50 Days of War and Peace or Why Harry Dropped the Atomic Bomb!
by
Book Cover & Preview Text
CHAPTER 4 (partial)
JULY 19, 1945 THURSDAY
COMMUNIQUÉ: JCS DIRECTIVE:
To Nimitz and MacArthur:
CINCPOA has transferred to CINCAFPAC the control of US-held areas in the RYUKYUS. In turn, Nimitz retained responsibility for the operations of naval units and installations in this area.
NAVAL OPERATIONS
OKINAWA THEATER Off OKINAWA, several Kamikazes attacked the pickets. The fatally damaged DD CHARLES J BADGER missed being hit by another suicide plane which crashed into BUCKNER Bay. A second Kamikaze hit DD THATCHER which suffered only minor damage.
CENTRAL PACIFIC THEATER Admiral Halsey wanted continued pressure to be maintained on JAPAN and ordered continuing night-time anti-shipping sweeps. On the night of July 19, R. Adm. Cary Jones's Crusdiv 17, consisting of CLs PASADENA, SPRINGFIELD, WILKES-BARRE, and ASTORIA plus 6 destroyers began sweeping around NOJIMA Zaki, at the end of the peninsula SE of TOKYO. As was the case in TU 34.8.2's sweep of July 14-15 along the N coast of HONSHU, Crusdiv 17 encountered no Japanese ships or opposition. At 2300, Admiral Jones's cruisers and destroyers fired 240 rounds of 6-inch shells into the NOJIMA Zaki station. This was the fourth attack by American and British warships in 6 days. With no reports of damage or visible signs of activity at the Cape, Admiral Halsey moved his ships to the SW of KYUSHU and the INLAND Sea.
TASK GROUP 95.02 OFF OKINAWA After being warned of the approaching typhoon, on July 17, while on a search-and-sink operation off the CHINA coast, the TG had raced S and was now 230 miles S of OKINAWA. All other ships were under orders to leave the OKINAWA area which was now being lashed by winds of over 140 miles per hour. The fleet scattered throughout the PACIFIC Ocean, not wanting to be added to those which were lost in the typhoons of December 1944 and June 1945.
TG 95.02 was fortunate in escaping the center of the raging storm, but its small destroyers were being swamped by the 50- to 60-foot waves which often hid the “tin-cans” from view of the crew members on the much larger cruisers. Destroyers would rise on the crest of an enormous wave with their bows completely out of the water. After poising motionless on the top of a wave for a long moment, they would then dive forward, crash onto the surface of the sea with a teeth-rattling, bone-jarring, violent collision, and disappear into the trough.
Even though typhoons in this area were known to last for as long as a week, the Weather Station reported that the TG could plan on returning to the CHINA coast and its search-and-sink mission on July 21.
ULTRA THIRD FLEET Retiring towards fueling area. Only Japanese air activity was one plane dropping a bomb. It was thought to be just training exercise.
SS GABILAN DOWNED PILOT RESCUE The submarine had remained submerged all night and was able to survive without any damaged from the shelling and depth charge attacks by TU 35.4. As daylight broke this morning, GABILAN surfaced and rendezvoused with SS RUNNER II trading 15 shaken aviators for 2 movies, some canned milk, and a box of flares.
AIR FORCE ACTIVITY
Maj. Gen. L.E. Woods (USMC) reported that his mixed units of Air Forces had destroyed 500 Japanese planes in the OKINAWA area since April 7. The original mission for these units had been the tactical air support of the TENTH ARMY in the capture of OKINAWA, but squadrons of the Wing remained to continue tactical operations against the Empire in conjunction with the vastly increased ARMY AIR FORCES which arrived on OKINAWA in July. General Woods gave credit to the FIFTH AIR FORCE, SEVENTH AIR FORCE, and various VMF, VMF(N), and VMTB squadrons of SECOND MARINE Air Wing.
FEAF P-38s hit a suicide boat hide-out at SANDAKAN while B-25s bombed JESSELTON air base. P-38s spotted ground forces and hit their positions along KIBAWE Trail. B-25s hit ITU ABA. From IWO Jima, 94 P-51s of VII FC pounded numerous targets on sweeps over NAGOYA area and hit air fields, factories, railroads, power facilities, and gun positions at locations including KAGAMIGAHARA, NISHINOMIYA, OSAKA, NAGOYA, MIEJI, IZUMI, and TAMBAICHI.
