Brayden Nichols

5/10/17

Chemistry

Trinity Paper

Should we have dropped the atomic bombs on Japan? Although many questions could be

asked throughout the book Trinity, I chose this one because I believe we didn’t necessarily need

to drop it. First off, the war was winding down, Germany had already surrendered. Secondly, I

don’t believe the world was ready for this type of weapon. Finally, the destruction that these

bombs caused was terrible and inhumane.

The main reason I don’t believe we needed to drop the bomb was because Germany had

already surrendered. The motive of the government to build this bomb was to stop Germany and

end the war. The Germans surrendered on May 7, 1945; we didn’t drop the bomb until August 6,

1945. Although we had spent the time building this bomb, three months should be sufficient time

to shut down the atomic bomb program. Those who argue that we need to use them, I would

simply say, why couldn’t we just save the bombs for later. By the time Japan knew we dropped

the first bomb, we were already sending the second bomb on Nagasaki. How do we know that

they wouldn’t have surrendered after the first bomb was dropped?

Next, I believe the world was not ready for this type of weapon, not only were these

bombs incredibly lethal, the nucleus of atoms was discovered only thirty years earlier. Ernest

Rutherford discovered the nucleus in 1911, the construction of the bomb began in 1941. At this

time, we were the only nation experimenting with the idea of nuclear weapons. We should have
known that once we dropped one, it would be an example and the rest of the world would be in

an arms race with us to build nuclear weapons. This ties in with the first one, if we didn’t drop

the bombs on Japan, we wouldn’t have started the nuclear age so soon. We might have been able

to postpone the Cold War or even stopped it.

Finally, the destruction that these bombs caused in and around Hiroshima and Nagasaki

was inhumane and terrible. Imagine the fire of hell coming out of oblivion and burning millions

of people on the streets. Why did we have to result to this terrible ultimatum? Three miles. This

was the blast radius of the bomb, the casualties inside this radius were instantaneous. For those

who ‘escaped’ the initial blast, radiation poisoning would kick in, killing you in a slow painful

process. If people don’t call these weapons inhumane, I ask you to think, what would you call it

if someone you love was the victim of incineration or radiation poisoning? Roughly eighty

thousand people died when the atomic bombs were dropped. Many more died of radiation

poisoning in the months and years that followed.

In conclusion, I believe we shouldn’t have dropped those God forsaken bombs on the

innocents in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The main reason that we started building the bombs was

that people believed that Germany was capable of building the same type of weapon. Although

the Germans had already surrendered and the Japanese were slowly losing their ground to the

Soviets, so couldn’t we have saved the weapon? We kicked off the atomic age by dropping the

bombs, and I don’t think we (the world) were ready for this type of weapon. Also, these bombs

destroyed the lives of many innocent Japanese people. It is scary to think of the new, more

powerful weapons that make these two bombs look like little 9mm bullets.