The Most Awful Responsibility: Truman and the Secret Struggle for Control of the Atomic Age

(Hardback)

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A nuclear historian gives a new, surprising account of one of the most controversial actions in historyhow the United States deployed the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War IIand the fallout that continues to haunt us.

In the eight decades since the United States deployed the most destructive weapon ever used, conventional wisdom has held that American leaders were faced with a difficult choice: Invade Japan, which would have cost millions of Japanese and Allied lives in bloody combat, or use the fearsome atom bomb in the hopes of convincing the Japanese emperor to surrender. President Trumanin what many have come to regard as an immoral decisionordered the military to drop the bomb.

Now, historian Alex Wellerstein offers a revisionist narrative of what happened in the spring of 1945, uncovering new research that points to a very different chain of events. Wellerstein reveals a much more complex situation in which American leaders, limited by time, knowledge, and authority, and under great secrecy, each jockeyed to influence if and how the bomb would be used. Refuting previous accounts, Wellerstein explains how there was no official decision to use the bomb, nor did President Truman likely know that Hiroshima or Nagasaki were heavily populated cities. Once the bombs were dropped, Truman began a years-long struggle for control of the awesome power of atomic weapons, the ramifications of which are still felt today.

The Atomic President documents the little-known truth of the circumstances leading to this momentous event, painting a more complete picture of the end of World War II and of Truman himself. It is essential reading for all who want to truly understand not only why the bomb was dropped on Japan, but also why it has not been used since.

Author Bio

Alex Wellerstein is an Associate Professor in the Science and Technology Studies program at the Stevens Institute of Technology. He is the author of Restricted Data: The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United States, and he has written for The New Yorker, Atlantic, Harpers Magazine, and many other venues. He is perhaps best known as the creator of the NUKEMAP, the worlds most popular online nuclear weapons effects simulator. He is also the author of the Doomsday Machines blog, and he has taught at Harvard, MIT, and Georgetown University.