Hiroshima still makes the headlines. Today, if a nuclear test occurs, the leader who ordered it can expect to be the recipient of a telegram from the mayor of Hiroshima. Until there are no more nuclear weapons in the world, an eternal flame continues to burn at Peace Park, Hiroshima. A plaque in a memorial at the park reads: "Let all the souls here rest in peace; for we shall not repeat the evil." The Smithsonian Institute drastically had to alter a fiftieth anniversary exhibit about the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the bomb, because veteran's groups protested that the exhibit made the Japanese look like innocent victims. Fifty years after the bombing, a Gallup poll showed that senior citizens, by a narrow margin, supported the bombing. Younger Americans, however, appeared to believe that the nuclear bombing of Japan was wrong. Looking back at the bombing, historians find it easy to second-guess or use hindsight. The lens through which we peer at that decision today is different from the lens that people were looking through 1945. It is important not to take such decisions out of their historical context, which is difficult to do so many years after the fact. It makes more sense to consider what led to the decision based on the atmosphere of 1945 rather than to try and weigh the pros and cons of the decision in our era.
There were several factors involved in the decision to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Personalities, politicians, lack of understanding between cultures, the uncertainties of scientists, and top meetings among world leaders all had something to do with the decision.
The creation of an atomic bomb began in 1941 when Franklin Roosevelt was persuaded by Albert Einstein to fund the project. However, when Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945, the bomb had not been tested and scientists were not in agreement about its possible effects. In fact, so little was known about this bomb that later strategists figured some B-29s would have to follow after it to ensure a huge conflagration.
