In 1945, the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively, which shocked the whole world. So why did the United States drop the atomic bomb on Japan? What kind of conflicts do the United States and Japan have?
1. The conflict between the United States and Japan
On December 7, 1941, Japan suddenly attacked the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor, which not only fired the first shot of the Pacific War, but also paved the way for Japan's final surrender and defeat.
On September 18, 1931, Japan launched the " September 18th Incident" in northeastern my country, officially declaring a full-scale war of aggression against China. Japan chose to launch a war in the Northeast region of our country precisely because it took a fancy to the natural resources in the Northeast region.
In fact, Japan's economy has been extremely severely affected since the 1929 U.S. stock market crash caused the global financial crisis . It can be said that a large part of the reason why Japan was determined to launch a war of aggression against China was to alleviate social conflicts caused by lack of resources and rising unemployment.
However, Japan's economy has not improved as a result. On the contrary, due to the continuous war, Japan's finances are also very tight. According to reliable data analysis, Japan's military budget in 1938 was even larger than Japan's overall economic budget in 1937.
In addition, Japan's strategic resources are completely dependent on imports from the United States. This is undoubtedly a life-threatening situation held by the United States. Therefore, there are only two paths before Japan: First, attack the Soviet Union and obtain Siberian strategic resources. 2. Obtain strategic resources in Southeast Asia.
But no matter which of these two roads it is, it is not that easy to walk. Japan chose to fight the Soviet Union first. In 1939, the Japanese army launched a war against the Soviet army in the Nomenkan area. However, facing the Soviet army, which was powerful and equipped a hundred times better than itself, the Japanese army could only lose with regret. At this time, Japan also realized that it was overestimating its capabilities, so it signed the "Japan-Soviet Neutrality Treaty" with the Soviet Union, and at the same time gave up its plan to attack the Soviet Union to obtain strategic resources.
At this time, Japan turned its attention to Southeast Asia. However, Southeast Asian countries such as Philippines and Indonesia are within the sphere of influence of the United States, Britain and other countries. If these Southeast Asian countries are affected, it will undoubtedly affect the interests of the United States and other Western countries.
However, for the sake of its own economic development, Japan chose to attack southern French Indochina under such circumstances. After touching the interests of the United States, the United States quickly imposed economic sanctions on Japan. The first one was to implement an oil embargo and freeze all Japanese assets in the United States. Japan was caught in a dilemma.
At this time, the arrow was on the string and had to be fired. Japanese Combined Fleet Commander-in-Chief Yamamoto Isoroku finally decided after some consideration: to take advantage of the unpreparedness of the US military to surprise Pearl Harbor.
Some people say that Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor was correct, while others say that Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor was stupid. But regardless of whether the decision was right or wrong, it was a decision that Japan had to make. In fact, Japan has no second choice.
Isoroku Yamamoto knows very well that Japan cannot defeat the United States in terms of hard power, so it must strike first and give the enemy the most fatal blow, so that the enemy cannot come back.
So, on December 7, 1941, under the cover of radio silence, Japanese planes flew into the sky over the Hawaiian Islands of the United States and conducted a 90-minute strategic bombing of Pearl Harbor, the most important military port in the United States. Under such an offensive, Pearl Harbor had already turned into a sea of flames before the U.S. military could even react.
This incident caused the US military to lose dozens of ships, nearly 200 aircraft, and a total of more than 6,000 soldier casualties. It can be said that the Pearl Harbor incident caused the US Pacific Fleet to be extremely severely traumatized. Even US President Roosevelt said bluntly: "December 7, 1941 is a day of shame."
After Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, the combat power of the United States was seriously damaged. As a result, the United States was in a state of strategic defense for most of the next six months. Japan, which had gained the upper hand for half a year, successfully occupied the territory of Southeast Asia. ml1 oil , rubber and other strategic resources have successfully "extended their lives"
Although the attack on Pearl Harbor was undoubtedly a success at the time, it is estimated that Japan did not expect the so-called successful strategic plan of the attack on Pearl Harbor. What serious consequences did it bring to myself?
