At Cliopatra, Greg James Robinson raises interesting questions about the morality of the atomic bombing of Nagaski, just three days after the bombing of Hiroshima. But in the comment sections, Allan Allport notes that the opponents of either/both atomic bombings typically offer a false dichotomy.
In their scenarios, the United States has two choices — drop the bombs (which kill hundreds of thousands) or try to wait out the Japanese government and military and hope they come to the table with some sort of surrender (waiting and negotiating, of course, would not involve killing anyone).
But waiting would also have meant death for potentially hundreds of thousands of people. World War II was still raging in much of Asia. Allport cites Robert P. Newman’s book, Truman and the Hiroshima Cult. In that book, Allport notes that the based on casualty rates, 10,000-13,000 people were dying each day in the Pacific Theater, 80 percent of those in Japanese-occupied territories. Every day of delay in ending the war would have added to the horrific death toll exacted by the Japanese military.