Oppenheimer Biopic Should Rekindle Japanese A-Bombing Debate

The movie Oppenheimer, based on American Prometheus, the Pulitzer Prize winning bio of J. Robert Oppenheimer, hits theaters today. Neatly bookended on the calendar between the July 16, 1945, A bomb test and the Hiroshima/Nagasaki strikes 3 weeks later, Oppenheimer is sure to be an atomic like blockbuster.

Besides widely informing America of the epic life of possibly its most consequential American in history, it should also spur debate on the necessity for killing over a hundred thousand Japanese civilians in those 2 monstrous attacks.

The mainstream American narrative still portrays the bombings as necessary and just to end the Japanese war without an invasion projected to inflict a million US casualties.

I learned of the atomic bombings 72 years ago at age 6. For the first decade afterward, I swallowed whole the US fairytale that the military and political elite were unified in dropping the bombs to prevent that costly invasion.

Few if any reputable historians buy that version today. They point to a number of top military leaders who opposed the nuclear attacks, for good reasons. Most prominent was U.S. Army Chief of Staff General George C. Marshall who argued not using the Bomb would strengthen America’s prestige and position in post war Asia. He even advocated for inviting the Russians to view its July 16, 1945 test. Navy Secretary and later Defense Secretary James Forrestal rightly argued the bombings would impede our post WWII relations with the Soviet Union. Fleet Admiral William Leahy, senior US military officer on active duty in WWII, called the proposed bombings “barbaric.” Assistant Secretary of War John McCloy told Truman that neither invasion nor atomic bombings were necessary. Japan would surrender if we avoided ‘Unconditional Surrender’ terminology since any surrender would amount to that without saying so. McCloy even advocated telling Japanese leaders we had the Bomb as additional incentive to quit the war.

Though not involved in the atomic bombing decision process, Gen. Dwight Eisenhower was furious we dropped them. He recounted telling Secretary of War Harry Stimson shortly after the attacks “I voiced my grave misgivings, first on my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly, because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of “face.”

Ike, McCloy, Leahy, Forestall, Marshall and others were right; Truman and his supporters were wrong. Seventy-eight years on, America is still the only country to explode nukes in anger. Current US belligerency abrogating sensible nuclear agreements, routinely threatening imagined enemies with “all military options are on the table,” spending a trillion dollars to upgrade our nuclear capability, lurching toward nuclear confrontation with both Russia and China, all bode ill the world will make another 78 years nuclear attack free.

Every American concerned about avoiding nuclear winter should view Oppenheimer and ponder the current nuclear dilemma facing mankind.

Walt Zlotow became involved in antiwar activities upon entering University of Chicago in 1963. He is current president of the West Suburban Peace Coalition based in the Chicago western suburbs. He blogs daily on antiwar and other issues at www.heartlandprogressive.blogspot.com.