Overview

• The Daily Signal’s Victor Davis Hanson argued that limited bomb inventories and delivery risks precluded a public test and that the strikes averted a bloody invasion and expanded firebombing campaigns.
• Letters to the Los Angeles Times cited declassified 1990s U.S. files revealing Japan’s extensive Kyushu defenses to question the military necessity of targeting cities.
• Critics invoked Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower’s documented opposition to city bombings, asserting that Japan was ready to surrender without an atomic strike.
• Commentators and readers proposed a demonstration detonation on a remote island as an alternative that might have compelled surrender while sparing civilian lives.
• Eighty-year anniversary ceremonies and shrinking hibakusha numbers have intensified survivor testimony and renewed ethical scrutiny of the wartime decision.