Public opinion held that “nothing short of a miracle could prevent the collapse of the government of China,” Hurley noted.
China was on the brink of civil war and communist revolution.
Meanwhile the Soviets had other territorial goals in the Far East. On August 11 a State Department official in Moscow, Edwin Pauley, sent a top-secret cable to Truman and Byrnes following troubling conversations he had engaged in with representatives of Stalin’s government. “Conclusions I have reached thru [sic] discussions . . . lead me to the belief that our forces should occupy quickly as much of the industrial areas of Korea and Manchuria as we can.” Truman concurred. The following day the Joint Chiefs of Staff sent General MacArthur orders regarding China and Korea: “The President desires that such advance arrangements as are practicable be made to occupy the Port of Dairen [in China] and a Port in Korea immediately following the surrender of Japan if those ports have not at that time been taken over by Soviet forces.”
With Japan’s military rule disintegrating, a power vacuum was forming in the Far East. Even before the Japanese surrender, the race was on for control of China and Korea.
On August 12, the four-month anniversary of Roosevelt’s death, Edward R. Murrow offered a point of view over CBS Radio regarding the war’s end: “Secular history offers few, if any, parallels to the events of the past week. And seldom, if ever, has a war ended leaving the victors with such a sense of uncertainty and fear, with such a realization that the future is obscure and that survival is not assured.”
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At 6:10 p.m. on August 14, in his State Department office, Jimmy Byrnes received a messenger from the Swiss chargé d’affaires, who came bearing the document all the world had been waiting for: Japan’s acceptance of the surrender terms. Byrnes moved quickly to the White House to deliver the document to Truman. Bess had returned to Washington, and at seven o’clock that night, when newsmen pushed into Truman’s office to hear the announcement, she was in the room. The air felt charged with excitement. This war that had killed tens of millions of soldiers and civilians—the worst catastrophe that had ever struck the human race—was over. Certainly in the minds of all those in the Oval Office, the right side had won.
Klieg lights nearly blinded the president as he stood up from behind his desk, holding a document in his right hand. He had Byrnes and Leahy sitting on his right, and Cordell Hull—FDR’s longtime and highly respected secretary of state—sitting on his left, so that Roosevelt would have a presence in the room. Cabinet officials stood in a row directly behind Truman. Newsreel cameras were rolling as he began his statement.
“I have received this afternoon a message from the Japanese Government,” Truman said. He paused to say that Charlie Ross would be handing this document out, so there was no need for reporters to be taking notes down word for word. He continued, “In reply to the message forwarded to that Government by the Secretary of State on August 11, I deem this reply a full acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration which specifies the unconditional surrender of Japan.”
He went on to announce General MacArthur’s role as supreme allied commander over Japan, and that the proclamation of VJ-day would await the signing of the official surrender documents.
When he was done, reporters sprinted out of his office, and the news of Japan’s surrender began to spread across the globe.
Truman had no more appointments on August 14. Outside the White House, in Lafayette Square, crowds had long since begun to gather, for the news of surrender had legs. It had already crisscrossed all of Washington and beyond. By the time Truman had finished his press conference to announce the end of the war, the crowd outside the White House gates had reached some 75,000-strong, almost triple the capacity of the baseball stadium where the Washington Nationals played. Police were attempting to maintain order—to no avail. People stood atop their automobiles, while dozens of others honked their car horns. Military officers danced jigs in the streets. A man with a blond woman on his arm, a highball in one hand and a bottle of whiskey in the other, meandered through the throng drunk, while another reveler did the same, wearing a turban made out of ticker tape. From inside the White House, Truman could hear the crowd chanting.
“We want Harry! We want Harry!”
The more time that passed, the larger the crowd grew, and the louder the chanting.
“WE WANT HARRY! WE WANT HARRY!”
The sun had begun to set when Truman appeared on the White House lawn, with Bess. MPs and secret service men sprinted around wildly trying to figure out how to keep the president safe. Truman made a V symbol for victory with his hand, flashing it at the crowd, which responded with deafening roars. Even Bess, as uncomfortable as she had proven to be in the public eye, could not keep the pleasure from illuminating her face. Remembered one man present: “[Truman] was on the White House lawn pumping his arms like an orchestra conductor at tens of thousands of cheering Americans who suddenly had materialized in front of the mansion.”
