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SafeSurfer

[Deleted User] wrote: »

It's a partial truth. The need for a superweapon to counter the power of the Soviet Union, so there was a desire to see it in action, due to the political ramifications of having such a weapon.



An actual invasion, followed up by a campaign across the whole of Japan, would have cost more lives overall, because the bombing of the cities wouldn't have stopped while the beach head was expanding. However, the long term effects of the Atomic bomb were likely a stronger consequence than an invasion would have been.

Still, in terms of actual deaths, an invasion along with the continued bombing, would have caused more deaths... on both sides.



True enough, although US intelligence placed greater emphasis on the desire by civilians to fight, which they found after the war to have been misplaced. All the same, there would have been significant resistance and it would have continued long into the occupation.

The dropping of the bomb changed warfare. The rules and expectations regarding what came after also changed.

I honestly doubt we would have seen the Japan that exists today if it had lost to a completely conventional war. The Atomic bomb shattered their philosophy on warfare to an extent that it's only now starting to recover.. whereas a conventional war, the outcomes were known, and the losses (regardless of how bad) could have been dismissed, and we likely would have seen a militant Japan in the 60s/70s..

I think the modern view that the Atomic bomb was dropped on 2 Japanese cities as a show of strength to the Soviet Union is a revisionist misconception.
The bombs were dropped to persuade the Japanese to surrender and thus avoid the necessity of a ground invasion.

US intelligence had hugely underestimated the number of troops that had been mobilised for the defence of the island of Kyushu, the location for the planned US landing which was to take place on November 1st. US forces demobilised almost 800,000 Japanese troops in the island after the surrender. Twice what was expected.


I don’t understand why you think that Japan could more easily have returned to militarism in the 60s if they had been defeated by conventional means as a result of an invasion. This wasn’t the experience in Germany.
There would have been an occupation post capitulation however it came about.
Mc Arthur was skilful in directing the anger of the Japanese people away from US occupying forces and towards the Japanese militarism which had brought them to defeat.

SafeSurfer

SafeSurfer wrote: »

I think the modern view that the Atomic bomb was dropped on 2 Japanese cities as a show of strength to the Soviet Union is a revisionist misconception.
The bombs were dropped to persuade the Japanese to surrender and thus avoid the necessity of a ground invasion.

Nothing is simple when war and diplomacy meet. It's not revisionism, but simple common sense. The bombs were dropped at 6 and 9 August 1945. By the end of the European war, the Soviet Union had shown itself capable of dominating the Eastern front, essentially breaking the Wehrmacht, taking huge areas of territory and that struck fear into the Allied command. A message was needed, and the atomic bombs did that wonderfully.

Stalin wasn't particularly afraid of Allied forces immediately following WW2, and it was only "the bomb" that made him hesitate considering the range of forces he could have committed for a thrust into Europe.

I don’t understand why you think that Japan could more easily have returned to militarism in the 60s if they had been defeated by conventional means as a result of an invasion. This wasn’t the experience in Germany.

You can't compare postwar Germany and Japan. Entirely different situations, and also completely different cultures. Still.. we're going way off topic here, so I'll leave it at that.