The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-1945 (Modern Library War)

by Toland, John

  A few hours later Stimson received another report from the Interim Committee:

  DOCTOR HAS JUST RETURNED MOST ENTHUSIASTIC AND CONFIDENT THAT THE LITTLE BOY IS AS HUSKY AS HIS BIG BROTHER. THE LIGHT IN HIS EYES DISCERNIBLE FROM HERE TO HIGHHOLD [Stimson’s home on Long Island] AND I COULD HAVE HEARD HIS SCREAMS FROM HERE TO MY FARM.

  The officers decoding this coy subterfuge figured the seventy-seven-year-old Stimson had become a father and wondered if the conference would adjourn for a day to celebrate. “The little boy” was, of course, the plutonium bomb just exploded in New Mexico and “his big brother” the untested uranium gun-type bomb that would be dropped on Japan.

  Success at Alamogordo had aggravated the distress of scores of scientists who had made it possible. Dr. Leo Szilard (like Dr. Franck, a refugee from the Nazis) submitted a petition to the Interim Committee drawn up by himself and signed by fifty-seven Chicago scientists. It urged that the Japanese be given suitable warning and the opportunity to surrender.‡

  At lunch on Wednesday, Truman sounded out Churchill on the question of apprising the Russians about the bomb. Churchill suggested that if Truman was “resolved to tell,” he should explain that he had been waiting for the successful test. Then he would have an answer to the question, Why did you not tell us this before? Churchill also offered other advice. The phrase “unconditional surrender” bothered him; it could lead to tremendous loss of American lives. Couldn’t it be expressed in another way so that the Allies got “all the essentials for future peace and security, and yet left the Japanese some show of saving their military honour and some assurance of their national existence, after they had complied with all safeguards necessary for the conqueror.”

  “I don’t think the Japanese have any honor after Pearl Harbor,” Truman retorted. “At any rate they have something for which they are ready to face certain death in very large numbers, and this may not be so important to us as to them.”

  That afternoon Truman met with Stalin. The President made no mention of the bomb, but Stalin had a secret to confide that was already known to Truman. The Generalissimo showed him the Emperor’s confidential message requesting that Prince Konoye be received as an emissary of peace. Stalin wondered if he shouldn’t ignore it; the U.S.S.R. would “eventually” declare war on Japan.

  Innocently Truman told him to do what he thought best. Stalin suggested he “lull” the Japanese to sleep: what if he told the Japanese government that the message was so vague about Konoye’s visit that he couldn’t give a concrete reply?

  So it was that Molotov’s deputy in Moscow, Alexander Lozovsky, after keeping Ambassador Sato waiting for five days, at last sent him a confidential letter: the Emperor’s proposal was so vague and Prince Konoye’s mission so unclear that his government did not feel it could reply definitely to either question. Sato followed up his report to Tokyo with a plea to accept peace on any terms as long as the Emperor remained on the throne:

  I REALIZE THAT IT IS A GREAT CRIME TO DARE TO MAKE SUCH STATEMENTS, KNOWING THEY ARE CONTRARY TO THE VIEWS OF THE GOVERNMENT. THE REASON FOR DOING SO, HOWEVER, IS THAT I BELIEVE THAT THE ONLY POLICY FOR OUR NATION’S SALVATION MUST COINCIDE WITH THESE IDEAS.

  But his superiors back home were not yet ready to go that far, and if they had, the Americans would have given no formal assurance regarding the Emperor.

  In Switzerland, however, Per Jacobsson was more determined than ever to open a channel for negotiations. He had finally succeeded in overcoming General Okamoto’s reluctance to trust any American promises not in writing—by sophistry: the Americans had broken their written promises after World War I; now they were refusing to put promises in writing because they intended to keep their word. It appealed to Oriental logic and General Okamoto agreed to cable Tokyo a “strong recommendation” to end the war.

