HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI

THE DROPPING OF ATOMIC BOMB ON HIROSHIMA AND NAGASAKI BROUGHT AN END TO WORLD WAR II, BUT AT A TERRIBLE PRICE TO HUMANITY.

On July 29, 1945, Japan rejected an ultimatum issued by the Allies to surrender unconditionally or suffer "complete destruction." This left two options : invade Japan or use the awesome power of what U.S president Harry S Truman described understandably as "a new weapon of unusual destructive force" -  the atomic bomb. U.S. military adviser considered that an invasion would incur some 1 million Allied casualties and untold civilian death, so Truman opted for what he considered the lesser of two evils, authorizing the immediate use of four atomic bombs. He also reiterated the call for surrender, warning the japanese og " a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth."

LITTLE BOY AND FAT MAN

On August 6 Operation Centerboard began. A B-29 bomber name Enola Gay, after the mother of the pilot, Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, took off from the Mariana Islands, in the Pacific Ocean, for the city of Hiroshima, where bombardier Major Thomas Ferebee released an atomic bomb code-named Little Boy. The tail gunner, who witnessed the explosion from 10 miles away as Enola Gay returned to base, voiced a thought that would be echoed around the globe:  " My God. What have we done?" The city was vaporized, nearly 1000,000 people were killed instantly, and up to 250,00 died of burns and radiation sickness, some of them years later.

Japanese surrendering on the USS Missouri

Still Japanese would not surrender, and on August 9 a second atomic bomb, code-named Fat Man, was dropped on the port Nagasaki, wreaking similar destruction but with fewer casualties. The following days, Emperor Hirohito announced that Japan would surrender conditionally, thereby preventing the United State from dropping the remaining two atomic bombs, which had been scheduled for August 14 and 16.