Posted on 08/03/2005 10:06:42 AM PDT by curtisgardner
> ... sorry about that ...
No apologies necessary.
Search on FR is pretty weak, and even a determined
effort often overlooks prior dupes.
I post dupe notices just to let people see existing
discussions. It's rarely even worth notifying the
mods, although they'll sometimes lock a dupe on
their own.
You make interesting claims. Please provide the data to back them.
And even then Tojo wouldn't have surrendered. He thought if enough Americans could be killed, public opinion in the US would call for an end to the invasion. Had the horrors of Iwo Jima and Okinawa been duplicated a hundred fold, he might have been right.
Little publicized fact: Hiroshima was a military HQ for the island from where forces opposing Operation Olympic would be directed.
Incorrect in every respect.
I am not a fan of Harry Truman, but IMO he made the right decision on this one and millions of Americans, our allies and Japaneses are alive today because of it.
It must be August and time for the annual anti-nuke-nut festival to start ranting about how Japan was/might/could surrender instead of the US dropping the bomb(s).
So, here is my annual answer to those revisionist historians who "know better" than anyone alive at the time.
Since you like historical facts, here is a suggestion for you.
Take a trip to Okinawa and visit Peace Prayer Park.
It's easy to find. It's right next to the Suicide Cliffs just down the road a ways from the Japanese Naval Underground Headquarters.
There you will see the names of 200,656 men women and children inscribed on black marble slabs who died on that tiny island in the last battle of World War II.
Japanese 188,136
From other prefectures (soldiers and civilian employees) 65,908
From Okinawa (soldiers and civilian employees) 28,228
From Okinawa (civilians fighting in battles) 56,861
From Okinawa (non-fighting civilians) 37,139
Americans 12,520
Following the battle there was not one thing on the island growing or man-made that was over 24 inches high. The entire population of the island was 574,368 and there were 4.72 artillery shells fired per person during the battle.
Keep in mind that this is a time when the Japanese had no problem finding enough volunteers for their Kamikaze planes and submarines.
While you are there be sure and view the Naval Underground Headquarters. While there you will see a room into which the high command entered with hand grenades and pulled the pins on themselves rather than surrender. The pock marks remain in the walls from the grenade fragments. Of course, they only go down so far because of the mound of bodies that "protected" the bottom of the wall from getting any fragments. This was only days after the Japanese soldiers there had slit the throats of the babies of civilian employees, who willingly gave their children to the soldiers, to keep them from crying and giving away their position to the Americans.
Be sure to enjoy the crystal clear waters under the Suicide Cliffs. They were not always so clear. In June of 1945 civililians and soldiers alike jumped to their deaths rather than surrender to the Americans. The bodies were so thick in that part of the bay, one could have walked on them.
Then consider that not one but two bombs had to be dropped on the mainland before the Japanese surrendered and how many lost their lives compared to Okinawa, one tiny little island. And all without one American casualty.
Oh! By the way. The civilians who died on Okinawa. They were not a part of any industrial base either. But they fought, and died, just as energetically as their cousins on the main Japanese islands most certainly would have.
Not directed at you. Just jumping in with my take on things.
Pretty good summary. The Army estimated that for Operations Olympic, the invasion of Kyushu, and Coronet, the invasion of Honshu, American and allied casualties ranged from 500,000 to a million killed and wounded. That was why Truman ordered the bombs dropped.
This account is not accurate.
Here are some links that might provide useful background on the decision:
CASUALTY PROJECTIONS FOR THE U.S. INVASIONS OF JAPAN, 1945-1946: PLANNING AND POLICY IMPLICATIONS
http://tigger.uic.edu/~rjensen/invade.htm
Transcript of "OPERATION DOWNFALL [US invasion of Japan]: US PLANS AND JAPANESE COUNTER-MEASURES" lecture by D. M. Giangreco, US Army Command and General Staff College, 16 February 1998
http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/giangrec.htm
(Be advised these are long detailed accounts, written by scholars, and fully footnoted (unlike the article above).)
And here is a good general reference site on the subject:
http://www.ibiblio.org/hyperwar/PTO/FatLady/index.html
A "What a great post" BUMP!
It is sometimes said that Stalin knew more about the atomic bomb through his myriad of spies than Truman did. This is no doubt true. FDR was arrogant on this score in my opinion. In his dying days he could have briefed Truman in on everything, but he didn't, wanting to hold on to power a little longer. It really wasn't fair to Truman.
Not sure if I agree with what you wrote. Much of what I've read lately suggests that FDR may not have been all there during the last campaign, and until he died..We'll never know how lucky we are that the Dem power brokers dumped Wallace from the ticket and replaced him with HST,,
I guess in their minds FDR would never use such a horrific weapon. He probably ordered the thing built as a planter, but the scientists went beyond what he intended.
We are very blessed not to have had Wallace as President. Wallace, as I understand it, was more or less pro-Soviet. He might not have stood up to the Soviets. One must wonder if he would have countenanced aggressive action by CIA against the Soviet threat.
SO says you.
But documents released by the US government has supported the claims that Eisenhower disagreed with the dopping of the bombs. Japan was worried that the Emperer would be tried and executed for the war and was trying to get the US to drop any plans for that.
Check this out:
In fact, none other than Gen. Eisenhower, Gen. Macarthur, Gen. "Hap" Arnold, and Adm. Leahy, Truman's Chief of Staff, among others, thought the war with Japan could have been ended without invading and without dropping the bomb. The following is heavily exerpted from here: (http://www.ncesa.org/html/hiroshima2.html) Eisenhower reported in his 1963 Mandate for Change that he had the following reaction when Secretary of War Stimson informed him the atomic bomb would be used: "During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and secondly because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as measure to save American lives." Eisenhower also said: "Japan was at that very moment seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of "face.". . .It wasn't necessary to hit them with that awful thing." In his memoirs, Leahy said: "The use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. . . . in being the first to use it, we . . . adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages. I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars cannot be won by destroying women and children." Army Air Forces commander, General Henry "Hap" Arnold, in his 1949 Global Mission: "It always appeared to us that atomic bomb or no atomic bomb the Japanese were already on the verge of collapse." For Macarthur, and the opinions of others, see here. (http://www.doug-long.com/quotes.htm) From this site, on Macarthur and the bomb: William Manchester, American Caesar: Douglas MacArthur 1880-1964, pg. 512. Norman Cousins was a consultant to General MacArthur during the American occupation of Japan. Cousins writes of his conversations with MacArthur, "MacArthur's views about the decision to drop the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were starkly different from what the general public supposed." He continues, "When I asked General MacArthur about the decision to drop the bomb, I was surprised to learn he had not even been consulted. What, I asked, would his advice have been? He replied that he saw no military justification for the dropping of the bomb. The war might have ended weeks earlier, he said, if the United States had agreed, as it later did anyway, to the retention of the institution of the emperor." Norman Cousins, The Pathology of Power, pg. 65, 70-71.
So there you go........Incorrect in every respect....hardly.
http://www.doug-long.com/quotes.htm
I think you should read more on this subject.
See this site of quotes by leaders of the era:
http://www.doug-long.com/quotes.htm
My dad was there in the late 40s. I arrived in 1951 and lived there ten years. If you had spent ten minutes in country, you'd have a different opinion.
Wallace was an out and out Communist. I continue to be amazed that he is revered in his home state of Iowa.
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