ABSTRACT
Discussions of the atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in recent years have tended to focus on retrospective looks at the civilian casualties involved. In contrast, this chapter looks at the variety of motivations Washington had in dropping the bomb, and specifically at (a) the issues of just cause and right intention in Washington and (b) how the issue of proportionality comes into conflict with the principle of discrimination in this case. The Truman administration had very strong reason to believe that as many as 1 million U.S. casualties could be expected in a land invasion of Japan, and the vast majority of U.S. troops were average citizens (not a martial class of warriors) who had to go to war following Pearl Harbor. This chapter also looks at a principle often taken for granted: that of political authority over nuclear weapons (thus Truman’s dilemma as President), and how this has frayed in today’s era of rogue states, religionized politics on the Indian subcontinent, and the possibility of WMD-armed terrorists.
