Japanese Prime Minister Suzuki reported to the Japanese government that the entry of the Soviet Union into the war "makes the continuance of the war impossible."
Emperor Hirohito called the Supreme Council together and tried to make the military leaders accept the proposed surrender. At about 0300 hours, the meeting breaks up with nothing decided other than a cautious sounding of the possibilities of peace through Sweden and Switzerland.
The next atomic mission took off 47 minutes later, with none of this known, of course, to the Allies.
0347: The B-29 Superfortress Bockscar took off from Tinian with the plutonium bomb Fat Man aboard, for the target city of of Kokura.
The plane's crew for the mission was the one normally assigned to The Great Artiste, which was being flown by the crew normally assigned to Bockscar. Major Charles W. Sweeney piloted the plane, being the only pilot to fly in both atomic missions. The planes themselves had multiple crews.
The plane was named for Fred Bock, the pilot, on this mission, of The Great Artiste.
Sweeney later wrote a controversial account of both missions, which was contested by other participants.
0351 and 0353: Great Artiste and Big Stink lift off from Tinian. The Enola Gay, as a weather spotting plane, and Laggin’ Dragon were already airborne. The Enola Gay was not crewed by the crew that had flown on the Hiroshima mission.
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0400: Fred Ashworth armed the Fat Man atomic bomb.
1044 Bockscar arrived at Kokura, but haze obscured the target and made it too difficult to locate the drop point.
1132: Sweeney made the decision to turn for the secondary target, Nagasaki, 95 miles south of Kokura.
1158: Upon arrival over Nagasaki, cloud cover allowed for only one drop point, several miles from the intended target. Bombardier Kermit Beahan releases the Fat Man atomic bomb on that point. The dropping expended the last of the US's nuclear arsenal at the time.
1202 (11:02am in Nagasaki) Fat Man explodes 1,650 feet above the city, killing between 40,000 and 75,000 people. The geography of Nagasaki prevented the blast from being as deadly as it had been at Hiroshima.
2230: All aircraft returned to Tinian.
The Soviet Union invaded Manchuria.
Mongolia declared war on Japan.
Chinese paratroopers are dropped on the Canton-Hankow rail line.
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