Today marked the 77th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Eisenhower in his memoirs said he told Truman “I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary." Even MacArthur and complete hawk Curtis LeMay thought it totally unnecessary to deploy the bomb.
Truman chose to drop the bomb because with Soviets entry in Japanese theater it would've allowed Japan to sign Potsdam Treaty to Russia in a conditional surrender. He chose to deploy USAF Enola Gay drop 'Little Boy' August 6, 1945 on Hiroshima, vaporizing 80K people, 130K others eventually. 3 days later the dropped 'Fat Man' killing another 75K. They continued conventional bombs throughout Japan until 8/15/45 when Japan surrendered. 77 years ago today.