FEATURED POST

The Potstdam Conference in midsummer, 1945, led Japan to an infamous decision. Japan failed to agree to the terms of the treaty, which ultimately led to the U.S. decision to drop the Atomic Bombs on Japan. Iriye explains that the U.S. viewed the decision to go atomic as purely strategic.* Even after Japan failed to reach the terms, the U.S. was firm in their belief that the Japanese government should be established by the will of the Japanese people. 

 

What is more striking about the dropping of the bombs was the aftermath. According to Iriye, Japan dealt with the U.S. afterward as if nothing happened.* Obviously this is an exaggerated statement, but considering the end of the war (after the bombings and Japan's surrender) brought a mutual cooperation between the U.S. and Japan, why didn't Japan cooperate in the first place? The bombings, although initiated by the U.S., could have and should have been avoided. Regardless, the significance of the aftermath is that the mutual cooperation between Japan and the U.S. showed that all along, the two nations were better off being dependent on one another than being conflicting rivals.*

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Beyond the aftermath of the war, however, the dropping of the bombs shifted the world and the world's anxieties to an age of uncertainty. A reversion to the past was not even a possibility. As a result, Japan came to accept the U.S. conditions of welfare, prosperity, and domestic peace.* So the new order in Japan was established on stability and dependence and they came to accept and agree with the push for a strong world order. 

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Photo: Low, David. Baby Play with Nice Ball. 9 Aug. 1945.