Why did America drop the Atomic Bomb?
... lived in the center of Hiroshima. There was no separation between commercial, industrial, and residential zones. The houses and industrial buildings were made of wood. Also, the outskirts of the center of the city had an area of close small wooden workshops that were scattered between the Japanese houses. There were also some industrial plants that had lain on the outskirts too. These facts left Hiroshima highly susceptible to fire damage. The mission to bomb Hiroshima went very smoothly. The crew and equipment functioned exactly as planned, and the weather was just right. The only thing the flight crews weren’t sure about was if “Enola Gay,” the B-29 carrying the atomic bomb, was going to lift. The plane carried a total of 7,600 gallons of fuel. Because of the plane’s weight and for the safety of the island of Tinian, it was decided that the final assembly of the bomb would be finished in the air. The plane was lifted amazingly and was off to drop the first atomic bomb, also known as “little boy.” At an elevation of 31,600 feet the Enola Gay dropped the atomic bomb. Forty-three seconds later, at about 1,800 feet over Hiroshima, the bomb detonated. This was the first atomic bomb ever to be dropped; the time was 8:15 a.m. Japanese time, the day of August 6, 1945. It was dropped by the United States Army Air Forces. Following the detonation of the bomb there was a great flash of light, brighter than that of the sun and eye scorching. There was also a great rush of air and a loud rumble of noise that circled the city. Sounds of buildings crumbling to the ground and the sounds of growing fires were among the city. A great cloud of dust began to cast itself upon the city, leaving the people of Hiroshima in a state of darkness. Hiroshima was an assembly area for troops, a storage point, and communication area. A control operator for a Japanese Broadcasting Corporation in Tokyo noticed that the Hiroshima station had gone off the air. The operator tried to reconnect with his program and then once more on another connection but had failed. Twenty-minutes later the Japanese found out that a Tokyo railroad telegraph center was not working just north of Hiroshima. Small railway stops within ten miles sent confused reports on an explosion of Hiroshima. These reports were sent to the headquarters of the Japanese General Staff. The military headquarters had tried many times, over and over, to call the Army Control Station in Hiroshima. The headquarters were confused and puzzled by nobody answering their calls. They thought that no large enemy raid could have occurred, and they knew that no large amounts of explosives were in Hiroshima at that time. They felt that that nothing serious had happened, and that these reports were only terrible rumors, which they will soon find to be true. From the Japanese General Staff, a young officer was told to fly to Hiroshima, land and to survey the damage, and then to return to Tokyo. The officer went to the airport and took off towards Hiroshima. While about only one hundred miles from Hiroshima, 3 hours later from when he took off, the officer and his pilot saw an enormous cloud of smoke. When they had finally reached the city, they went around it in disbelief. The land was as though a big scar, and still burning down to nothing. The officer immediately reported back to Tokyo the terrible news. Sixteen hours from after the bomb was dropped there was a White House public announcement that notified Tokyo what had really happened to Hiroshima. A massive amount of damage was done to Hiroshima and its people. The bomb’s explosive energy was equivalent to about 20,000 tons of TNT. Sixty-eight percent of Hiroshima’s buildings were destroyed completely. There were a total of 135,000 estimated casualtie...