Well, I do have a question for you.
Do you care about Japanese casualties?
As I have said, I have followed this very interesting thread. Your posts in particular, are very intriguing. In one post you indicated that a blockade would not preclude naval and air attacks. Would that not have ultimately caused more death to civilians in the long run? From what I have read, the carpet bombing of Tokyo was devastating.
And would not extending the war in such a manner increased Allied forces deaths as well?
I am not trying to put words in your mouth but I ask one sincere question...is your point of contention that there was more than one way to end the war? No matter how inefficient it may have been?
“Do you care about Japanese casualties?”
Yes I do. I’m arguing that there were other options that would have succeeded in winning the war with Japan. I believe that while the atomic bomb was the best option, it was not the only option.
“Would that not have ultimately caused more death to civilians in the long run?”
Yes, it would have, even with a blockade and with naval and air attacks, the casulty ratio in Japan would not even approach the casulties Japan inflicted on China. The only two belligerants with positive ratios of civilian deaths to combantant deaths were Japan and Germany, which should tell you everything you need to know about the second world war.
“No matter how inefficient it may have been?”
I believe Japan would have surrendered after the winter, probably in February or March of 1946, had the blockade been used. I do not believe that Russia would have had sufficient forces to succeed in a landing in Hokkaido, given logistics and the presence of Japanese forces in China and Korea.