Writing, Righting, or Wronging the Historical Record: President Truman’s Letter on His Atomic-Bomb Decision

Diplomatic History

Volumn 16, Issue 1, 1992, Pages 163-173

  Bernstein, Barton J ^a  

^a STANFORD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84963071632     PISSN: 01452096     EISSN: 14677709     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-7709.1992.tb00494.x     Document Type: Article

References (51)

1. See, for example, Richard Rhodes, The Making of the Atomic Bomb (New York, 1986).
2. Len Giovannitti and Fred Freed, The Decision to Drop the Bomb (New York, 1965).
3. Merle Miller, Plain Speaking: An Oral Biography of Harry S. Truman (New York, 1973).
4. Barton J. Bernstein, “An Analysis of ‘Two Cultures’: Writing about the Making and the Using of the Atomic Bombs,” Public Historian 12 (Spring 1990): 83-107.
5. Graham Allison, Essence of Decision: Explaining the Cuban Missile Crisis (Boston, 1971).
6. Richard Neustadt, Presidential Politics (New York, 1960).
7. Barton J. Bernstein, “The Cuban Missile Crisis: Trading the Jupiters in Turkey?” Political Science Quarterly 95 (Spring 1980): 97-104.
8. Joseph Bouchard, “Use of Naval Force in Crisis: A Theory of Stratified Crisis Interaction” (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 1988), 610-42.
9. Forresl R. Jehns, “The Cuban Missile Crisis Quarantine,” Naval History 5 (Spring 1991): 12-18.
10. Banon J. Bernstein, “Reconsidering the Cuban Missile Crisis: The Problem of Jupiters in Turkey,” in The Cuban Missile Crisis, ed. James Nathan (forthcoming). Analysis should also consider the implications in the recent admission by Theodore Sorensen that he suppressed, and rewrote, a crucial passage (on the Jupiter deal) in Robert Kennedy’s manuscript of Thirteen Days before its publication. Bruce Allyn, James Blight, and David Welch, eds., Proceedings of the Moscow Conference of the Cuban Missile Crisis, 27-28 January 1989 (xerox of transcript marked December 1989), p. 58.
11. Sorensen to Bernstein, 17 August 1990.
12. For serious doubts about often cited sources (Eisenhower’s A-bomb recollections) see Barton J. Bernstein, “Ike and Hiroshima: Did He Oppose It?” Journal of Strategic Studies 10 (September 1987): 337-89.
13. The literature on the A-bomb decisions is vast, and is critically surveyed and analyzed in Barton J. Bernstein, “The Atomic Bomb and American Foreign Policy, 1941-1945: An Historiographical Controversy,” Peace and Change 2 (Spring 1974): 1-16.
14. J. Samuel Walker, “The Decision to Use the Bomb: A Historiographical Debate,” Diplomatic History 14 (Winter 1990): 97-114.
15. Leslie Groves, John J. McCloy, and Leo Szilard) was the panel session on “Hiroshima and the End of World War II,” at the June 1991 meeting of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations SHAFR
16. Professor James L. Cate to Truman, 6 December 1952, President’s Secretary’s Files (PSF) 112, Harry S. Truman Library, Independence, Missouri. Largely at the behest of Harvard president James Conant, who had also been a World War II A-bomb adviser, former Secretary of War Henry Stimson, with the aid of young McGeorge Bundy and his father (Harvey), had cast what long served as the standard official account, “The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb,” Harper’s 194 (February 1947): 98-108. For Conant’s influence see Conant to Harvey H. Bundy, 23 September 1946, Conant Harvard Presidential Papers, Pusey Library, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts; and Stimson to Felix Frankfurter, 12 December 1946, and Conant to Stimson, 14 December 1946, both in Henry L. Stimson Papers, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut.
17. Cate to Truman, 6 December 1952.
18. Irving Perimeter memorandum to Major General R. B. Landry, 23 December 1952, PSF 112.
19. Memorandum for the president, 30 December 1952, PSF 112.
20. Truman to Cate, 31 December 1952, PSF 112. In 1946, Truman had told press secretary Charles Ross that he had informed Stalin, in Ross’s words, “just as the Potsdam Conference was breaking up … that we had a bomb equal in power to twenty thousand tons of T.N.T.” Ross Diary, 5 September 1946, Ross Papers, Truman Library. American interpreter Charles Bohlen was not present when Truman mentioned the powerful explosive weapon to Stalin. Bohlen to Herbert Feis, 25 January 1960, Feis Papers, Library of Congress, Washington, DC. In 1952 and 1953, Ross’s papers were not easily available to White House aides, and the press secretary had died.
21. Truman to Cate, 31 December 1952.
22. Truman to Cate, 31 December 1952.
23. Kenneth W. Hechler memorandum for David D. Lloyd, 2 January 1953, PSF 112.
24. Kenneth W. Hechler memorandum for David D. Lloyd, 2 January 1953, PSF 112.
25. Hechler memorandum for Lloyd, 2 January 1953. The historian was Rudolph Winnacker, and the 25 July order (General Thomas Handy to General Carl Spaatz) is in PSF 112, among many archival locations, and widely reprinted. See, for example, Harry S. Truman, Memoirs, vol. 1, Year of Decisions (Garden City, 1955), 420-21, but incorrectly dated is 24 July.
