﻿Before July 16th, 1945, the United States faced what looked like a daunting challenge:
the invasion of the Japanese main islands. Though it had suffered catastrophic casualties in the
Pacific War, had seen its naval and air forces practically destroyed, and its cities ruined in
American bombing raids which had already killed over 300,000 civilians, Imperial Japan still
refused to surrender. With such a stubborn enemy determined to avoid what it saw as dishonor at
any cost, the Allied invasion and occupation of Japan appeared to be the only option for bringing
the war to an end. It was an unprecedented prospect, as Japan had never been occupied
by a foreign power. The only serious attempt came from the Mongols in the 13th century and
they failed. The United States had overwhelming military superiority against its Japanese opponent
by that point. However, the invasion would be a far more difficult task than invading Germany had
been. War planners in Washington estimated that the operation, codenamed Downfall, would take
several years to complete and involve unthinkable casualties. 500,000 to 1 million is the most
commonly cited number, but the Joint Chiefs of Staff had some estimates which were even higher.
In late July, the JCS assessed that Operation Downfall could cause between 1.7 and 4 million
American casualties, with 400,000 to 800,000 dead. Since the plans for Operation downfall called for
a total of about 1.8 million American troops to go ashore, the late July estimate was staggering,
suggesting that much more manpower would have been needed for success. Japanese deaths,
meanwhile, could have been between five and ten million. These were not unrealistic scenarios.
The invasion of Okinawa, which was widely seen as a dress rehearsal for the eventual invasion of the
main islands, proved that Operation Downfall would be extraordinarily bloody. Japanese troops would
fight to the last and civilians were also being trained to resist the invaders. The dropping of
the two atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki the following month, and the Soviet Union’s
entry into the war at the same time, prevented this apocalyptic scenario from occurring.
However, the way the war ended has a certain peculiarity: why was Tokyo,
the Japanese capital, not a target for the two atomic bombs? In this video,
we’ll look at the reasons why, and how Tokyo almost wasn’t spared nuclear fire after all.
The successful Trinity test on July 16th gave the United States another option to end the war with
Japan. President Harry Truman did not hesitate in deciding to use it. He let out hints about his
plans early, when he threatened that Japan would face “prompt and utter destruction” if it did not
surrender according to the terms of the Potsdam Declaration, which included the unconditional
surrender of the Japanese military, disarmament, and the Allied occupation of Japan. However,
no surrender came in the following days, and Truman gave orders to drop the first atomic bomb,
codenamed “Little Boy,” with a yield equivalent to about 15,000 tons (15 kilotons) of TNT.
The Tokyo area immediately came to the attention of American war planners. Specifically,
Tokyo Harbor was proposed as a target for the bomb early in the planning phase. However, this idea
was quickly abandoned as being inadequate. Above all, the dropping of the atomic bomb needed to be
a psychological demonstration, meant to convince Japan that its total destruction would occur if
it did not surrender. A bombing of Tokyo Harbor, while certainly forceful, would not produce the
desired effect. The first atomic bombing needed to be as shocking as possible to achieve the outcome
that American leaders desired. Therefore, the Manhattan Project assembled a Target Committee
to make criteria for the atom bombs. The choice of cities to drop the bomb
on originated in the Target Committee of May 10-11, 1945. The Manhattan Project, led by Major
General Leslie Groves, determined the following criteria would be ideal for target selection:
1. Targets should be urban areas more than three miles in diameter.
2. They should be capable of being damaged effectively by the bomb’s blast.
3. They should be unlikely to suffer an attack by August.
4. They should be of strong psychological significance, meaning that the use of the
weapon would both have a high psychological impact on the Japanese and “make the
initial use sufficiently spectacular for the importance of the weapon to be internationally
recognized when publicity on it is released.” 5. The target should have a military objective,
but that objective should be located in a larger area subject to blast damage
to prevent a loss of effectiveness should the bomb be placed badly. In other words,
it would be desirable to destroy residential areas along with the military targets.
In this initial assessment, five cities stood out as being good targets: Hiroshima, Kyoto, Yokohama,
Kokura, and Niigata. Tokyo was not among them, although the Emperor’s palace was considered as
a potential target, only to be discarded later as having little strategic value.
