Why didn't the USA drop atomic bombs on Germany instead of Japan?

With no navy, no air force, their armies losing in China, their people at home starving to death, American bombers ruling their skies, an effective American sea blockade in place, Russia having just declared war on them, and with martial law imposed, Japan was essentially defeated by August 1945. America had 100% air superiority over Japanese skies and 100% sea superiority in Japanese waters. Japan didn't even have the ability to shoot down the lone bomber that carried the atomic bomb.

No atomic bombs or a costly US invasion was militarily necessary to end WWII. If I was President of the USA I would've waited until Russia declared war on Japan on August 9, 1945 (as part of the promise they made to America). I would've waited to see if Japan would surrender in the wake of this Russian intervention (Note: this is actually what happened, Russia's entry into the Pacific War was what forced Japan to surrender).

I would've waited until Japan believed all hope in China was lost (which was inevitable with the Chinese winning the war and Russia's eventual invasion of Manchuria). I would've waited until the sea blockade forced the majority of the starving Japanese people and the nervous Japanese cabinet to end the war (this is what Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz suggested to Truman, since he knew that with martial law imposed Japan was on the verge of rebellion). I would've given a public message to Japan saying that Emperor Hirohito would not be tried as a war criminal and the imperial family would be saved (this is what Gen.

Douglas MacArthur wanted Truman to do, since he believed Japan only fought on to save the imperial family from post war prosecution). These alternatives were there for Truman to use. It wouldn't of hurt to have tried them, but Truman did not use any of them.

All these possibilities would've saved American lives, saved Japanese lives, given America a good image, and more importantly, ended World War II in a civilized manner. If Truman was serious about saving lives he would've tried those alternatives before resorting to the atomic bomb. It's suspicious that the atomic bombs were dropped on August 6 and August 9 when Truman knew that Russia would declare war on Japan on August 9.

In an interview to "The New York Times" in 1946, Albert Einstein believed that Truman deliberately used atomic bombs to try and end WWII before Russia could get involved. And by looking at those dates, I agree with Einstein. The only possible explanation for Truman to drop the atomic bombs on civilian cities and so close to Russia's intervention is that he wanted to stop Russia.

Truman committed a war crime by using atomic bombs but he was saved from hanging because he was on the winning side. Gen. Curtis LeMay lamented that if the US lost the war he would've been hanged for firebombing Japanese cities such as Tokyo, let alone the atomic bombings.

Leo Szilard and the scientists of the Manhatten Project asked Truman: "if a Nazi had used an atomic bomb on the US, would you have sentenced him to be hanged?" Say, if for whatever reason, atomic bombs just HAD to be used. Why were civilian cities targeted?

There were plenty of Japanese military bases all over the island. Japan's air force no longer existed, America had 100% air superiority and bombing any of these military bases would've been easy. Japan had concentrated all their military in the southern island of Kyushu in anticipation of a US invasion.

Bombing two key military targets in Kyushu could've taken out a chunk of what was left of Japan's military. With Japan's military witnessing the atomic bomb, it would've sent a much stronger message since the reason why Japan didn't surrender due to atomic bombs is because their military never saw it and so tried to downplay it. The decision to skip behind enemy lines to deliberately bomb their innocent civilians is just barbaric and low.

It even puzzled Gen. George Marshall who asked "should we not concentrate on targets that will be of the greatest assistance to an invasion rather than industry, morale, psychology, and the like? About 20,000 Koreans died in Hiroshima.

That is one in seven of the victims. About 3,200 Japanese Americans detained in Hiroshima and Nagasaki were killed. Compare that figure to 2,300 Americans who died in Pearl Harbor.

This means that more American citizens were killed by the atomic bombs than the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Ironic isn't it? How some people can justify the use of atomic bombs is beyond me.

The belief was that an ground invasion of the Japanese Home Islands could have cost between 250,000 and 1,500,000 US troops and over 4 million Japanese, if 75,000 Japanese civilians died in the A-bomb attacks, that was cheap by comparison. Plus Truman was facing a potential steel strike in 1946 that could have crippled American materiel shipping. Additionally, Truman wasn't read in to the Manhattan Project until FDR's death, so he only had a short time to make the decision.

Finally, there WAS no International Criminal Court to try Truman for war crimes, even if ANYONE had been willing to charge him (which no one was) because the ICC grew out of the Nuremberg Tribunals for the Nazi party members.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.