Kyuma: Atomic Bombs Ended World War II

Japan's defense minister said Saturday that the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the United States during World War II was an inevitable way to end the war, drawing criticism from atomic bomb survivors.

"I understand that the bombing ended the war, and I think that it couldn't be helped," Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma said in a speech at a university in Chiba, just east of Tokyo.