To make a long story short, the Target Committee wanted to achieve two effects with the use of
the weapon – staggering casualties and apocalyptic damage in the chosen city,
all from the use of one bomb. Its power would therefore be demonstrated to the entire world,
and the Japanese leadership would understand just how formidable their enemy had now become.
One of the reasons why Tokyo did not make the Committee’s list was because much of it
had already been reduced to rubble. This tends to get overlooked in the United States today,
but Tokyo had suffered repeat firebombings. The worst of these occurred on the night of March 9-10
and was called Operation Meetinghouse. A squadron of 334 B-29 bombers emptied their payloads of
incendiary bombs over the Japanese Capital. These bombs used both white phosphorus and the newer
napalm as incendiary weapons. The carpet bombing created a firestorm that the tightly-packed wooden
buildings of Tokyo easily spread. 100,000 people died in the attack, with hundreds of
thousands more severely wounded with third-degree burns. Meanwhile, over a quarter of the city,
about 40 square kilometers, was reduced to rubble. The fire raged for days afterward and left over a
million survivors homeless. Only 14 of the 334 B-29 bombers were lost, despite them flying at
low altitudes between 5,000 and 9,000 feet. Operation Meetinghouse was the deadliest
single air raid of all time. By some metrics, it was even more destructive than the atomic
bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. So, one reason why Tokyo was not made
a target for the first two atomic bombs was because it had for all intents and purposes
already been destroyed. Dropping one of the bombs on Tokyo would therefore lessen
the weapon’s psychological impact by not showing the true extent of its destructive capabilities.
An intact population center would be needed. Another reason was that the United States did not
want to create a power vacuum in Japan. The United States wanted the Japanese to surrender as quickly
as possible, especially after the Soviet Union got involved in the Pacific War. Washington wanted to
prevent Moscow from completely overrunning East Asia and potentially occupying part of
Japan. Dropping the bomb suddenly, and taking out members of the Japanese government in the process,
would have only delayed the surrender, as surviving elites jockeyed for power.
Finally, there was little military value left in dropping an atomic bomb on Tokyo. Again, the
firebombing had already destroyed all of that. In December 1944 the United States military
created the 509th Composite Group, the first organization dedicated to delivering nuclear
weapons. Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., a bomber veteran from the contested skies of Europe,
was chosen to lead it. Specialized B-29 bombers were created to ensure that the
B-29s in the 509th could cruise at 260 miles per hour at an altitude of 30,000 feet while
carrying the bomb. Such modifications would be needed to protect the crews from the blasts.
On August 2nd, Tibbets and his men got their orders. Hiroshima would be the primary target,
as it had military value and was surrounded by adjacent hills that would produce a focusing
effect to “considerably increase the blast damage,” according to the Target Committee. The
secondary targets for the August 6th attack were Kokura and Nagasaki, the latter of which had not
been considered in the initial target committee but was later considered acceptable, replacing
Kyoto on the list, for reasons we will get into in a moment. All of these cities met the criteria
of having military infrastructure around them. The ultimate decision would be based on the weather in
the area. Clear skies were preferred so that the crews on the bombers could take full measurements
of the nuclear blast. The skies were clear around Hiroshima and the bomb, the 15-kiloton,
uranium-235-based “Little Boy,” was dropped on this city with a population of about 318,000.
The effect was as the Target Committee had hoped for. The bomb wiped out nearly the entire city.
Between 70,000 and 100,000 people died in the initial explosion, although some authorities
raise the figure to up to 140,000. The destruction of Hiroshima, a city which had been untouched by
American air raids during the war, was a clear signal to the world about the capabilities of the
nuclear weapons the United States now possessed. One bomb had been dropped, one bomb which was
capable of causing this level of destruction. Unfortunately, the Japanese still refused to
surrender in the aftermath of the attack on Hiroshima. On August 9th, Japan’s Supreme
Council met to discuss the bombing and the Soviet declaration of war the night before. This council
consisted of six top members of the government and it was Japan’s effective ruling body. Three
members advocated that the Council should accept the Potsdam declaration. These were Foreign
Minister Shigenori Togo, Prime Minister Kantaro Suzuki, and Navy Minister Admiral Mitsumasa Yonai.
