This is John Batchelor, a conversation with author Evan Thomas, and this is an excerpt from a two-hour

conversation.

Of his new book, Road to Surrender, three men in the countdown to the end of World War II, the decision to drop the atomic bomb

1945. They had not tested it yet, but Oppenheimer was in the room. The meeting was called the it

but Oppenheimer was in the room. The meeting was called the interim committee.

It consisted of those who were making a decision to go ahead with the bomb.

President Truman was not in the room but its representatives were and it was

blessed by the Secretary of War Mr Stimson attended by Jimmy Burns a man who most close to Harry Truman to inform him about the

distance of the atomic bomb right after FTR's death.

We're looking at a decision that was made with incomplete information, for example

radiation.

Evan Thomas will describe this. I mention it because this is the original use of

retaliation when a nuclear weapon was available right here.

Dealing with a situation in the Middle East right now,

that is extremely, extremely dangerous.

Not only for the Middle East, but for Europe Europe or Asia and the United States.

Does Iran have their weapon?

We don't know. We also don't know what the scale of Israel's response will be,

firing hundreds of projectiles at a civilian population without a declaration of war by Iran.

We don't know.

So here's Evan Thomas on the decision made in 1945 by the interim committee to use a weapon that had never been used,

never tested since before the Trinity test to lie.

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