This article contains mildOppenheimerspoilers.
Below was a city that had been left relatively untouched by the ravages of the brutal Second World War.
It would be the first nuclear weapon deployed in anger in the history of humanity.
The second came three days later when another A-bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Nagasaki.
Nearly 80 years later, the carnage and horror these weapons inflicted remain infamous.
Thousands more perished from the devastation inflicted by the fireball which followed.
It is estimated the final death toll exceeded 220,000 people.
We only see it from Oppenheimers viewpoint, and how he was initially in lockstep with the military.
To Save Lives?
At the Battle of Saipan in 1944, 3,500 American soldiers died while 30,000 Japanese soldiers were also killed.
And they just didnt die in battle.
This, too, included civilians.
In the aftermath, there was still the invasion of mainland Japan to come.
But by any metric, it would be severe.
The estimates, I think, were 250,000 to a million in a land invasion of Japan.
So these are impossible questions and unanswerable questions.
However, there is a historical debate about whether there were other alternatives considered and dismissed out of hand.
But he did unsuccessfully attempt to sway military thinking behind the scenes.
It never reached Trumans desk though; the Army seized the report and immediately classified it.
This is based largely on the Americans intercepting a Japanese cable to Russia that summer.
Fini Japs when that comes about, Truman wrote.
It should be noted, such thoughts eventually seemed to color Oppenheimers mind.
But in the weeks leading up to the Hiroshima bombing, he began succumbing to regret and self-doubt.
It could become a Frankenstein which eats us up, or it could secure the global peace.
He was an American G.I.
We had had enough.
After the horrors of Hiroshima, Japan did not surrender.
Nor did they surrender a day later when the Russians declared war on Aug. 7.
And even after Nagasaki, half of Japans Supreme Council for the Direction of the War refused to surrender.
As Damon said, these are impossible questions.
Oppenheimeris in theaters now.
