The most awful responsibility Truman and the secret struggle for control of the Atomic Age

President Truman only received partial and misleading information ahead of the atomic bombing of Japan, according to this sensational account from historian Wellerstein (Restricted Data). Truman believed that the target would be a purely military one, Wellerstein provocatively argues, pointing out that Secretary of War Henry Stimson's notes on his briefings with the president never indicate that he informed Truman civilians would be killed, and that a "sample" bombing announcement given to Truman named "Nagasaki Naval Base" as the target, which he would not have realized was a city. As Wellerstein points out, Nagasaki was not actually being considered at this time--instead, Gen. Leslie Groves was pushing for Kyoto, and Stimson was defending it because he'd honeymooned there. Wellerstein highlights how strange it is that behind-the-scenes wrangling over destroying a major city was happening even as Truman was hearing about a "naval base." Moreover, a journal entry of Truman's from this period unequivocally states that military personnel would be targeted; he continued asserting that no civilians had been killed up until reports of the Hiroshima death toll began to break, Wellerstein notes. Most shockingly, the author posits that Truman was so uninformed that he "almost certainly had no clue that another atomic bomb was about to be dropped." It's a remarkable act of reading between the lines and a dark warning about how decisions unfold in the halls of power. (Dec.)

Many people think that the U.S. decision to use atomic bombs against Japan in 1945 was made by a pro-nuclear President Truman, hoping to persuade the Japanese to surrender to the Allies and end six years of war. But Wellerstein (Restricted Data: The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United States) argues that this was not the case. He carefully details how not only did Truman not decide to use atomic bombs, but he was also very much against the use of such weapons because of the unimaginable consequences for innocent civilians. He hoped that they would never have to be used again. The incorrect but often touted explanation was that the use of the bombs convinced the Japanese to surrender and ended the war. Even Truman would publicly use this moral defense of the atomic bomb, despite believing atomic warfare to be immoral, evil, and contrary to a civilized society. VERDICT This must-read book takes readers on a journey through the use of atomic weapons as it relates to the geopolitical landscape and how the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing shaped current views on atomic weapons and deterrence.--Thomas O'Brien

The buck stopped with him. Wellerstein, a historian of science, writes that President Truman was "the one who made the modern nuclear age, and rooted the personage of the US president at the core of it." When President Roosevelt died in 1945, his successor faced, in his words, the "most awful responsibility a man ever had." Scientists were preparing to test the first atomic weapon--a weapon that Truman knew nothing about. But he would be the one to decide if, when, and where this powerful new weapon might be used. The atomic bombs used on Japan led to unconditional surrender, and the atomic age moved into an arms race. Truman knew the only advantage the U.S. had was "the know-how" of putting the widely known science of nuclear fission "practically to work," but that other nations--of most concern, the Soviet Union--would soon join the nuclear club. Truman wanted to keep the U.S. atomic program in civilian hands and refused repeated military requests to deploy nuclear weapons for possible use in Korea. He saw the atomic bomb in these terms: "It is used to wipe out women and children and unarmed people, and not for military uses. So we have got to treat this differently from rifles and cannon and ordinary things like that." Truman jockeyed Congress, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and his own cabinet into agreeing that the ultimate decision on the use of nuclear weapons by U.S. forces rested with the American president, and that policy remains in place today. Balancing nuances on all sides left Truman with "a complicated legacy," the author concludes: "The sum of his choices might lead one to believe that Truman was the most important anti-nuclear president of the 20th century….[H]e was so plainly human, pulled here and there by the forces of history, by the things he knew and did not know, and by his conscience." A nuanced portrait of a president who shaped the modern nuclear age. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.