26. Wesley F. Craven and James L. Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in World War II (Chicago, 1953), 5: facing 697. The reason for the dating error in Truman’s memoir can probably be explained by the immediate history of this order and the ghostwriters’ confusion about when it was approved in Potsdam and when it was actually issued by General Handy. The order was drafted in Washington and included, without a specific date, as part of a longer cable from Colonel Pasco, secretary of the General Staff, to Terminal, in WAR 37683, 24 July 1945. Replying from Potsdam on 25 July, General Marshall informed General Handy, in VICTORY 281, “S/W [Secretary of War] approves Groves directive.” That directive had been prepared upon the order of Marshall, who had cabled Handy on 22 July, in VICTORY 213, to “prepare a tentative directive to the Secretary of War and me.” All of these documents are in the Harrison-Bundy file 64, Records of the Manhattan Engineer District, Record Group 77, National Archives, Washington, DC. On the background of the 25 July order also see Stimson Diary, 22-25 July 1945.
27. Hechler memorandum for Lloyd, 5 January 1953, PSF 112.
28. Hechler memorandum for Mr. Lloyd, 5 January 1953 (this is a different memorandum from supra), PSF 112.
29. Lloyd memorandum for the president, 6 January 1953, PSF 112.
30. Lloyd memorandum for the president, 6 January 1953, PSF 112.
31. This conclusion is drawn from R. Gordon Ameson oral history (1989), pp. 13-16, Truman Library, and my own examination of the relevant collections (mostly the PSF, Dennison Files, and Elsey Papers), as well as from the ghostwriter files in Post-Presidential (Memoirs) Papers, Truman Library. In the approved air force order, the statement was to use the A-bomb “after about 3 August,” which Groves later explained meant, in official army usage, four days on either side of lhe specified date. Thus, under this order, the weapon, if ready, could have been dropped as early as 30 July 1945 (Pacific time), which generally would have been 29 July (Washington time). At Potsdam, Truman undoubtedly did not understand this, and he seemed to have wanted the weapon used after he left the Poudam conference. This conclusion is based upon an interpretation of Truman’s handwritten note (“Release when ready but not sooner than August 2”) on the back of AGWAR Washington to Tripartite Conference Babelsberg, Germany, 30 July 1945, War 41011, Elsey Papers, and also attached to Ameson oral history. Actually, Truman had been asked to approve release of a statement that would follow the A-bomb attack, but Truman may have meant to imply more than the release of that statement; he may have meant to approve release of the A-bomb on Japan. The technical army meaning of “after about 3 August” is in Leslie Groves, Now It Can Be Told: The Story of the Manhattan Project (New York, 1962), 312.
32. In a 1982 interview, Hechler had no recollection of helping to prepare this reply or any recollection of whether Lloyd might have believed the 250,000 estimate was more reasonable, or whether Lloyd was simply seeking to avoid offending Truman. Lloyd’s statement is in Lloyd memorandum for the president, 6 January 1953.
33. Joint War Plant Committee, 369/1, 15 June 1945, and Joint Staff Planners, 697/2, 9 July 1945, both in file 384 (5-3-44), War Department General Staff, Record Group 319, National Archives; G. A. L. [General George A. Lincoln] memorandum for General Hull, 18 June 1945, Lincoln Papers, United States Military Academy, West Point, New York.
34. Department of State, Foreign Relations of the United States: Berlin (Potsdam) (Washington, 1960), 1:903-10, and unabridged in CCS 381 Japan (6-14- 45), Records of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Record Group 218, National Archives; and William Leahy Diary, 18 June 1945, Leahy Papers, Library of Congress. For interpretations see Barton J. Bernstein, “A Postwar Myth: 500,000 Lives Saved,” Bulletin of Atomic Scientists 42 (June/July 1986): 38-40, which is based on Bernstein’s July 1985 newspaper essay.
35. Rufus Miles, Jr., “Hiroshima: The Strange Myth of Half Million Lives Saved,” International Security 10 (Fall 1985): 121-40, which came to roughly similar conclusions while generally disregarding archival sources and therefore sometimes making dubious assumptions.
36. These archival materials do not seem to be available in any of the Truman Library files, and the matter has been partly double-checked (the 18 June minutes) by the Truman Library staff (Benedict Zobrist to author, 16 April 1986). Miles, “Hiroshima,” 127 n.14, cited these minutes as also being at the Truman Library, but that citation seems to be in error.
37. See, for example, Truman to Roman Bohner, 12 December 1946, PSF 112; transcript of Truman’s news conference, 14 April 1947, in Public Papers of the Presidents: Harry S. Truman, 1947 (Washington, 1963), 381; and speech, 28 October 1948, in Public Papers: Truman, 1948 (Washington, 1964), 859.
