Hiroshima & Nagasaki - A different question

[adios]

Kamakaze's caused total havoc with U.S. forces. Having U.S. ships sit in a blockade would make them sitting ducks. I'm sympathetic to the arguments about Japan's imminent surrender but we also shouldn't lose sight of how the Japaneese conducted the war. A subjective judgement but not that many Japaneese POWs were taken i.e. they fought to the last man alot. No reason for many in the U.S. to think that they wouldn't do the same in an invasion.

[Rick Nebiolo]

Completely eliminating the militarized Japanese government and instituting a more or less Western style democracy was a great achievment. How else would we have gotten GM and Ford to wake up and start producing decent cars built to last without Japanese competition?

~ Rick

[Rick Nebiolo]

Andy,

Two quick comments. I love this forum but I have to remind myself I'm not earning when I surf here [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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Keep in mind that Edward Teller himself thought there was a certain chance of an atomic explosion detroying the earth's atmosphere and killing all life on the planet.

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Wasn't that fear eliminated after the Trinity test (actually of the bomb used on Nagasaki, the Hiroshima bomb was never tested).


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So there was something of a race between Truman and Stalin, the one trying to end the war before the Soviets had any influence in the arena, the other trying to get into the arena before the other ended the war.

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If Stalin's armies entered the Japanese mainland before we did, or if Japan surrendered to them rather than us, do you think Japan would be the prosperous and stable nation it is today?

~ Rick

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[quoteYou can't just stop when the nation hasn't surrendered, then you wont get them to sign a treaty at the end of the war and then everything will go back to the way it was.

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No it wouldn't. Pre-1941 Japan had tremendous abilities in man power and machinery to persue its goals. By 8/45 that was no longer true. How does signing a piece of paper change what a defeted (whether in word or deed) Japan is capable of?

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your right, it wouldnt necasarily go back to the way things were. unfortunatly it would require an indefinate and permanent occupation to prevent it. the soviets didnt drop an atomic bomb on eastern europe to destroy their war making capabilities.....they merely occupied and controlled it for 50 years. we probably could have not dropped the bomb and done something similar in japan.

[lehighguy]

My personal impression, and this is based solely on my time spent in Japan, is that they never would have surrendered unconditionally absent the atom bomb.