FLEET AIR WING 18 Search aircraft set afire a small coastal cargo vessel in waters S of HONSHU.
SECOND MARINE AIR WING OKINAWA Before daylight, night fighters destroyed a Japanese plane in the air near TOKUNO Island, bringing to 500 the total number of Japanese aircraft destroyed by them since April 7 when it began operating in the OKINAWA area.
FOURTH MARINE AIR WING CORSAIRS and AVENGERS attacked installations in the Japanese-held PALAUS with bombs and rockets. HELLDIVERS of this Wing struck targets on YAP.
FIFTH AND SEVENTH AIR FORCES In SE KYUSHU, fighter-bombers bombed and strafed railroad tunnels NW and SW of KAGOSHIMA. These tunnels were sealed skillfully by direct hits. Near MIYAZAKI many water-craft and docks were destroyed, while a 10,000-ton cargo ship was destroyed by 12 direct hits. Night bombers harassed TOMITAKA and BYU airfields.
ARMY P-51 MUSTANG fighters from IWO Jima, while attacking air fields in the NAGOYA-OSAKA area, surprised a small group of Japanese planes in the air and shot down 9. They then made repeated strafing attacks over NISHINOMIYA, KOMAKI, KAMEYAMA, and SUZUKA.
TWENTIETH AF During the day, 72 B-29s dropped 700 tons of bombs on the AMAGASAKI plant of Nippon Oil Company.
During the night of July 19-20, 27 B-29s laid mines in TOYAMA, NIIGATA, MIYAZU, MAIZURU, TSURUGA, NEZUGASEKI, OBAMA, and KOBE-OSAKA areas and at WONSAN.
600 MARIANAS-based SUPERFORTRESSES hit 5 separate cities (HITACHI, CHOSHI, FUKUI, OKAZAKI, and AMAGASAKI) with more than 3,500 tons of bombs. HITACHI was one of the five that had been struck with fire-bombs and within 1 and 2 days after the heavy bombardment by the THIRD FLEET. CHOSHI, 60 miles E of TOKYO on the PACIFIC coast of CHOSHI Peninsula, was a major food processing center for TOKYO, YOKOHAMA, and other cities of the KANTO Plain. It also handles one-eighth of all the fish caught in the nation’s waters. The third and fourth cities that were hit with incendiary bombs were FUKUI and OKAZAKI. The first 4 cities had a total population of 327,000. The fifth city, AMAGASAKI, was bombed with demolition type explosives.
The quantity of the THIRD FLEET and TWENTIETH AIR FORCE attacks on HITACHI illustrated the problems and waste of a divided command. Neither the ARMY, NAVY, nor the AIR FORCE command knew what the other was doing, and, in this overlapping of attacks, there was a duplication of targets. The individual egos and the persistent personality conflicts of the 3 CINCs, throughout the PACIFIC war, have caused the needless deaths of young men during invasions which were not necessary, and contributed to the needless waste of precious materiel which was in short supply in other areas.
OTHER MILITARY ACTIVITY
ASIATIC COAST Heavy, medium, and attack bombers of the SEVENTH AIR FORCE penetrated a thick cloud cover to drop over 200 tons on KIANGWAN airfield near SHANGHAI. FIFTH AIR FORCE night patrols started fires in the CANTON industrial area.
SEVENTH FLEET night air patrols destroyed or damaged 27 cargo craft along the coast and sank a freighter-transport off HAINAN Island. During the day, they set storage facilities afire and damaged motor transport near CANTON.
BORNEO AIR Search planes sank a freighter and left another burning at SAMARINDA and fired a third in the shipyards at BANJARMASIN. Fighters set a fuel barge ablaze and heavily damaged a river boat near SIBU.
