Reporting the atomic bombs and VJ Day

In an era before the internet and smartphones the dropping of the atomic bombs and eventual surrender of Japan on VJ Day was reported in more traditional ways. Professor Tim Luckhurst, Principal of our South College, has explored how the popularity of newspapers helped spread these stories to huge audiences, offering images and commentary that radio, the only existing form of broadcast media, could not. The Anglo-American Manhattan Project that built the atomic bomb was a fiercely guarded secret with only a small number of political leaders and scientists knowing about it. When the first bomb hit Hiroshima on 6 August, Britons and Americans reached for their favourite newspapers to read about it, with many reporting that they were stunned by the new technology. The Manchester Guardian's first reports concluded that it was the result of 'Immense co-operative effort by ourselves and US', and The Daily Mail informed readers that Japan faced obliteration by 'the mightiest destructive force the world has ever known - unless she surrenders unconditionally in a few days'. Nobody expected the war to end so soon. On Okinawa, the smallest and least populated of the five main islands of Japan, American forces had lost 10,000 in their campaign to expel the Japanese garrison and it was widely believed the war would carry on much longer if the US and British forces tried continue to conquer Japan in this way.