However, the other three: Army Minister General Korechika Anami, Chief of Staff of the Army,
General Yoshijiro Umezu, and Chief of Staff of the Navy, Admiral Soemu Toyoda, held out. To them,
surrendering unconditionally would mean giving up Japan’s entire way of life. For example,
they were deeply worried about whether an unconditional surrender would see their
Emperor have his position abolished and then be hauled up as a war criminal in a
Nuremberg-style tribunal. These members wanted a counterproposal to the Potsdam Declaration.
They would agree to surrender if: 1. Japan could disarm its own forces.
2. Japan could conduct its own war crimes trials. 3. There would be no occupation of Japan.
4. The Emperor would retain his throne. The Council needed to unanimously agree
on a decision, so even with the use of nuclear weapons against Hiroshima,
the Japanese leadership was deadlocked, meaning the status quo was maintained.
Of course, something else happened that day that is much better-known, the second atomic bombing
against Nagasaki, which the Council got word of during its meeting. This time, the plutonium-based
“Fat Man” device, the same type as the one tested at Trinity, was used in the attack. However,
unlike Hiroshima, which had always been considered the juiciest target for the use of an atomic bomb,
the brass disagreed over which target should be chosen next. Nagasaki was not a consensus
candidate even though it had been placed on the updated Target Committee list.
At first, Kyoto was considered as the best target besides Hiroshima. It had a high population of
over 1 million and it was the ancient Japanese capital, so it had great cultural significance.
Additionally, it had miraculously been untouched by the earlier firebombing campaigns. The city
had no significant military infrastructure, but since the primary criteria for atomic
bomb use was psychological, this was not considered a deal-breaker. The minutes of
the Target Committee’s meeting in May make its assessments of Kyoto as a target clear:
“In this respect [the psychological aspects] Kyoto has the advantage of the people being
more highly intelligent and hence better able to appreciate the significance of the weapon.”
However, the ancient capital was spared precisely because of its cultural and religious
significance. Henry Stimson, the United States Secretary of War who had taken a trip to Kyoto
with his wife in the pre-war period, intervened. This personal connection gave him an affinity for
the city. He also argued that even though many civilians would necessarily die with the use
of nuclear weapons, they nevertheless should be used in accordance with the laws of war. Namely,
their targets should have some military value that would justify their use. Kyoto might have had
great psychological significance, but according to him, that was not enough justification. A lack of
military value meant that the city should be left alone. General Groves did not share his opinion,
but the Secretary of War was his boss and he eventually acquiesced. Kyoto was removed from
the target list and Nagasaki put in its place. Unlike Kyoto, Nagasaki was a center of Japanese
shipbuilding and maritime trade, so it had military value, stemming from a long tradition.
For the 250-year Edo Period under the Tokugawa Shogunate, it was the only port in the Japanese
main island of Honshu where foreigners were allowed to trade in the Japanese marketplace.
The city also hosted the Mitsubishi Steel and Arms Works and Mitsubishi-Urakami Torpedo Works,
making it of unarguable military value. However, Nagasaki was still put behind
the other targets as a priority, not least of which was because there was a POW camp nearby
and its hilly terrain which would lessen the effectiveness of the nuclear blast.
Kokura, which hosted one of Japan’s largest military arsenals and was a crucial hub for light
ordnance, anti-aircraft weapons, and beach defense materials, in particular, was the primary target
for the August 9th attack. August 11th was the originally-selected date for the bombing. However,
weather conditions were expected to deteriorate over Japan by then and persist for five days,
so the operation was moved up by two days. The Enola Gay, which had dropped the bomb
over Hiroshima, was on reconnaissance duty that day, and its crew reported that the weather over
Kokura was clear. However, by the time that Bockscar, which carried Fat Man, arrived,
the weather had deteriorated. Fuel was running low, so the crew decided to abandon Kokura and
move to Nagasaki, the secondary target. However, weather conditions were poor over
Nagasaki as well, and the Bosckscar was almost forced to return to its base on Okinawa. There
was even a protocol in place to drop Fat Man over the ocean if necessary. Then, just as the crew was
set to abort the mission, the clouds over Nagasaki cleared and they could spot their target. It was
bombs away after that. The poor weather meant that Fat Man detonated in the Urakami Valley,
two miles away from its designated target. This, and the hilly terrain in Nagasaki,
meant that damage to the city was not as great as had occurred in Hiroshima, despite the Fat
Man being a higher-yield weapon, at about 20 kilotons compared to Little Boy’s 15. Still,
between 40,000 and 70,000 people died instantly. The damage in the areas most subjected to the
blast was also catastrophic. With the second atomic bombing,
it became clear that Hiroshima was not a fluke, and although some Japanese leaders, like Toyoda,
believed (correctly) that the United States did not at that moment have a large arsenal of these
weapons, it would only be a matter of time before America’s seemingly limitless industrial potential
would create more of them. After all, President Truman had promised “a rain of ruin from the air,
the likes of which has never been seen on this Earth,” among other threats. In this light,
influential figures appealed to Emperor Hirohito that the “four condition” offer
conceived earlier in the day would not be sufficient to stop the slaughter.