BORNEO LAND Troops of the 7th AUSTRALIAN Division secured SAMBOJA, the oil center 28 miles NE of BALIKPAPAN, and after occupying AMBORAWANG, they pushed on W toward the Japanese's inland escape route to SAMARINDA. Patrols fanning out from PENAJAM have reached the RIKO River and the mouth of the TOENEN River,
Formats
Book Details
About the Book
UNITED STATES NATIONAL ARCHIVES
D767 .A53 2003
NATIONAL WORLD WAR II MUSEUM Library of the United States Navy.,
National Infantry Museum.,
Rare Book Collection, University of California LA
Used in the Steven Spielberg/Tom Hanks $100,000,000 HBO Production "Pacific"
About the Book
50 Days of War and Peace or Why Harry Dropped the Atomic Bomb! is a two volume book.
Between the moment the atomic bomb was tested on July 16, 1945 (Chapter 1) and the peaceful mass surrender of the 2,500,000 Japanese military servicemen on outlying Pacific Islands on September 3, 1945 (Chapter 50), tens of thousands of people were being killed. Japanese military officers were constantly debating heatedly about surrendering or fighting until the last Japanese died. Each day (50 days-50 chapters) there were constant meetings, and many of them included the presence of Emperor Hirohito. The confrontations are detailed each day, and they led to the killing of a Japanese general and a lieutenant colonel on the Palace grounds by other Japanese officers during the coup d'etat attempt.
Every Battle report and secret intercept discloses the intensity of the air, land , and sea battle each day. They reveal what every combatant nation knew; what they thought they knew; and what they did not know! More than 20,000 Japanese soldiers were killed in Burma during the last 11 weeks, and the location of the individual military units and their commanders are identified in the South-East Asia Command Battle Reports of Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten. Scores of battles continued daily throughout China, including the beginnings of the Chinese civil, the Viet Nam, and the Korean Wars. The invasion of Manchuria on August 9, 1945, is followed each day as 1,000,000 Russians stormed from the West, North, and East to occupy the Manchurian territory and take over 1,000,000 Japanese soldiers and civilians as prisoners.
Detailed are all the naval battles in which the American and British ships were participating when they were crashed by the Kamikazes. The damage and sinking, the sailors who were killed or wounded, and the activities of more than 1,630 ships are revealed from documents released by the archives of the United States Navy. The complete naval battle of Leyte Gulf is detailed ship by ship and shot by shot, and identified are each of the heroic smaller ships who won. The tragic sinking of CA Indianapolis after she delivered the atomic bomb at Tinian. Fly with the planes who were on regular missions, and become aware of the internal activities before and during the dropping of the two atomic bombs by two different B-29's.
Revealed are the minutes of meetings conducted by President Harry Truman which involve the decision to drop the bomb and the subsequent orders to make the drop after Truman left Potsdam. There are more than 1,730 persons in this book, and there are scores of stories about them- some tragic, some humorous, but always interesting. All the activities of the communist spies are revealed from their confessions.
An enlightening research section of 60 pages is FOR YOUR INFORMATION which explains to the reader the difference between military ranks; types of warships and planes; abbreviations used; location of 2,500 cities, towns, and villages in the book; the activities and positions held by the 1,730 persons; and, a great deal of other information.
About the Author
Dr. Edgar Leo Anderson, Ph.D. served in the U.S. Army during World War II. He is the son of Sgt. Gerald Anderson who served in World War II in the U.S. Army. His son, Sgt. Gerald Anderson, served in the U.S. Marines during the Vietnam War.
You can contact the author at: eande55517@earthlink.net
PREFACE
“You have only one year to live.” My physician was leaning over me while I was lying on a bed and connected to IVs and wires in the emergency room of West Hills Hospital in the suburb of Los Angeles, California. He patted me on the shoulder and confided that I was going to die from a massive heart attack! It was August 1, 1980.
By August 15, 1980, I had shut down my four companies: real estate land development; real estate sales operation; mortgage company; and, advertising agency. My wife suggested that I go someplace and decide upon what activities were important to me during my final year. On September 3, I was in Tahiti, and then I spent weeks on the most beautiful islands in the world—Bora Bora and Moorea. After returning from Paradise, I announced that I would document the reasons President Harry Truman dropped the atomic bombs.
My former-Marine son and I have been active in the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars, and it amazed me that many World War II veterans had only the rumors and biased opinions of others upon which they based their knowledge about the end to the Pacific War. This was even more pronounced by the lack of knowledge of lay persons. I bought a computer and utilized the writing education I obtained from years in the University of California Extension Writers Program. I began my researching and writing.
It is now January 2003, and I am pleased to state that my manuscript is now complete and is going to the publisher this week. I did not die, but my physician died of a massive heart attack in 1982. In 1983, I began swimming every day so I would not follow him. I have swum almost every day for over 19 years, and I feel marvelous.
My goal was to present every event that happened throughout the world during those last thirty days of the war and the first twenty days of peace. I did not want someone’s faulty memory of the activities. Throughout all my interviews with the principals who participated in the events I had requested only the correct spellings and dates. I offended some of the interviewees because I did not want to know how they felt—then or now.
