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wellerstein's profile
Alex Wellerstein
Alex Wellerstein
Alex Wellerstein
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@wellerstein

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Alex WellersteinVerified account

@wellerstein

Professor of History of Science/STS at @FollowStevens. Author: RESTRICTED DATA: The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the USA (U. Chicago, 2021). Maker of NUKEMAP.

Hoboken, NJ / NYC adjacent
blog.nuclearsecrecy.com
Joined September 2011

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    Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

    I've posted two (unexpectedly) popular tweetstorms on the Hiroshima and Nagasaki "anniversaries," so let me post one more short one today on an important event that happened 74 years ago today that is generally much lesser known, but JUST as important. THREAD

    5:22 AM - 10 Aug 2019
    • 963 Retweets
    • 1,980 Likes
    • cpb Alyson Miles Mike Adams Mark Jardine Ken Stancil Jr. Sara Border Silvi Krebs Marcel Breton Masked Marie & The Hand Washers
    40 replies 963 retweets 1,980 likes
      1. New conversation
      2. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Hiroshima happened on August 6, 1945. Nagasaki on August 9th. And on August 10th, 1945, General Groves, head of the Manhattan Project, sent President Truman a memo stating that a THIRD attack on Japan could occur in about a week, sooner than had been expected.pic.twitter.com/J45OaWO9Iz

        7 replies 72 retweets 243 likes
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      3. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Contrary to a lot of opinion, the threat to continue using atomic bombs on Japan after Nagasaki wasn't a bluff! The US didn't have another bomb immediately ready to go, but it almost did. And it had a bomb production system that could produce +3 bombs per month.

        1 reply 35 retweets 211 likes
        Show this thread
      4. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Nobody had known, of course, that two bombs might be "enough." Groves himself thought it would take far more — at least 2, maybe 3, maybe 4. The military plan was to just keep rolling them out, and using them as they saw fit.pic.twitter.com/BnVoFtduRE

        2 replies 31 retweets 187 likes
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      5. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Truman, however, wasn't into this at all. His reactions to the atomic bomb were complicated. Initially he was thrilled — he called the atomic bomb "the greatest thing in history" when he first was told of the bombing of Hiroshima.

        2 replies 25 retweets 207 likes
        Show this thread
      6. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        But when (on the morning of August 8th) he got the first casualty reports from Hiroshima, and the first photos of the damage, he got much more sober about it.pic.twitter.com/0isfKz8E7L

        5 replies 36 retweets 265 likes
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      7. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        As I mentioned in my Nagasaki thread, he doesn't seem to have known that the Nagasaki attack was pending — he seems to have thought there was more time between the first and second uses of the bomb. Again, the source of that confusion seems traceable to a telegram at Potsdam:pic.twitter.com/q95cFI6gK0

        2 replies 24 retweets 220 likes
        Show this thread
      8. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Anyway, on August 10th, he was told about this memo from Groves, saying that another bomb would be ready and used soon. His response was immediate: he told Marshall to clamp down on any further use of the bombs.pic.twitter.com/CGFA8SI5Ko

        1 reply 40 retweets 271 likes
        Show this thread
      9. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        "It is not to be released on Japan without express authority from the President" reads Marshall's reply. Groves understood this for what it was: Truman taking strong control of the atomic bomb question, after he had released that control to the military.

        2 replies 30 retweets 273 likes
        Show this thread
      10. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Why'd Truman do this? One reason is that negotiations with Japan were getting delicate — on August 10th, the Japanese sent a conditional surrender agreement to the US. The US rejected this, and insisted on unconditional surrender. The atomic bomb could muck this up.

        2 replies 19 retweets 205 likes
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      11. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        But Truman also told his cabinet it was about avoiding further horror. From the diary of Secretary of Commerce (and former VP) Henry Wallace, Truman wanted to avoid killing "all those kids."pic.twitter.com/fxW4pjue4J

        2 replies 45 retweets 268 likes
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      12. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Does that mean Truman wouldn't have used more bombs had the war continued? Probably not. He told a British ambassador a few days later that he had to order "an atomic bomb to be dropped on Tokyo." But he didn't seem happy about it.pic.twitter.com/zumctlqyrA

        3 replies 26 retweets 188 likes
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      13. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        (Fortunately for everybody, later that day, on August 14, Japan did offer unconditional surrender. It is not clear that Tokyo would have in fact been the target — the military had other ideas. On this, see @GordinMichael's book, "Five Days in August.")https://press.princeton.edu/titles/8237.html …

        6 replies 29 retweets 226 likes
        Show this thread
      14. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        Truman's August 10th order asserted that the President, and only the President, was in charge of future nuclear orders. This became his attitude going forward — mixed with a dread about what atomic bombs are, and what they do.

        3 replies 26 retweets 240 likes
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      15. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        According to postwar Truman, atomic bomb was "the most terrible of all destructive forces for the wholesale slaughter of human beings" (Dec. 1945). It "is used to wipe out women and children and unarmed people." (July 1948). It "murders [civilians] by the wholesale." (1952)

        2 replies 38 retweets 264 likes
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      16. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        His administration codified the Presidential control policy in September 1948 (NSC-30), and it has more or less remained the way things work in the US since. For better and worse.pic.twitter.com/xeWJGplIfS

        3 replies 27 retweets 199 likes
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      17. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        But Truman's taking of the decision to use nuclear weapons away from the military, and his aversion to future use of the atomic bomb (even in non-deterrence situations, like the Korean War), set an important precedent for the nuclear age.

        1 reply 52 retweets 317 likes
        Show this thread
      18. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        It's the wisest thing he did regarding the bomb, in my opinion. It may have saved the world from a lot of harm. And it's something that neither the pro-bomb and anti-bomb crowds tend to give him credit for, because it conflicts with BOTH of their narratives about Truman.

        3 replies 56 retweets 539 likes
        Show this thread
      19. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        We haven't had a nuclear detonation used in war since August 9, 1945. That's not ALL on Truman, of course. But if the US had treated the atomic bomb like the military wanted to in the immediate postwar — a new "toy" for their arsenal — who knows what would have happened.

        5 replies 39 retweets 316 likes
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      20. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        So whatever your thoughts on Truman — whether you think his role in the bombing of Hiroshima was great, justified, horrible, unjustified, etc. — add August 10th, 1945, to your list of "important atomic anniversaries."

        4 replies 31 retweets 334 likes
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      21. Alex Wellerstein‏Verified account @wellerstein 10 Aug 2019

        August 10, 1945, didn't end the threat of nuclear war. It is still with us. It may or may not always be with us — I can't see the future. But it did put us, as a species, on a different path than one might think we were on looking at the actions of the days before.

        13 replies 36 retweets 555 likes
        Show this thread
      22. End of conversation

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