Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
boston.com
Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
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Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#2> Hasegawa’s ability to read three languages, Bernstein says, gives him a unique advantage over other scholars. Hasegawa spent years working through primary documents, with a deep understanding of linguistic and cultural nuance. His knowledge was especially valuable because historians of the period face such fragmentary and contradictory evidence, in part because the Japanese destroyed many documents.
> But therein lies the weakness of the Hasegawa interpretation as well, Bernstein says. After a long war and in the space of a few days, the Japanese leadership was hit with two extraordinary events - Hiroshima and the Soviet invasion - and sorting out cause and effect, based on incomplete documentation, may prove impossible.
There's something else barely examined in the article as well (beyond 2 sentences). I would imagine that totalitarian governments will behave differently from democratic republics when their own people are dying.
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#3[deleted]
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#4August 6: bombing of Hiroshima
August 7:
1. Japanese nuclear scientists determine that the bomb was indeed nuclear device.
2. Imperial Navy estimates that US has only one or two more bombs and Japan could endure the attacks.
August 9:
1. bombing of Nagasaki
2. USSR declares war to Japan & Manchurian Strategic Offensive started.
3. Hirohito worried because USSR declared war and held an Imperial conference that authorized minister Tōgō to surrender with only one condition: status of the Emperor must be preserved.
August 15: Japan Surrenders
Even after Hirohito made the personal decision to surrender, the intention was to continue the war if the kokutai (Imperial institution and national polity) would not be preserved.
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#5"If killing large numbers of civilians does not have a military impact, then what, Wilson asks, is the purpose of keeping nuclear weapons?"
The writer stupidly jumps from the idea that if nukes have less than a major impact then they have no impact. Does anyone think the UK or USSR would not have surrendered if the Germans had nukes?
If the US had today's nukes on 8 Dec 1941 the war would not have lasted nearly as long. Every island stronghold, port, airfield, city and fleet would have been taken out early. the remnants would have been mopped up by the Marines.
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#6Lol. This topic is just about the most sensitive things I can imagine. The concept that America "won" both the pacific and European wars is an integral part of American identity. Shortly after the war, with the rise of the cold war, US students were brought up on the one narrative. Any suggestion that the Soviets were a driving force in ending the war forces them to confront deeply held beliefs regarding the use of force and violence generally.
Another aspect not covered in the OP is the efficiency of US nukes. Much/most of the damage done was not from the bombs. If you measure damage through the heat energy released, most came from the burning of the cities rather from the fission in the bomb itself. The firebombing of a city releases as much energy as a nuclear explosion, doing a comparable amount of damage. At the time, a firebombing raid required fewer resources than a nuke. So, from an energy standpoint, the nukes were not an economical means of destroying Japanese cities.
Why then were they used? Why were they used in the pacific and not in europe? (Insert massive screaming rants here.)
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#7> Hasegawa’s ability to read three languages, Bernstein says, gives him a unique advantage over other scholars. Hasegawa spent years working through primary documents, with a deep understanding of linguistic and cultural nuance. His knowledge was especially valuable because historians of the period face such fragmentary and contradictory evidence, in part because the Japanese destroyed many documents. > But therein l…
The article also poses the idea that its unlikely that the U.S. would surrender a war after a city was destroyed.
Article also gives the example of UK not giving up after German bombing in WW2.
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#8"If killing large numbers of civilians does not have a military impact, then what, Wilson asks, is the purpose of keeping nuclear weapons?" The writer stupidly jumps from the idea that if nukes have less than a major impact then they have no impact. Does anyone think the UK or USSR would not have surrendered if the Germans had nukes? If the US had today's nukes on 8 Dec 1941 the war would not have lasted nearly as lo…
I don't think the USSR would have even considered surrendering had the Germans had two 15 kiloton nukes and used those against them.
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#9Recommended reading: "Japan's Longest Day", the nonfiction book, not the movie or novel (Review: http://www.warbirdforum.com/end.htm). This was written in the 1980s by a group of Japanese historians who interviewed almost everyone still living who had been directly involved in the decision to end the war.
The key thing to understand is that nobody was firmly in charge. The 6-member Supreme War Council, with representatives of the Army, Navy, and the civilian government was running the war. They had been operating by consensus, despite severe disagreements. The civilian government was much weaker than the military. (This stemmed from the February 26, 1936 attempted coup. Long story there.) The Japanese army and navy never got along. A strong faction in the Army wanted to continue the war to the bitter end. (They tried a coup against the Emperor on August 14, 1945, just before the surrender, captured the Imperial Palace, and almost succeeded.) War Minister Anami (the Army head on the Supreme War Council) said, after the Hiroshima bomb, "I am convinced that the Americans had only one bomb, after all." After the second bomb was dropped, Anami still wanted to fight on, but the Emperor decided otherwise. Anami committed ritual suicide.
It was a close thing. If Anami had supported the coup, or the coup had succeeded in capturing the NHK radio station or the Emperor himself, the war probably would have continued.
Re: Why did Japan surrender? (2011)
#10Lol. This topic is just about the most sensitive things I can imagine. The concept that America "won" both the pacific and European wars is an integral part of American identity. Shortly after the war, with the rise of the cold war, US students were brought up on the one narrative. Any suggestion that the Soviets were a driving force in ending the war forces them to confront deeply held beliefs regarding the use of f…
The trinity test was in july 1945, two months after the surrender of Germany.
We don't know whether atomic bombs would have been used on, say, Berlin or the Ruhr area (maybe even tactically, to speed up the allied advance in the west), but I think the USA would have used one, if only to send a message to the soviets.