  As a result of Okamoto’s positive action Allen Dulles flew to Potsdam to give Stimson a firsthand report of the Japanese overtures. Dulles did not expect an immediate response, nor did he get it. He was satisfied, nevertheless, that the very real possibility of negotiations through Okamoto had been pointed out to “authoritative American quarters in a timely and, I believe, effective method.” But the American leaders, now in possession of the ultimate weapon, were already determined to accept nothing short of unconditional surrender, and were no longer capable of considering negotiations even as the most peace-minded Japanese saw them.§

  On July 21 Stimson read aloud to Truman and Byrnes a detailed report from eyewitnesses describing the awesome spectacle at Alamogordo. Both were “immensely pleased” and Truman was “tremendously pepped up.” The following morning Stimson brought the report to Churchill, who was exhilarated. The Prime Minister leaned forward. “Stimson, what was gunpowder?” he asked rhetorically, brandishing his cigar. “Trivial. What was electricity? Meaningless. This atomic bomb is the Second Coming in wrath.” Suddenly he remembered something amusing. “Now I know what happened to Truman yesterday. I couldn’t understand it. When he got to the meeting after having this report he was a changed man. He told the Russians just where they got on and off and generally bossed the whole meeting.” His excitement went beyond the scientific triumph. It would no longer be necessary to invade Japan. “Now all this nightmare picture had vanished,” he later wrote. “In its place was the vision—fair and bright indeed it seemed—of the end of the whole war in one or two violent shocks.… Moreover, we should not need the Russians.”

  As far as Churchill and Truman were concerned, the decision to drop the bomb had been made. But three American military men continued to debate the issue. Beyond his moral reservations, Admiral Leahy suspected that the scientists and others in the program wanted to use the bomb “because of the vast sums that had been spent on the project.” General “Hap” Arnold claimed that conventional bombing alone could end the war, even in the face of Marshall’s insistence that it was either the bomb or a costly invasion. General Dwight Eisenhower also took vehement issue with Marshall’s conclusion. He told Stimson privately that Japan was already defeated. Dropping the bomb was “completely unnecessary.” More over, America should avoid rousing world condemnation by using a weapon which, in his opinion, “was no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives.”

  On the evening of July 23, Churchill was host at a banquet. Many of the innumerable toasts and speeches were drowned out by the Royal Air Force Band. Mischievous, Churchill whispered to Leahy that it was his retaliation for being “bored to tears” by classical music at the Truman and Stalin banquets.

  The President said he hoped he had been fair at the conference and would endeavor to be so in the future. Stalin immediately got to his feet. “Honesty adorns the man,” he said and spoke at length in praise of Truman. King leaned over to Moran and whispered, “Watch the President. This is all new to him, but he can take it. He is a more typical American than Roosevelt, and he will do a good job, not only for the United States but for the whole world.”

  The toasts became more effusive. Churchill addressed the Soviet leader as Stalin the Great, and he in turn startled his listeners with “Here’s to our next meeting in Tokyo!” After dessert Stalin began moving methodically around the big table collecting autographs on his menu.

  Socially the banquet was an unqualified success, but the morning after revived doubts about the continuing unity of the Big Three. Field-Marshal Brooke, now Lord Alanbrooke, glumly noted in his diary: “One fact that stands out more clearly than any other is that nothing is ever settled!” The Big Three were no longer drawn together by the bonds of a common cause.

  Truman’s morning began with the news that the bomb should be ready by August 4–5, almost certainly no later than August 10. Before lunch he reviewed the final report of the Combined Chiefs, who recommended that Russia be brought into the war as soon as possible in order to eventuate the earliest possible surrender of Japan. This conclusion was a reflection of their conservative attitude toward an untried weapon. Secretary of State Byrnes, howeve
r, had no misgivings. Like Churchill, he saw the bomb as a means to end the war. It made Russia’s entry, which would surely complicate the postwar settlements in Asia, unnecessary. At lunch he was so persuasive that Truman agreed that while Stalin had to be informed of the bomb, he should be told in a casual way. Otherwise the Generalissimo might realize its full import and move into Manchuria against the Japanese before the date he had promised—“early in August.”ǁ

  After adjournment of the plenary that afternoon, Truman singled out Stalin and offhandedly mentioned, without using the words “nuclear” or “atomic,” that America had “a new weapon of unusual destructive force.” Just as casually Stalin replied that he was glad to hear it and hoped the Americans would make “good use of it against the Japanese.”a

  Churchill, who shared Byrnes’s desire to keep Russia out of Asia, sidled up to Truman. “How did it go?” he asked conspiratorially.

