– News reports – NBC/CBS – August 10, 1945 – Gordon Skene Sound Collection –
News for this August 10th, 70 years ago was full of anticipation mixed with caution. Shortly after reports of the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb attack surfaced, and after President Truman went to address the nation on the status of the war, word came from Tokyo Radio that Japan had accepted, at least in principle, the terms laid down during the Potsdam Conference earlier in the year.
The sticking point was Japan’s retaining of The Emperor as ruling head of Japan. And despite there being no mention of The Emperor in the Potsdam ultimatum, the Allies reiterated the surrender terms were unconditional.
And so the diplomatic wrangling went on. And news of the end of World War 2 was tempered, at least for a while.
Meanwhile, Russia was wasting no time jumping into the Pacific War. With major advances throughout China and as far south as Korea, and occupying Formosa and Sakhalin Island.
And so reports on this August 10th in 1945 about the anticipated surrender of Japan and the official end of World War 2 had many excited, it also had some concerned over the future – we were on a war footing for so long, how were we going to act to a world in peace? For a while, we forgot about the devastating new weapon we had, and that the latest bomb destroyed most of Nagasaki, leaving some 70,000 dead and disintegrated in its wake. Those were all questions waiting to be asked.
On this day, everyone just wanted it to be over. Here are several news reports, given throughout the day of August 10, 1945 by NBC Radio and CBS Radio.
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