Ward Wilson: The Myth of Hiroshima

well conventional wisdom states that the dropping of non-conventional bombs on japan ended the second world war but author ward wilson disagrees with that statement moreover he says that nearly 70 years of nuclear weapons policy has been incorrectly based on that myth ward wilson the author of five myths about nuclear weapons is with us now he's the senior fellow at basic that is the british american security information council and also director of the rethinking nuclear weapons project hello welcome to the agenda in the summer thank you thank you it's nice to be here yeah um we're going to spend um our our time today examining the role of nuclear weapons and ending the war with japan but just remind us what is sort of the orthodox view of japan surrender the orthodox view is that the united states bombed hiroshima on august 6th and three days later they bombed nagasaki on the 9th and on the 10th the japanese indicated that they wanted to surrender although the actual surrender was some several weeks later and um americans decided that it was clearly the result of the bomb and in fact the emperor said in his radio address announcing the surrender that they had to surrender because of a new and most cruel bomb so point a leads to b leads to c direct line this is the reason that's what most people believe it's a really simple story and it fits and uh if you look at the facts kind of from a distance it it seems perfectly logical okay in a general sense because we're going to talk about this in in quite some detail but in a general sense what's the the other view the opposing view to that narrative well in 1964 an american historian published a view that said that it was that the u.s bombed hiroshima even though they didn't need to because japan was already going to surrender and so it was immoral for the u.s to have bombed hiroshima nagasaki now i'm actually talking about a third point of view which is that japan didn't surrender because of the nuclear bombings they surrendered because the soviets came into the war okay how common is this revisionist we have all heard i mean we were all taught growing up and believed that bombing had that abc narrative right one led to next led to next how common is the revisionist view in public discourse well the revisionist view which is this it was immoral and japan was going to surrender anyway view has actually been pretty widely discussed among historians and in political science circles and so on um and some people know about it this new view that it was uh those soviets that caused the japanese to surrender is really very new just in the last 10 years and is not very widely discussed and that's where you i mean that's the view you you uphold that that's what happened um i mean when we talk about hiroshima and nagasaki it has long been the narrative that has been sold and bought what kind of uh impact has it had on america's interpretation of the second world war well hiroshima fits really well with a bunch of our national myths and uh it it's kind of the capstone of all our efforts we we think of ourselves we think of ourselves as inventors and entrepreneurs and not really as soldiers like the germans or a warlike nation but you know we're kind of farm boys and the uh the bomb is the embodiment of an inventive people that creates a weapon that can win a war when nothing else could so the bomb really fits with our our our sense of ourselves and when you know you talked about the last 10 years or so the sort of revisionist view really emerging to what extent is that sort of based on hindsight i mean it becomes so clear looking backwards but not so clear obviously looking forward well hindsight's funny because once you kind of think you know the story it's unless you go down and examine the facts at the lowest level of detail hindsight can kind of um obscure stuff in fact there were some stories on the agenda in last winter and in the spring about the lack of historical knowledge in canadian high schoolers and college kids and i think that that this is a kind of a similar problem we have this simple story about hiroshima it kind of fits the facts and if you don't look too closely um it's pretty persuasive thank you for watching the agenda paying close attention excellent okay uh you know yes looking back has its advantages and disadvantages and history we always have revisionism in in history how much resistance is there when it comes to this part of american history to revisiting what really might have happened well there's a lot of resistance there's resistance in the united states there's resistance in japan where the bomb also serves their purposes um it's very hard to get people to give up their myths we always i mean we laugh my friends we talk about you know when nuclear weapons are finally gotten rid of what will be the last country to give up nuclear weapons it won't be pakistan and it won't be israel we say it'll be france because nuclear weapons are such an important part of france's identity they make up um you know without nuclear weapons france is just a middle-sized power with really great cuisine so nuclear weapons make them france with a capital f so myths are are important and people resist uh facing facts but are there political calculations i mean mr one thing that you want to hold on to to something that you believe to be true and has started taking on life