  “He never asked a question.”

  Within twenty-four hours the operational order to drop the first atomic bomb was on its way to General Carl A. (“Tooey”) Spaatz, the new commander of the Strategic Air Forces:

  The 509 Composite Group, 20th Air Force will deliver its first special bomb as soon as weather will permit visual bombing after about 3 August 1945 on one of the targets: Hiroshima, Kokura, Niigata and Nagasaki. To carry military and civilian scientific personnel from the War Department to observe and record the effects of the explosion of the bomb, additional aircraft will accompany the airplane carrying the bomb. The observing planes will stay several miles distant from the point of impact of the bomb.…

  A day later the heavy cruiser Indianapolis dropped anchor a thousand yards off Tinian Island in the Marianas. Numerous small craft swarmed around the warship, and high-ranking officers of all services climbed aboard to watch the unloading of its top-secret cargo, a metal cylinder about eighteen inches in diameter and two feet high—the heart of the first practical atomic bomb. It weighed several hundred pounds and contained U-235, a derivation of uranium metal, shielded by lead. The momentous occasion was marred by a slight miscalculation. The wire on the winch lowering the cylinder to an LCT was six feet short and the onlookers—GI’s and brass alike—jeered the sailors. But at last the ticklish job was over and the U-235 was safely ashore. Indianapolis’ grave responsibility was over.b

  On July 25 the opposition Labour party challenged Churchill’s leadership at the polls for the first time since the war began. Churchill flew home, and though still confident his Conservative party would get a substantial majority in the election, he carried with him a feeling of foreboding. “I dreamed that life was over,” he told Moran. “I sat—it was very vivid—my dead body under a white sheet on a table in an empty room, I recognized my bare feet projecting from under the sheet. It was very life-like.” Then he added, “Perhaps this is the end.” He went to bed still confident of victory but was wakened “with a sharp stab of almost physical pain.” He was suddenly convinced he was beaten and thought: “The power to shape the future would be denied me. The knowledge and experience I had gathered, the authority and goodwill I had gained in so many countries, would vanish.”

  By noon on the twenty-sixth it was obvious that the Labour party would win; Clement Attlee would be the new Prime Minister and return to Potsdam in his stead. “It may be a blessing in disguise,” said Mrs. Churchill at luncheon.

  “At the moment it seems quite effectively disguised.”

  The bomb was on Tinian, the orders for its use were cut. Now all that remained was to dispatch the final warning to Japan, the Potsdam Proclamation.c On the day of Churchill’s defeat, President Truman ordered the Office of War Information in Washington to beam the message in the open to Japan. It threatened “the utter devastation of the Japanese homeland” unless Japan surrendered unconditionally, but made no mention of the atomic bomb; nor did it contain the controversial paragraph about retaining the Emperor. It limited Japanese sovereignty to the four main islands, but did promise that the Japanese would not be “enslaved as a race or destroyed as a nation” and would be allowed “to maintain such industries as will sustain her economy” and permitted access to raw materials. Moreover, the occupying forces would be withdrawn as soon as a new order was established and there was convincing proof that Japan’s war-making capabilities were destroyed.

  China and Britain had approved the proclamation, but not until that night was it shown to the Russians, who were understandably surprised and annoyed. Molotov immediately got on the phone with a request that the release of the declaration be postponed for a few days. Too late, Byrnes replied apologetically, it has already been issued. He hurriedly added, “I deemed it inappropriate to consult the Soviet Union about the document when your government was not at war with Japan.”

