“It shows just how fanatical elements of the Japanese army were.”
And the fanatical fighting on Okinawa and other islands showed what we (and the Japanese) would have been up against with a land invasion. Lots of lives on both sides were saved.
I wonder how a prolonged war with Japan would have changed history. Would the Russians have invaded and taken over half of Japan? Would they have sat on the sidelines and waited until neither Japan or the USA had much fight left in them and taken on both of us?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NDlUSeeRu0U
Colorized video of the celebrations in San Diego and San Francisco. Thousands in the street, lots of young sailors mugging for the camera.
100% yes the Russians would have invaded Japan (mainland). The Japanese surrender in fact came after Russia declared war on them and invaded their holdings in Manchuria and then the Soviets followed through on plans to invade the Kurile islands (August 18th) after the emperor’s announcement on the 15th. They didn’t draw up and execute the plans in three days.
Read about the Soviet invasion of Manchuria August 9th. They steamrolled the Japanese.
Had Japan fought to the most bitter end, it’s a certainty that Japan would have been divided like postwar Germany. I think it most likely the U.S. wouldn’t have been in Korea at all postwar in the case of a split Japan. No telling what that would have ultimately meant for American involvement in Vietnam, but I have to think it would have made it only less likely.