Should the United States Bomb Japan?

Harry S. Truman recently was sworn into presidency after Franklin D. Roosevelt's
untimely death. The main question is will the United States bomb Japan? Sources have reported
that Truman was briefed on the Manhattan project recently. The three nuclear bombs being
created in the Manhattan project are ready to be used. Truman has visited the sites of the bombs
and experienced the test of the New Mexico based bomb. The test was a success. The United
States has a very important decision to make.
Harry S. Truman should take the countries opinion into mind before he goes and makes
the wrong decision. Most of the people in the United States want Truman to bomb the Japanese.
He will need to have a successful bombing so the Japanese wont have a retaliation. Harry has
tried to do his best to do what the country wants, but it is very hard to please a nation that is in
war.

Our response from the public was immense. Many people want to end World War II.
This is one of our new Americans that was very impressed by the way Harry S. Truman. He
enjoyed the way we Americans treated immigrants. This is his story.

My husband and I, World War II survivors from Poland, arrived in New York on March
16, 1948, on a dilapidated transport ship. We were taken to the Latham Hotel at 28th Street and
Fifth Avenue. The next morning, my husband, an avid photographer, woke me with a kiss. He
was dressed and off to take pictures. President Truman will be in New York, he said, and I
must take photos. Then he was quickly out the door.

It is my first day in America, I thought. I must see President Truman in person.

Wanting to look elegant, I put on a dress, plus clothes I had picked out from the American Red
Cross in Bremen, Germany: a fur-lined housecoat, high heels and a hat with a long pheasant
feather.

Knowing little English, I asked in the hotel lobby if anyone spoke French or German. A
woman answered in German. She said President Truman would be reviewing the St. Patricks
Day parade, and told me to go to the library on 42nd Street. Negotiating my way through the
crowds, I began to sweat. I became confused: The street was totally empty. So I went around the
barriers and walked freely on Fifth Avenue. Suddenly I heard clop, clop, clop and a stern voice.
Where do you think you are going? It was a police officer on a horse.

I held up my index finger. First day in America, I said. See President Truman. In one
motion, the policeman lifted me up and placed me in front of him on the horse. I was convinced
he was taking me to jail. Soon, from a distance, I saw a huge building with stairs and many men
in black hats. The officer pointed to a reviewing stand and said, President Truman. Then he
deposited me back on the street. Welcome to America, said President Truman.

-Alfons Van Fleewick

 It is nice to see that immigrants accept America for what but there are also bad reviews.
Harry S. Truman was one of the most unpopular presidents. Harry S. Truman was anything but
"profoundly unpopular." The fact that Joe Martin called him "the worst President in history" is to
Truman's credit, for Martin was among our worst Speakers of the House. Some unnamed
"liberals" might have "despaired" of Truman, but their eventual support of Henry Wallace for
President in 1948 was hardly an example of good judgment. Despite the opposition of Wallace
and Strom Thurmond, Truman was elected President that year with 49.5 percent of the total vote,
hardly an index of being profoundly unpopular. We tend to forget that in their first terms
Abraham Lincoln in 1860 received 39.9 percent of the total vote, Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876
having 47.9 percent, Woodrow Wilson in 1912 had 41.8 percent and Richard Nixon in 1968 had
43.4 percent. Grover Cleveland was elected to his second term as President in 1892 with 46
percent of the popular vote.

He had the strength of will to order atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1945 at the very
time that many of us were preparing to participate in the invasion of those islands. He had the
guts to cashier a popular but insubordinate general officer who complicated our position in
Korea; he was the power behind the Marshall Plan and an early recognizer of Israel; and he did
stand up for his daughter, as all fathers should! Sure, Truman was feisty and not infrequently
made poor or hasty judgments. But he was a President for his time, honest and forthright, well
loved and respected. His unpopularity among some American citizens was surely no greater than
that endured by most other national heroes during their own lifetimes. America needs to stand
behind their president and have courage in him.

-Chase Cross