  Japanese monitors picked up the broadcast of the proclamation on the morning of July 27, Tokyo time. Togo’s first reaction was that “it was evidently not a dictate of unconditional surrender.” Perhaps the Emperor’s personal desire for peace had become known to the Allies and moderated their attitude. There were, of course, some ambiguities but it was clearly desirable to enter into negotiations with the Allies for clarification and “revision—even if it should be slight—of disadvantageous points in the declaration.” He reported at once to the Emperor urging that the ultimatum be “treated with the utmost circumspection, both domestically and internationally.” He worried particularly about what might happen if Japan let it be known that she intended to reject it. In subsequent reports to the Big Six and then to the entire Cabinet, Togo recommended the same course as he had outlined to the Emperor. Admiral Toyoda countered that they should issue a statement at once proclaiming that “the government regarded the declaration as absurd and would not consider it.”

  Prime Minister Suzuki supported Togo, but everyone agreed that the proclamation had to be announced in the newspapers. The military wanted an official rejection to accompany the press release, but Suzuki suggested that they ignore the ultimatum. A compromise was reached: they would allow the papers to publish an expurgated version, without comment or criticism.

  In the morning, however, several newspapers disregarded instructions and did editorialize, much to the discomfort of the Foreign Ministry. The Mainichi headlined the story LAUGHABLE MATTER and the Asahi Shimbun declared: “Since the joint declaration of American, Britain and Chungking is a thing of no great moment, it will merely serve to re-enhance the government’s resolve to carry the war forward unfalteringly to a successful conclusion!”

  Togo thought the military were responsible—the editors would never have had the courage to defy the government on their own—and they countered his accusation with renewed insistence that the declaration be refuted in definite terms. Once more a compromise was reached: the Prime Minister would read a statement belittling the Allied terms without rejecting them. At four o’clock Suzuki told reporters, “The Potsdam Proclamation, in my opinion, is just a rehash of the Cairo Declaration, and the government therefore does not consider it of great importance. We must mokusatsu it.” The word means literally “kill with silence” but as Suzuki later told his son, he intended it to stand for the English phrase “No comment,” for which there is no Japanese equivalent. Americans, however, understandably applied the dictionary meanings: “ignore” and “treat with silent contempt.” On July 30 the New York Times headline read: JAPAN OFFICIALLY TURNS DOWN ALLIED SURRENDER ULTIMATUM.

  The use of the atom bomb was inevitable, but for the Americans a question still remained: Would the Russians declare war before the bomb brought about a quick Japanese surrender? Only days before, General Antonov had postponed Soviet entry until “the last half of August.” Now, after issue of the proclamation, Molotov pressed for a letter formally inviting Russian participation in the war. Truman stalled for forty-eight hours but finally, on the last day of July, sent Stalin the draft of an ambiguous invitation stating that “it would be proper for the Soviet Union to indicate its willingness to consult and coo
perate with other great powers now at war with Japan with a view to joint action on behalf of the community of nations to maintain peace and security.”

  In a covering note, which attempted to shift the onus of the initiative on the Russians, Truman said he would send them a formal, signed copy after Stalin had reached an agreement with Chiang Kai-shek. “If you decide to use it, it will be all right. However, if you decide to issue a statement basing your action on other ground or for any other reason prefer not to use this letter, it will be satisfactory to me. I leave it to your good judgment.”

  “Terminal” was over. Truman, Attlee and Stalin publicly expressed their gratification, but there was an underlying atmosphere of weariness and disappointment. Truman, suspicious of Russian motives, privately resolved not to allow them “any part in the control of Japan” or to reveal anything about the bomb until there was some agreement on control and inspection. “You never saw such pig-headed people as are the Russians,” he wrote his mother. “I hope I never have to hold another conference with them—but, of course, I will.”

  Leahy was proud of the way Truman had stood up to Stalin, particularly in refusing to be “bulldozed into any reparations agreement that would repeat the history of World War I,” but continued Soviet objections to proposals important to the future peace of Europe had left the admiral with “serious doubts that any peace treaties acceptable to our government could be negotiated.” Byrnes too was dissatisfied. The concessions won from Stalin depended on the Russians’ carrying out their part of the bargain, and by this time Byrnes had “little confidence in their pledges.”