The main alternative to the atomic bombings was invasion; code named Operation Downfall, and continued conventional air attacks. Would these options have been any less destruction and/or resulted in fewer casualties than the two atomic attacks? If course there is no way to fully answer this question but it is possible to conclude that the invasion and total conquest of Japan would not have been a pleasant and bloodless affair. Many estimates of casualties American forces would have suffered have been published with preposterous low figures of 25,000 up to a ridiculously high number of 1,000,000. While the true number probably falls between 150,000 and 250,000, this would all depend on how fanatical the Japanese defense was and on the options to deploy other “special weapons”. Excluding atomic and radiological weapons, the most likely “special weapon” would have been poison gas. President Roosevelt had prohibited the use of poison gas due to the risk of Germany retaliating with gas against the Allies in Europe. With the surrender of Germany on May 8th, 1945, that risk disappeared. The United States had been producing various stockpiles of gas for use in retaliatory strikes should the Axis use it first but now an offensive use of gas was being planned. Bringing back images of the First World War, substances with names of Phosgene, Mustard, and Cyanogen Chloride, were produced and shipped to the Pacific. The U.S. also began shipping gas masks and protective clothing from Europe to the Pacific once the risk of German gas attacks dissipated. MacArthur had the supplies of gas stored in the Pacific shipped to Luzon in preparation for use during Operation Downfall. Even the official planning for the first part of Downfall, Operation Olympic, had sections dealing with offensive and defensive gas attacks.
While the Japanese had issued orders in 1944 NOT to use gas due to fears of American retaliation, the orders for the defense of the Home Islands were calling for “any and all measures” to repel the invaders. The Japanese did have a stockpile of some chemical weapons but how likely the threat was for their use is unknown. The real question on the use of gas during invasion would be casualties. General Marshall advocated the use of gas and President Truman wanted to keep American casualties to a minimum. This set the stage for American invasion forces to eliminate the Japanese defenders with poison gas long before hitting the beaches. Had both sides employed poison gas throughout the Downfall campaign, the battle for Japan would have been eerily reminiscent of the World War I battle of Verdun and would probably surpassed Verdun’s 700,000 casualty figure. If anyone says we should have invaded Japan or just “waited them out” instead of using the atomic bomb, they should consider that another, even more destructive weapon was being prepared for use. A weapon that was available in large quantities and in many ways, far more destructive. As American commanders watched the bodies pile up and casualties mount, it would have become hard to reject the idea of poison gas attacks in order to remove the dug in defenders.
While American troops were battling with Japanese defenders, the XXI Bombing Command under Curtis LeMay’s would have continued incinerating every Japanese city. Many look at the atomic attacks differently and yet they were no more and in some cases, less destructive as a single B-29 fire bombing raid. The famous fire bomb raid on Tokyo killed at least 100,000 people but this number is uncertain and probably low due to the fact so many bodies were burned to ashes. Almost all other Japanese cities received the same treatment resulting in all but five major cities being burned to the ground and hundreds of thousands of deaths and injuries. When looking at areas of Tokyo that had been hit and those of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, it is almost impossible to distinguish one city from the other. The effects of a 350 plane B-29 raid and those of an atomic attack are indistinguishable. The only real difference in atomic bombings is that once the fires of a conventional attack die down, the death and destruction are over.
We should turn this into a moral debate or to revise history. People who try to rewrite the history of the atomic bomb are attempting to apply modern morals and opinions about nuclear weapons to 1945. Until the advent of the ICBM and the ability of push button global destruction, many people, both civilian and military, simply looked on atomic bombs as another weapon in the military’s arsenal. Once the atomic bomb became a political weapon, not a military one, it developed a stigma against it that makes large numbers of people attempt to say that the United States was morally wrong for what happened in August, 1945.
President Truman was given two choices in 1945, to use or not use the atomic bomb. While not using it would likely result in the war continuing and far greater casualties on both sides, using the weapons as soon as possible could bring about a quick end to the war. For Truman the answer was very clear. Today, we look at everything as being “gray”. Perhaps if we stood back in 1945 on Okinawa, looked northward toward Japan, and contemplated what would be waiting for us when we hit the beaches. You could be a mother waiting at home wondering if your son is going to come home from the Pacific or your young child will ever see his father who is serving out there. Knowing that the United States had a way to end the war without needless suffering, it would look to you as a Godsend.
Japan herself was not an innocent victim of unnecessary American aggression or used as a demonstration to impress the Soviets. She had invaded Manchuria in 1931 and then the rest of China in 1937. Her soldiers had committed countless atrocities against the Chinese people and later the Allies. She used Allied prisoners of war in biological weapons experiments at the infamous “Unit 731” in Manchuria. Had the invasion come, the High Command had issued order for all Allied POW’s to be executed. It was well known among the POW’s that the Japanese were preparing to execute them. For them, the atomic bombs were a divine deliverance. Japan waged aggressive, bloody, and murderous war starting in 1931 and it took the power of the United States more than 3½ years to finally end it.
One must also not forget American attitude toward the Japanese. Japan, without a declaration of war, attacked the United States on December 7th, 1941. This created an attitude of resentment and hatred that guaranteed that the war in the Pacific would be a war to the death. Few Americans would have felt sorry for the Japanese if the United States had turned them into radioactive ash.
Finally, while Truman and his advisors were primarily concerned with American casualties, the atomic bombs also prevented an even larger number of casualties among the Japanese themselves. With millions of Japanese on the Home Islands, there can be no doubt that the Japanese would have suffered an almost unimaginable number of dead and wounded. Continual firebomb raids, naval bombardment, and the possible use of chemical weapons all could have pushed the number of Japanese casualties into the millions. It was for more merciful to drop two atomic bombs and kill between 150,000 and 250,000 than to kill millions. If these cities had not been atomic targets, they would have been burned to the ground by LeMay’s Superfortresses probably killing just as many people if not more.
Today many people like looking back on history and trying to second guess and criticize the people. However, I take a conservative approach to history. It is impossible to look at events and decisions through the eyes of those who lived them. None of us can know the fear of American soldiers who were preparing to invade Japan or of the leaders who were preparing to send tens of thousands to their deaths. The Generals and politicians looked on the atomic bombs as simply another weapon with which to win the war. A quote by President Truman on August 10th, 1945 sums up how many people felt in 1945 and in my opinion; we should not question their judgment. “Having found the bomb we have used it. We used it against those who attacked us without warning at Pearl Harbor, against those who have starved and beaten and executed American prisoners of war, against those who have abandoned all pretext of obeying international laws of warfare. We have used it in order to shorten the agony of war, in order to save the lives of thousands and thousands of young Americans.” Winston Churchill said of the atomic bomb, "To avert a vast, indefinite butchery, by a few explosions seemed, after all our perils and toils, a miracle of deliverance."
Sorry everyone for going on so long. This area of WWII has been an area of study for me throughout my college education. So one can probably understand it causes me to get a little passionate. It was the topic of my senior thesis (35 pages) and what I posted was bits of my oral presentation in the same class.
Your long-winded crap ignores the FACTS in my posting...none of which you respond to.