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American revenge - Tokyo bombing
This is the real image of the atomic bomb explosion in Hiroshima. More than 300 B29 bombers flew over Hiroshima, Japan, and half of Japan was transformed in one moment. It became a sea of fire.
Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor will undoubtedly drag the United States, which has always claimed to be neutral, into the murky waters of this war. At the same time, Japan will also suffer the serious consequences of awakening this sleeping lion, and what will follow is the United States' aggressive revenge on Japan.
In 1945, The U.S. Army Air Force carried out two large-scale strategic bombings on Tokyo, Japan, which dealt a serious blow to Japan, paralyzing Japan's wartime economy, and making Tokyo, Japan, the country most damaged by conventional bombs. Serious city.
However, the strange thing is, why was the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, but the bombing of Tokyo was four years later, in 1945?
In fact, after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the United States has been studying how to accurately combat Japan's arrogance. So the United States first thought of adopting the daytime precision bombing tactics used in Europe that year, and sent the B-29 bomber to Japan to perform bombing missions.
B-29 bomber is the latest super flying fortress bomber manufactured by the US military. Not only can it reach a speed of 563 kilometers per hour, its strike range can reach 2,400 kilometers, but it can also carry bombs up to 9,000 kilograms. Once the B-29 bomber came out, it dominated the field of fighter , leaving other countries behind.
However, even the United States itself did not expect that such an excellent fighter jet failed to make waves in Japan when it debuted in Japan.
Therefore, in order to effectively attack Japanese industry, the commander-in-chief of the US bomber force Curtis LeMay specially made a plan to fight Japan - changing daytime precision bombing to nighttime low-altitude bombing.
It turns out that because Japan is located in an earthquake zone and has frequent earthquakes all year round, Japanese housing buildings are mainly made of wooden structures. Japan's air defense forces also have weak air defense capabilities at night.
With this discovery, Li Mei ordered his men to replace the bombs on the bombers with incendiary bombs , and change daytime operations to night operations, catching Japan off guard.
March 9, 1945 , 334 B-29 bombers carrying a large number of incendiary bombs flew towards Tokyo, dropping more than 2,000 tons of incendiary bombs over Tokyo.
After being bombed by incendiary bombs, Tokyo was instantly enveloped in fire, and even the rivers were turned into boiling water by the fire all over the sky. Hundreds of thousands of Japanese, unable to advance or retreat, were burned alive in this sea of fire. Overnight, the city of Tokyo was burned to a ruins.
This operation by the US military caused 230,000 casualties, displaced millions of people, and caused the burning of a quarter of the buildings in Tokyo.
But this was just an "appetizer" for Japan. The United States immediately carried out bombings again in Nagoya, Osaka and other places. Even the Japanese Imperial Palace was not spared.
However, the United States has no intention of letting Tokyo go. The battlefield of the last major bombing had just been cleared. On May 26 of the same year, Le Mei launched another attack on Tokyo. More than 500 bombers hovered over Tokyo. The repeated bombings caused Tokyo to fall into despair again. This operation can be called the most cruel non-nuclear weapon air strike in human history, and is known as the Tokyo Bombing in history.
However, the US military’s revenge plan is not over yet.
3. Hiroshima Atomic Bomb
On August 6, 1945, with the fall of the atomic bomb, a mushroom cloud appeared over Hiroshima, Japan, and Hiroshima was razed to the ground in an instant. This was not only the first time the United States dropped an atomic bomb, but also the first time in human history that nuclear weapons were used in war. So why did the United States drop an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, after the bombing of Tokyo? What was the reason for the United States to drop the atomic bomb?
After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, the US military chose the bombing of Tokyo as the first step in revenge. But this is just the beginning. The next step of the US military plan is to invest 2 million troops to attack Japan's main island in one fell swoop. But all plans changed in July 1945.
