Atomic Bombing Flashcards
WHAT WAS THE POTSDAM DECLARATION?
After the end of the war in Europe, the allies started to focus on the Pacific war to make Japan surrender.
They issued the Potsdam declaration and if Japan didn’t surrender it would face ‘prompt and utter destruction’. The Japanese simply remained silent.
WHAT WAS THE MANHATTAN PROJECT?
Letters were sent by famous physicists, Einstein and Szilard, to Roosevelt concerning their suspects about the Nazi army researching about atomic bombs, they advised him that the U.S should start its own research, Roosevelt agreed. The Manhattan project was a name given to a research program that developed the world’s first atomic bomb.
EXPLAIN THE JAPAN CAMPAIGN.
The Japan Campaign was basically the series of events of how the U.S pushed Japan to accept the Potsdam Declaration. It began with a series of minor air raids by the U.S which developed into major strategic firebombing campaign. In 1944 large numbers of small bombe were dropped. This sudden change caused mass destruction in multiple cities of Japan. Despite the desperate levels of deaths and damage the Japanese army didn’t surrender.
The U.S therefore continued to cause havoc and aimed for the home islands of Japan resulting in 2 major battles. Even after that there was no sign of surrender which made the U.S continue with Operation Downfall, plan to invade Japan.