38. In a publication in 1952, Truman had also placed General Arnold at such an A-bomb meeting. William Hillman, ed., Mr. President (New York, 1952), 248. For serious doubts that such a large A-bomb session ever occurred, see the following sources: William Leahy Diary, Leahy Papers; Arnold, “Terminal Conference,” Henry Arnold Papers, Library of Congress; Stimson Diary and also “Notes for Diary,” Stimson Papers, Yale University; “W. B. [Walter Brown’s] Notes,” James F. Bymes Papers, Clemson University, Columbia, South Carolina; Truman, “Potsdam Diary” (which may be incomplete), and Lt. William Rigdon, “Log of the President’s Trip to the Berlin Conference,” Truman Library. Also see the published memoirs by Arnold, King, Leahy, Bymes, Stimson. Compare with Truman, Years of Trial and Hope, 415. For other stated doubts about such an A-bomb session see Bernstein, “Ike and Hiroshima,” 378-79 and notes 8-10.
39. Truman to Cate, 12 January 1953 (photostat), in Craven and Cate, eds., The Army Air Forces in World War II 5: between 712 and 713.
40. For Truman, the number of saved American lives may not have gone up to one half million until the second draft, in 1953 or 1954, of his memoirs. For the pattern of casualty- fatality inflation, which in the first draft was written as “our military estimated no less than half a million casualties with at least 300,000 dead,” also see the second and third drafts. Draft #1, p. 429; draft #2, p. 683; draft #3, 804, Post-Presidential (Memoirs) Papers, Truman Library. For most laypeople who easily confuse casualties and fatalities, it was also easy to assume, even if the distinction was pointed out, that the ratio of casualties to fatalities might well be about 2:1, thus seeming to justify the one half million number of estimated dead and drawing upon Stimson’s report and Truman’s 1953 letter to Cate. See Truman, Memoirs, vol. 1, Year of Decisions, 417, for the one half million prediction, as ascribed to Marshall, compare wilh Hillman, ed., Mr. President, 248.
41. Truman, Memoirs, vol. 1, Year of Decisions, 241. Compare with Truman, “Potsdam Diary,” 17-30 July 1945, Truman Library; Stimson Diary, 17 July-10 August 1945.
42. Stimson, “Notes for Diary,” 17-25 July 1945. None of these archival sourccs supports Truman’s statement of an “instruction.”.
43. Farewell address of 15 January 1953, in Public Papers: Truman, 1952-53 (Washington, 1966), 1197. See also Harry S. Truman, Mr. President (New York, 1960), 270. Scholars should be very wary of relying upon Margaret Truman, ed., Where The Buck Stops: The Personal and Private Writings of Harry S. Truman (New York, 1989), esp. 203-6 (on the A-bomb), which first appeared in Parade, 4 December 1988. Margaret Truman has never replied to any one of my six separate letters about the origin of this A-bomb manuscript, and apparently no archivist or historian has been able to track it down. Margaret Truman’s own introductory note to this book unintentionally suggests many questions about the actual authorship of this book’s contents, and the introductory note to the 4 December 1988 Parade article also raises unintended questions. In his lifetime, Harry Truman published “ghosted” memoirs under his own name, and perhaps he was provided with additional “authorship” well after his death.
44. Harry S. Truman, Mr. President (New York, 1960), 270. Scholars should be very wary of relying upon Margaret Truman, ed., Where The Buck Stops: The Personal and Private Writings of Harry S. Truman (New York, 1989), esp. 203-6 (on the A-bomb), which first appeared in Parade, 4 December 1988. Margaret Truman has never replied to any one of my six separate letters about the origin of this A-bomb manuscript, and apparently no archivist or historian has been able to track it down. Margaret Truman’s own introductory note to this book unintentionally suggests many questions about the actual authorship of this book’s contents, and the introductory note to the 4 December 1988 Parade article also raises unintended questions. In his lifetime, Harry Truman published “ghosted” memoirs under his own name, and perhaps he was provided with additional “authorship” well after his death.
45. For a related discussion see Peter Novick, That Noble Dream: The “Objectivity Question” and the American Historical Profession (New York, 1988).
46. Thomas Haskell, “Objectivity Is Not Neutrality: Rhetoric vs. Practice in Peter Novick’s That Noble Dream,” History and Theory 29 (1990): 129-57.
47. The recent “AHR Forum: Peler Novick’s That Noble Dream: The Objectivity Question and the Future of the Historical Profession,” American Historical Review 96 (June 1991): 675-708.
48. For the relationship of “facts,” “evidence,” and knowledge see also Wiebe Bijiker, Thomas P. Hughes, and Trevor Pinch, eds., The Social Construction of Technological Systems (Cambridge, MA, 1987), esp. 9-50.
49. Bruno Latour, Science in Action: How to Follow Scientists and Engineers through Society (Cambridge, MA, 1987).
50. Clifford Geertz, “Thick Description: Toward An Interpretive Theory of Culture,” in The Interpretation of Cultures (New York, 1974), 3-30.
51. Renato Rosaldo, Culture and Truth: The Remaking of Social Analysis (Boston, 1989), 127-43.