On July 16, 1945, the world's first nuclear explosion test was successful in the U.S. state of Mexico. The United States suddenly had a powerful killer weapon and officially became the first country in the world to possess nuclear weapons. After possessing nuclear weapons, how to use them and where to use them became the top priority of the U.S. military.
At this time, Japan's glory on the Asian battlefield was no longer good. Japan's defeat seemed to be destined, but Japan still resisted and launched a crazy counterattack, resulting in a large number of casualties among Allied soldiers.
At that time, the World Peace Agreement had been signed. Logically speaking, Japan should surrender immediately, but Japan not only refused to surrender, but also continued to resist needlessly. This behavior also angered the United States, as the overlord of one party, and the United States was ready to settle old and new scores together.
But how to calculate this account has become a big problem. Now that we have reached the end of the war, a head-on conflict between the US military and Japan will inevitably lead to many US military casualties. Therefore, a head-on battle is not the best option. How to reduce the casualties of the US military while preventing Japan from making unnecessary struggles?
At this time, U.S. President Truman came up with an excellent way of attack, which was to drop atomic bombs on Japan. Dropping atomic bombs on Japan at this time would not only have the benefit of reducing US military casualties, but it could also force Japan to give up resistance and surrender quickly and unconditionally.
Not only that, the dropping of atomic bombs in Japan can also effectively deter other countries, especially the Soviet Union, which has a rather tough attitude, allowing the United States to gain more say in the world.
So in the early morning of August 6, 1945, a US military B-29 bomber carrying an atomic bomb slowly flew over Hiroshima. At this time, the residents of Hiroshima did not know what kind of disaster was waiting for them ahead.
An atomic bomb fell, and Hiroshima was instantly hit by a huge shock wave. A huge mushroom cloud rose over Hiroshima.
All the buildings on the streets of Hiroshima were destroyed in an instant, and everything within a radius of 20 kilometers from the center of the explosion was in ruins. The intense light waves emitted by the atomic bomb explosion blinded tens of thousands of people. People who were close to the explosion point were vaporized by the high temperature the moment the bomb exploded. There were no whole bodies, leaving only an afterimage on the ground.
People further away from the center of the explosion were not spared. Although they were not directly vaporized, the intense high temperature caused most people to be directly burned to death. Burnt corpses were lying everywhere on the road.Some people were lucky enough to survive the explosion, but the nuclear radiation of the atomic bomb really affected the lives of the survivors.
To this day, the Hiroshima area is still affected by nuclear radiation. The elderly living in Hiroshima have the highest probability of suffering from leukemia and cancer in Japan. Although according to radiation detection data, the radiation in Hiroshima is within safe levels, the overall data is still higher than in other places.
After the atomic bomb exploded in Hiroshima, U.S. President Truman announced to the world that the United States had dropped a highly lethal atomic bomb on Japan 16 hours ago, and issued a warning to Japan, advising Japan to surrender as soon as possible, otherwise a greater blow would be struck.
But Japan still has no expression. So just three days later, the U.S. military dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan. This time, Japan did not dare to make any further moves.
On August 15, 1945, Emperor Hirohito of Japan officially issued the " Final War Edict", announcing Japan's unconditional surrender to the world. The Second World War also came to an end with the surrender of Japan, and the world returned to its former peace and tranquility.
However, to this day, Japan still does not want to repent, trying to claim the United States' retaliation against itself as a victim as an inhumane attack by the Allies on Japan, and demanding that the United States apologize to Japan for the bombing of Tokyo and the dropping of atomic bombs.
But Japan turned a deaf ear to the Chongqing bombing and Chengdu bombing in China. Instead, it focused on distorting history, beautifying the harm caused to the Chinese people by the Nanjing Massacre and other incidents of aggression against China, in an attempt to erase Japan's atrocities against China from history. Japan's double-standard behavior is infuriating!
As a Chinese, we should remember history and never forget the national humiliation! Japan must not be allowed to tamper with history and continue to act like a victim.
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