In an unprecedented move, a second conference was convened in Emperor Hirohito’s personal presence.
Both sides presented their arguments to the Emperor, and Hirohito said that he supported
a “one condition” surrender offer. Japan would accept the other terms of the Potsdam Declaration
if Hirohito was allowed to retain his throne. In reply, the Americans said that this was an
acceptable condition, but that Hirohito would be subordinate to the occupation.
This reply created yet more controversy. Some members of the Council, like Prime
Minister Suzuki, believed that the surrender terms must include an explicit
guarantee that the Emperor would survive. The Japanese government was still wavering,
despite the Emperor’s wish to surrender. On August 10th, General Groves declared
that another Fat Man-type bomb would be ready for delivery the next week, and requested more
targets to be added to the list, since only two remained: Kokura and Niigata. Groves’ Deputy,
Colonel Kenneth Nichols, suggested Tokyo. Truman temporarily ordered a halt on further atomic
bombings, expressing that he couldn’t bear the thought of killing more kids. However,
as Japan still seemed to be wavering, Truman confessed that he would soon have no choice
but to order a third atomic bombing. This time the target would be Tokyo.
However, Hirohito had by now recorded a message to the Japanese public explaining his decision
to surrender. Dramatically, on the night of August 14th-15th, an attempted coup took place,
which came to be called the Kyujo Incident. Kenji Hatanaka and Jiro Shiizaki, officers
at the army ministry, led a battalion of rebels to seize control of the Imperial Palace and stop
the surrender broadcast from taking to the airwaves. These rebels occupied the palace
and cut the phone lines. They attempted to assassinate Suzuki, too, and he escaped only
moments before his would-be killers arrived. The rebels held out overnight, but no flag officer
would join them in their effort, and General Shizuichi Tanaka, commander of the Eastern Army,
soon had them surrounded. Hatanaka and Shiizaki committed suicide after their plea to make a
broadcast to the public had fallen on deaf ears. Hirohito’s broadcast was now so sensitive that
the Eastern Army saw the need to take control of the streets around the headquarters of NHK,
Japan’s national broadcaster. From that place, the Japanese people heard their Emperor’s voice
for the first time. Explaining that “the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb,”
Hirohito said that further resistance would lead to the “obliteration of the Japanese nation and
the total extinction of human civilization.” Imperial Japan surrendered. Tokyo was spared,
but had the coup caused more chaos, or the wavering continued, it is possible that the
capital would have been the third atomic bombing target. The Emperor’s decision and the almost
religious adherence of the cabinet to his supposedly divine commandments, despite
his having no formal power, had saved Tokyo and other Japanese cities from nuclear fire.
In a video for his presidential library years later, Truman showed no regrets about his decision
to drop the two atomic bombs: “I don’t care what they say about me. They’ve said everything under
the sun. But I always come to the conclusion that nobody throws sticks at an empty fruit tree.”
He also believed that his decision to use these weapons had made for a new era in international
relations. In this era, humanity was actually safer from war because nuclear weapons made war
too terrible to undertake. Although President Truman’s words back then have not entirely come
true, the post-World War II era has been the longest time in recorded history with
an absence of war between great powers. Is that because of nuclear weapons? What do you think?
And what do you think about the decision to drop the atomic bombs at the end of World War II and
the criteria for selecting Japanese cities? How close was Tokyo to being bombed in the final,
dramatic days of the war? Don’t forget to let us know in the comments. Also don’t forget
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