of its own but are there political calculations to not wanting to revisit this well yes i mean nuclear weapons have this great big reputation as being effective and powerful um four billion people depend on nuclear deterrence either directly or indirectly for their security 37 countries around the world nato the nato countries the nine nuclear powers some other states so there are a lot of people who want the capabilities of nuclear weapons the the idea about how great the capabilities were to be true they don't want to have to think of some other way to keep themselves safe okay let's go back to japan 19 early 1940s up to august 6 45 i want to unpack the interpretation of japan surrender prior to the bomb being dropped on hiroshima on august the 6th what kept the japanese from surrendering well um primarily they had a very strong warrior culture uh the military had largely taken control of the government a lot of people think that the emperor was in charge of everything because he's an emperor but in fact he was more like a figurehead like a combination of the pope and the queen of england kind of someone with influence but not necessarily a dictatorial power so you have this weak emperor strong military the military believes that it might be possible still to win a last-minute victory that will give them better surrender terms and they also think it will dishonor them to surrender death before surrender and all this i mean japanese cities are being bombed to bits by conventional weapons japanese cities are being bombed there's a submarine blockade that has blockaded supplies they can't get troops from the mainland back there are one 1.2 million troops still in japan home islands but they have many more troops in china and other areas of asia but they can't get them back they can't get gasoline in their navy is confined to port because they don't have fuel and the us is bombing cities and cities are being i mean i read an article that you wrote where you talk about i mean cities 90 of cities being destroyed i mean thousands of people being killed in the three weeks before hiroshima there were 24 cities bombed 26 cities bombed of those eight were as completely destroyed as hiroshima or more destroyed in terms of the percentage of the city destroyed there's a city toyama was the size of chattanooga tennessee in in 1945 it's 99.5 percent destroyed so the us is doing a lot of damage with firebombing uh in the weeks all summer long leading up to hiroshima i wanted you to just paint that picture and to remind us of that because we focus almost solely on on august 6 on hiroshima and i think to some extent we sort of forget that this this came within the context of utter destruction that was going on destruction and death going on leading up to this so as much as the world was surprised by the type of bomb and the impact that it had in hiroshima there was a lot going on before well from japan's from the from the point of view of japan's leaders hiroshima was not that extraordinary there were if you graph all 68 cities bombed in the summer of 1945 you might think that hiroshima would be you know off the charts because that's the way we always present it in fact hiroshima is second tokyo conventional bombing is first and if you graph the square miles destroyed hiroshima is sixth if you graph the percentage of the city destroyed hiroshima is 17th so from the point of view of the leaders of japan hiroshima stood out because it was a new means that was used but the end result was not that different okay i want to talk about what how the leadership responds so the bombing of hiroshima happens in the morning right japanese time what does the japanese leadership do the bombs fall what sort of happens next in terms of a response well on that day they don't do anything the next day um they learn for sure that it's an atomic bomb because they get word of the press conference the press release that truman releases the head of the minister of war goes and meets with the head of the japanese bomb project and asks some questions they discuss nuclear weapons he finds out about what a nuclear weapon is and what it can do and then on wednesday the foreign minister goes to the premier and says we should have a meeting of the supreme council about this the supreme council's the ruling body effectively of japan and the premier says uh he checks with the military guys and he says no it's not that important we it's not important enough hiroshima being bombed with a new kind of bomb is not important enough to convene a meeting of the supreme council then something else happens and then they do meet the next day so the the the fact that they think about having a meeting and don't and nothing seems to be happening up until thursday is kind of the giveaway the giveaway in terms of that that the bombing didn't lead to the surrender right okay so parse that a little bit more for me well compare so midnight on august 8th 9th the soviets which have been neutral they had a pact a neutrality pack set to run for five years they declare war they invade manchuria with 1.5 million men they have a five to one superiority in tanks they invade socklen island which is just to the north of the japanese home islands and they make rapid progress within six hours of that news arriving in tokyo the supreme council is meeting to discuss unconditional surrender for the first time in the war so from the