There is one man, John E. Taylor, who gave me the impetus to persevere over the years and complete this manuscript. I had run out of research material at the libraries of UCLA and other colleges. After introducing me to all the material in the Los Angeles Public Library system, Glen Creason, History Librarian, suggested that I continue at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. I made the first of a dozen trips to Washington, D.C., from my home in Los Angeles.
It was in the National Archives that I met John E. Taylor. He had begun in the military section in 1946 and was still there in the late 1990s. When I met him he mentioned that the Archives would not let him retire, and the reason was that he knew where every document was located. Over the years, he had assisted tens thousands of researchers from around the world. When I outlined my goal of writing a book utilizing documents, rather than interviews, John told me that such a publication was necessary. He said that he would help me in every way. (The Los Angeles Times devoted a half page [page 5A main section] and a picture of John in its January 9, 1995 edition.)
John, at our first meeting, telephoned the FBI office and said that he was sending Dr. Anderson over and for them to assist me in every way. They were most co-operative and I searched through many boxes and located all the confessions of the spies who stole the atomic bomb secrets for the communist Soviet Union. With the assistance of an agent, I was also offered a great deal of other formerly secret documents which are also included in the book. John also telephoned Dr. Dean Allard at the United States Navy Operational Archives and asked him to open the files to me. Each time I entered Dr. Allard’s office, he assigned a yeoman to assist me and said that I was to be given whatever I wanted. He also asked the yeoman-librarian to suggest anything that he might believe would be useful to me, because there were no limits. Every military and archival agency has co-operated with me fully because I assured them that my book would not stress a point or belief.
A number of times, whenever a new document was about to be declassified, I would receive a letter or a phone call from Washington, and I would be on the next plane. Over the years, I have searched through thousands of boxes during my one- or two-week stays in the Archives.
WRITING STYLE:
My book is based upon the actual documents, cables, wires, top secret ULTRA and MAGIC dispatches, court testimonies, communiqués, minutes of meetings, Japanese interrogations and intercepts, and battle reports. During my time in the army I had read numerous dispatches and tens of thousands more in the various archives. I decided that my book should reflect the nature and style of those documents.
Scores of dispatches were received by commanders each and every day during the war, and many did not pertain to the activities of the recipient. Many words were capitalized and numbers were used so the reader could instantly determine if the document was directed towards him. If it did not, the recipient would toss it into the trash. (This was the case when the message to R. Adm. Lynde McCormick was trashed on July 28, 1945 [Chapter 13 INDIANAPOLIS].) Throughout the book, I have followed this dispatch-writing style. Every geographical name is capitalized, as are the names of every ship and plane. The directions are noted as N, NE, E, SE, etc., to facilitate rapid reading. The documents, minutes, quotations, and battle reports are unedited, except I have removed a great deal of jargon which might confuse the 21st Century reader.
The prologue is lengthy, but only to reveal to the contemporary reader the pressures which were upon all the leaders of all nations at that time. I have not injected my own conclusions or opinions, but I have detailed all the events as they occurred and were transcribed in the battle reports and various communiqués. The reproduction of these documents in chronological order offers the reader an insight into what all participants knew, what they thought they knew, and what they did not know.
Every chapter covers all the events around the world on that particular day which pertained to the prosecution of the war and the implementation of peace. Chapter 1 begins with July 16, 1945, at the moment the atomic bomb was tested. Chapter 2 details the events of July 17, 1945, and the final chapter (50) reveals the peaceful surrenders on September 3, 1945 throughout the Pacific islands on which 2,500,000 front-line Japanese combat veterans awaited transportation to the Home Islands. There were no more battles, and on some islands, days before, the Japanese soldiers were seen swimming in the surf as they waved to passing American planes
. The Potsdam Conference began on July 17, 1945, and the daily activities of Truman, Churchill, and Stalin are revealed, including the festivities sponsored by each. The Declaration was completed and Japan was warned to surrender. President Truman had already approved the dropping of the atomic bomb, but not before he left Europe. The meetings, minutes, and orders are duplicated in the book.
All the activities of the communist spies are detailed from their confessions, including on what corner or in which restaurant they exchanged the secrets for money.
Colonel Tibbets’ crew was trained for two missions, and their missions are graphically