It's not a "conventional" view, per se, but it's been an argument made since 1949, at least. So it's not exactly a new argument.

The best presentation of this argument is in the work of Gar Alperovitz, who wrote about this in the 1980s and mid-1990s. But it goes back to Patrick Blackett's work in the 1940s.

There are lots of problems with this particular interpretation, just as there are lots of problems with the "normal" interpretation, which itself has its own genesis. I've written about how scholars tend to see this today in brief here, and at length here. The short answer is that there were people who saw the bomb as a useful "tool" against the Soviets, but said people also saw it as a useful "tool" against the Japanese (among other motivations). Truman himself was more peripheral to the entire operation, however, than either of these arguments tend to emphasize.

There is some confusion about the argument that I make in "Unconditional." I do not suggest that Truman's motives for dropping the atomic bombs were more about Russia than Japan. I say that Truman's main objective was to obtain Japan's unconditional surrender. Some of Truman's advisors were more concerned about the Soviet Union. That is why they urged the president to change the unconditional surrender policy. They wanted to end the war before the Russians came in. Truman rejected their advice. Marc Gallicchio