japanese point of view the ninth is the crucial day and you ask yourself well you know why was that the first time they met to discuss surrender well it can't have been nagasaki because that happens later in the day while they're meeting it probably wasn't hiroshima because that was three days earlier uh and they had this discussion about having a meeting and they decided not to and you make the point that if it was a real crisis if they saw it as a real crisis they don't wait even hours to get together right well you look back at history i mean uh jfk was in bed on october 16th at 9 00 8 30 in the morning and mcgeorge bundy brings word to him that the soviets are sneaking missiles into cuba less than two hours and 45 minutes later they have selected an emergency committee brought them to washington they're sitting in the white house talking about what to do so the notion that the japanese leadership took 72 hours when they didn't do anything about hiroshima thought about meeting about it decided not to and then decided to discuss surrender it's if if the reason that they decided to meet to discuss surrender on thursday is hiroshima they're schizophrenic or something because you know they've decided not to then they decide to back and forth anyway okay so that bringing the soviet union into this how decisive is it that the soviet union declares war in japan then well think about any war in which you add a great power to the war usually that has a decisive impact the soviets are once they conquer socklen island they'll be 21 miles away from the northernmost island of japan japan's troops are all dug in on the east side of the island the soviets are going to invade from the west so the soviets are really poised to be in japan in 10 to 14 days so the japanese had figured out that we were probably going to invade kyushu the southernmost island in november or something they weren't exactly sure but they knew it wasn't going to be for a while when the soviets enter the war it changes the time frame of decision from months to days and what's truman saying in terms of how much does he attribute the surrender of japan to the soviets well in his memoirs and in his post-war statements he never says that it was the soviets but if you look at what the u.s government was saying at the time there are clear indications the bomb project the people building nuclear weapons were planning to build nine more nuclear weapons obviously if you expect the first two to be decisive you don't continue to build bombs james forrestal the secretary of the navy said they should replace macarthur who was going to be the commander of the invasion of japan this is going to cause and replace him with a navy guy this is going to cause a firestorm of bureaucratic fighting in washington you don't do something like that if you're expecting the war to end secretary of war stimson is on his way out of town to vacation at his farm in long island uh when the japanese surrender offer arrives obviously he wasn't expecting japan to surrender george marshall the secret the secretary of the army secretary of the army his intelligence guy writes him a report that says nuclear weapons won't be decisive for at least a month maybe longer so if you look at the top people in the u.s government they didn't think nuclear weapons were going to be they were surprised when japan offered to surrender and from the japanese leadership's perspective i mean what interest would would it have served them to say yep it was those bombs that fell on hiroshima and nagasaki that made us surrender what's the self-interest in that this is the giveaway because put yourself in emperor hirohito's shoes you're you've led your country into a disastrous war your cities are in ruins the army and the navy have been beaten again and again it's going to be economic chaos for years to come how do you explain this would you rather say well we made some misjudgments and we didn't fight as well as we could have and there were serious problems or would you rather say the enemy made an amazing scientific breakthrough that no one could have predicted and that's why we lost we were not to blame it was their miracle weapon that did it you make the case that it was the soviets that caused the japanese to to surrender in in a sense um ward it you know it's always been the bomb cosmic surrender can you really just despite what narrative we choose to believe but let's choose you let's choose yours for the purpose of this question obviously um can it really be as simple as saying the soviets caused the japanese to surrender is it again like sort of a direct line well the problem i mean yes i think so um and it partly it's because if you compare the reaction to the soviet invasion and the reaction to the bomb it gives you a sense for um the difference the other thing is um the the soviet invasion has genuine strategic importance it has real impact on their ability to wage war and their future prospects destroying one more city out of 68 doesn't you know it's a it is a horrible uh destructive attack that kills you know 90 000 people within a day or two and that's horrible but from the japanese leadership perspective they've been having their cities bombed all summer long so you know it's why would they surrender over something that um was strategically decisive why would they surrender over something that wasn't decisive like the bombing of hiroshima and