The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-1945

by John Toland

The bomb was on Tinian, the orders for its use were cut. Now all that remained was to dispatch the final warning to Japan, the Potsdam Proclamation.c On the day of Churchill’s defeat, President Truman ordered the Office of War Information in Washington to beam the message in the open to Japan. It threatened “the utter devastation of the Japanese homeland” unless Japan surrendered unconditionally, but made no mention of the atomic bomb; nor did it contain the controversial paragraph about retaining the Emperor. It limited Japanese sovereignty to the four main islands, but did promise that the Japanese would not be “enslaved as a race or destroyed as a nation” and would be allowed “to maintain such industries as will sustain her economy” and permitted access to raw materials. Moreover, the occupying forces would be withdrawn as soon as a new order was established and there was convincing proof that Japan’s war-making capabilities were destroyed.