Historical Context
While I can appreciate that those opposed to nuclear weapons, and the continuing threat they pose to mankind, would regard the bombing of Hiroshima (and Nagasaki three days later) as an act deserving of our condemnation. However, I believe that some historical context is needed with respect to these bombings. World War Two was essentially over in the summer of 1945, but the Japanese would not surrender as a matter of national pride. This led American President Harry Truman to deploy a new weapon, the atomic bomb. Terrible as the bombings were – and of that there is no doubt – they prompted the Japanese to surrender just one week later. As a result, many thousands of lives, Allied as well as Japanese, were saved.
That was but one of a number of very difficult decisions made by Harry Truman, an under-rated President in my view (after reading more than one detailed biography about him). Having become President because of the death of Roosevelt, he was given very little chance of winning on his own merits in the election of 1948. Indeed, there was a famous headline in an early edition of the Chicago Tribune the day after the election proclaiming “Dewey defeats Truman.” One of the toughest challenges Truman faced during his second term was dealing with General Douglas MacArthur, a popular hero of World War Two, who had been made commander of the United Nations forces fighting in Korea. MacArthur became increasingly aggressive in his military efforts and resisted taking directions from the President which led to his dismissal. Truman was quoted (in a 1973 article in Time magazine) as saying “I didn’t fire MacArthur because he was a dumb son of a bitch. He was, but that’s not against the law for generals. I fired him because he disobeyed an order of the President of the United States.”
Truman was no saint, and his political career began in the usual way with the backing of the local political machine – in this case Boss Pendergast who was Chair of the Democratic Party in Jackson County, Missouri, where Truman first sought office. However, by the time Harry became Vice-President he has severed all such ties. It is interesting to look more closely at his time in office and how his behaviour contrasts with the current occupant of the White House. What is most striking is how Truman would never consider taking a penny of taxpayer money for personal use. He even kept stamps in a desk drawer in the Oval Office for use with personal mail. We know of this because of an incident involving Harry’s daughter Margaret and a rather nasty review of her singing by an arts columnist with the New York Times. Indignant, Harry put pen to paper in a missive that concluded along these lines “and if our paths ever cross, you S.O.B, when I finish, you’ll be singing soprano.” His personal stamp was on the envelope, as much reported at the time.
When it was time for Truman to leave the White House (in 1952) he and his wife Bess got into their car and headed off to the house in Missouri that she had inherited from her parents. There was no entourage, there were no secret service agents accompanying them. Their only income after the White House years was a pension that Harry was receiving for his military service in World War One, about $130 a month as I recall. From time to time, Truman was invited to sit on some board, for which he would receive an annual stipend. He always refused, saying “you don’t want me, you want the Office of the President. It’s not for sale.”
What an extraordinary contrast with the current President whose every waking minute is devoted to how he can use the office to improve his standing and his personal wealth. In that regard, it seems appropriate to conclude with one of Harry’s pithier comments: “My choices in life were either to be a piano player in a whore house or a politician. And to tell the truth, there’s hardly any difference!”