ignore something that was strategically decisive like the soviet invasion you know we we talked a little bit about this about why the myth persists in the united states that the simple narrative why people still attach themselves to it's been nearly 70 years though okay we're you're 69 since hiroshima and nagasaki were bombed what kind of bitter pill would it be for the americans to have to swallow if if they accepted that it was they're terrible enemies the soviets who actually caused the japanese to surrender and not their own bomb well you know the cold war is over i mean it would have been impossible in the 50s for people to say yes it was the soviets and then the soviets could have said you know well we did in four days what you couldn't do in four years but you know a lot of people already believe that the soviets i mean if you ask russian friends they'll tell you what they're taught in school is the soviet intervention won the war i think um the truth is that things pass the day of nuclear weapons being so important and so crucial um it could well be that we're past that point that they're the united states now has all these other capable weapons it's enormously conventionally powerful and uh maybe we can get over uh what we did 70 years ago but i guess my question is i mean if i go on to you know main street america as we like to say and and tell people this version the truer version of what what happened do you think they're actually going to accept it well um i hope so because i think the only way that you can be successful and have a have safety and security is to deal with the world as it is to you know myth is the light of myth is a mellow soothing light that bathes us in a warm glow and reality is a much harsher light that shows off our imperfections but when the lives of millions of people are at stake and nuclear weapons do put the lives of millions of people at stake i think it's too important to matter to not be realistic let's say you're right soviets cause the japanese surrender to to what extent would that make the nuclear bombings of too japanese city immoral or or even more immoral depending on your perspective of that well you know the morality issue is is the the biggest stumbling block to getting people to reevaluate nuclear weapons because they want americans just want to talk about whether it was moral or not the ones who don't like it say it wasn't and the ones who are defending it you know loudly say it was but um i i think from my perspective means is less important than ends and if you bomb a city with fire bombs and kill a hundred thousand people as we did at tokyo or you destroy hamburg as the u.s and british did in 1943 or dresden and 45 then i think it doesn't really matter how you destroy a city destroying a city is destroying a city and the immorality is relatively the same no matter what technique you use well tomorrow we're going to talk about about nuclear policy but i i just want to end our conversation today about asking that because if if the ends are what matter as you say i think you might stand alone in that in terms of conventional thinking because many people would say nuclear weapons have a reputation that is established well established and no matter what we say that that reputation is going away what would you say to that well i when people talk about reputation i always think of patroclus remember achilles best friend was patroclus and achilles was fighting in the war between the achaeans and the trojans and they took his girl so he was pouting in his tent he said i won't fight i won't fight and uh the trojans because achilles was the best warrior the trojans were winning the kians were taking losses and they were going to achilles tent and they were saying dude you know you've got to come or whatever the greek equivalent of a dude is yeah you've got to come fight for us and achilles was saying i won't fight i won't fight finally his friend patroclus comes and says okay you won't fight give me your armor and i'll go fight and achilles says okay patrick puts on the famous breastplate takes the helm the shield he goes out and for a while the reputation of achilles carries the day the trojans fall back and the achions make up lost ground but eventually hector says well achilles are no achilles i have to go out and fight him he puts on his armor and he goes out and apollo sneaks up behind patroclus and knocks him down he doesn't hurt him but his helmet comes off and the trojans see that it is not the great achilles inside the armor it's just an ordinary man and they're running through with spears and i think that reputation can be useful in foreign policy and in defense but i want the real achilles to defend me i don't want a rep to rely on just a reputation because reputations can turn out to be false so i think it's important to be realistic and not simply rely on the reputation of nuclear weapon okay we're going to pick up on this tomorrow talk about reputation versus reality thank you for joining us tonight we'll see you again tomorrow thank you support ontario's public television donate at tvo.org

Channel: The Agenda | TVO Today

Views: 154,831

Keywords: TVO, TVOntario, The Agenda with Steve Paikin, current affairs, analysis, debate, politics, policy, Japan, Hiroshima, Second World War, nuclear

Id: r9H6o83NUf4

Length: 25min 4sec (1504 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 06 2014