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    "title": "Memorandum, \"The Atomic Bomb\"",
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    "ocrText": "- 6 -\nThe committee's work included the drafting of statements issued im-\nmediately after the first bombs were dropped, preparation of a bill for\ndomestic control of atomic energy, and recommendations looking toward in-\nHARRY U.S. ARCHIVES S. SERVICE\" RECORDS NATIONAL TRUMAN AND LIBRARY\nternational control of atomic energy.\nGOVERNMENT\nOn June 1st, this committee recommended that the bomb be used against\nJapan, without specific warning, as soon as possible and against such a tar-\nget as to make its devastating strength clear.\nStimson wrote that an advisory panel of the distinguished atomic phy-\nsicists reported that they could propose no technical demonstration likely\nto bring an end to the war -- \"we see no acceptable alternative to direct\nmilitary use.\" Stimson said that the conclusions of the committee were similar\nto his own although he reached his independently and he felt that to extract\na genuine surrender from the Japanese Emperereand his military advisors there\nmust be administered a tremendous shock which would carry convincing truth of\nour power to destroy the Empire. He felt such an effective shock \"would seve:\nmany times the number of lives, both American and Japanese, that it would\ncost.\" He set forth an argument in support of his opinion which opinion he\nsaid was held not only by himself but by all his senior military advisors.\nIn July, 1945, although Japan had been seriously weakened, he said there\nwas no indication of any weakening in the determination to fight rather than\nto accept unconditional surrender. Estimates of the War Department General\nStaff indicated that the Japanese army had a total strength of about five\nmillion men and there was a warm possibility that the Japanese Government might\ndetermine upon resistance to the end which would face the Allies with the task\nof destroying an armed force of five million men and five thousand suicide air-\ncraft. Plans of the armed forces for the defeat of Japan had been prepared\nwithout reliance upon the atomic bomb. They included an intensified sea and\nair blockade, strategic air bombing through the summer and early fall to be"
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