After a few minutes Truman went back inside the White House, so he could call his mother and personally deliver the news: World War II was over. (“That was Harry,” ninety-two-year-old Mamma Truman said after hanging up. “Harry’s such a wonderful man . . . I knew he’d call.”) Then Truman called Eleanor Roosevelt. “I told her,” he later recalled, “that in this hour of triumph I wished that it had been President Roosevelt, and not I, who had given the message to our people.”
Outside the crowds kept chanting Truman’s name, so he went out into the hot August night again and stood on a patio observing, with Bess on his arm. It was, in the words of one reporter present, “the wildest celebration this capital ever saw.” At the center of it all were Harry and Bess.
Truman had studied enough history to put this moment in context. The United States had provided soldiers and a great majority of the tools of war that destroyed Nazism and saved Europe. The United States had defeated a Japanese military intent on dominating all of the Far East. In the eyes of the world, this was America’s finest hour. Never before had the United States achieved such prestige. What Truman did not know at this moment was this: never would the United States achieve such prestige again.
Epilogue
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We can set no bounds to the possibilities of airplanes flying through the stratosphere dropping atomic bombs on great cities . . . I understand that the power of the bomb delivered on Nagasaki may be multiplied many times as the invention develops. I have so far heard no suggestion of any possible means of defense . . . If mankind continues to make the atomic bomb without changing the political relationships of States, sooner or later these bombs will be used for mutual annihilation . . . It is clear to me, therefore, that, as never before, the responsible statesmen of the great Powers are faced with decisions vital not merely to the increase of human happiness but to the very survival of civilization.
—Prime Minister Clement Attlee to Harry Truman, September 25, 1945
AT 8 P.M. ON SEPTEMBER 2, 1945, on the starboard deck of the battleship named for the president’s home state, the USS Missouri, Japanese officials signed their names to the surrender documents. The scene in Tokyo Bay was awestriking. A fleet of navy ships lay at anchor, American flags rippling in the wind. American bombers roared overhead; General Carl Spaatz of the U.S. Army Air Forces had warned that those aircraft were ready to release eight thousand tons of bombs on Japan at the slightest sign of treachery. General MacArthur stood on the Missouri’s deck monitoring the proceedings, his face so expressionless, he looked like he was already turning into a bust that would sit in a museum. Once the Japanese officials signed the documents, MacArthur became the supreme ruler of eighty million Japanese subjects. Representing Truman on board the Missouri that night was the president’s nephew, Seaman First Class John C. Truman.
With peace came all the adversity that Truman anticipated, and a whole lot
more. As one biographer, Robert J. Donovan, put it many years ago, “For President Truman the postwar period did not simply arrive—it broke about his head with thunder, lightning, hail, rain, sleet, dead cats, howls, tantrums, and palpitations of panic.” The president dug in. The now famous thirteen-inch-long sign appeared on his desk, a gift from his friend Fred Canfil, who had seen a sign like it in an Oklahoma reformatory. It read, THE BUCK STOPS HERE! Four days after Japan signed the surrender documents, on the one-month anniversary of Hiroshima, Truman delivered to Congress the twenty-one-point program that he had worked on with Judge Sam Rosenman aboard the USS Augusta, on his way home from Potsdam. In it, he outlined his domestic strategy for postwar America—hyper-fast reconversion to a peacetime economy, unemployment and labor programs, anti-inflation policy, investment in housing, small business, and farming, aid for veterans, and more. Many in Congress still hoped that Truman would prove more conservative than Roosevelt. From these twenty-one points, Truman showed that he would not. Republicans in Congress reacted negatively. In the 1946 midterm elections, Republicans seized control of the House and Senate for the first time since 1928, and from this point on, the man from Missouri found himself treading in a political shark tank.
In the Far East, China and Korea were spinning out of control. In Korea, American and Soviet military commanders agreed to allow the Japanese south of the 38th parallel to surrender to U.S. forces, and north of the 38th parallel to the Red Army. Less than five weeks after Japan’s surrender, a U.S. Army commander in Korea compared the situation in that country to “a powder keg ready to explode on application of a spark.” A civil war in Korea was inevitable. (Today the 38th parallel roughly demarcates the border between North and South Korea.) Before the end of 1946, China too was locked in a full-blown civil war, also between Communist and non-Communist regimes.