Did the Japanese deserve the Atomic Bomb?

[Formerjughead]

Originally Posted by Bob Guercio

I don't agree that they deserved it. Maybe I am naive but I don't believe that too many people on this earth deserve a horrible death.

I can think of quite a few actually

[Za Rodinu]

Somewhere in this thread it was stated that the A-bomb at the time was seen as just another bomb only an especially big one with no stigma was attached, that came later. The Japanese civilians had so much "entitlement" to be bombed, or perhaps even more than say the citizens of Amsterdam or Coventry due to the way industrial production was dispersed along a large number of small, private workshops. In total war you hit the other side's economy and that's what the B-29s were doing. The Japanese weren't doing the same to the American civilians because, well, they didn't have the means to. They had acquired enough practice already in the Asian continent.

[Bob Guercio]

Originally Posted by Za Rodinu

Somewhere in this thread it was stated that the A-bomb at the time was seen as just another bomb only an especially big one with no stigma was attached, that came later. The Japanese civilians had so much "entitlement" to be bombed, or perhaps even more than say the citizens of Amsterdam or Coventry due to the way industrial production was dispersed along a large number of small, private workshops. In total war you hit the other side's economy and that's what the B-29s were doing. The Japanese weren't doing the same to the American civilians because, well, they didn't have the means to. They had acquired enough practice already in the Asian continent.

There is no doubt that anybody who had the atomic bomb would have used it!

[Za Rodinu]

But then supposing the shoe had been on/in/into/over/beside the other foot we would be lamenting the Chinese, Korean, Russian, Taiwanese, Philipine, Indonesian, Myanmarian, Kambodian, Singaporean, British, Australian, NZer, USAer, you-name-it victims of the nuclear holocaust indulged in by the "criminal Japanese".

Oh, and we wouldn't be writing in English (or an approximation thereof), by the way. Thinking again, we wouldn't be lamenting at all!

[Biggles Prime]

I've just been all the way through this topic and have read every post.
One thing that annoys me about some opinions, is that which reflects the Japanese as sinned against, as the victims. The annoyance arises from reading how much a wilful ignorance of the time and the train of events contribute to the formation of such opinions.

Fortunately there were only a couple who held them, so the minority is hardly worthy of continuing mention.

I realise that over 10 months have elapsed since the last post. But having joined your excellent group only around a week ago I was unaware of this discussion until now.

The major reasons for Truman's decision to deploy the nuclear bombs have been covered, but I would like to emphasise one or two points.

Firstly, the mokusatsu episode.

The Japanese language is an exceptionally subtle one and the word can be translated with varying shades of emphasis. The Potsdam Declaration had been published and communicated to Japan on 26th.July. I won't place it all here, it is too long a document. But it is interesting to note that Douglas Fairbanks Jr [the film star] contributed much to the opening phraseology of the Declaration.

The Japanese War Cabinet decided to publish an expurgated version of it and it appeared in newspapers on 28th.Jul. with the news that the government would "mokusatsu" it. This word in Japanese could variously be interpeted as "To shelve it", "to take no notice of", "to ignore by keeping silent", "to treat with silent contempt". The final cabinet release read in part; "The Potsdam Declaration is only an adaptation of the Cairo Declaration and our government will place no importance on it. In short, we will 'mokusatsu' that".

Japanese English language newspapers headlined that Japan would ignore the Declaration. In the USA the ignore was interpreted as rejection and plans went forward for the deployment of Little Boy and Fat Man

Secondly, the seeking of peace by Japan.

It was upon the fall of Singapore [Feb 14th 1942] and very close to the maximum spread of the expanding Japanese Empire that the first suggestions for a negotiated peace was suggested to the Emperor by Marquis Koichi Kido, Lord Keeper of the Privy Seal and supreme confidant of the Emperor. It came to nothing. [Lester Brooks, BEHIND JAPAN'S SURRENDER ch.10].

The first serious suggestions surfaced in May 1944 when a very secret group was set up by the army it was designated G20 and it was charged to investigate the prospects of a negotiated peace. It produced a paper "Measures for Termination of the Greater East Asia War". Upon being consulted about it, Tojo exploded in indignation and shipped the leader of the group, Col.Makoto Matsutani, to the China front, others were arrested and imprisoned or stripped of authority.

Japan attempted several negotiated settlements during and late in the war, mostly through Russia and its Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov. Secretly agreed terms of the Potsdam terms of surrender required Russia to declare war on Japan within months of the Axis defeat in Europe. In addition, the Japanese failed to appreciate the continuing Russian hostility and imperative for revenge over defeat in the 1904-5 Russo-Japanese War that saw the ignominious destruction of its great navy in Tsushima Strait and the invasion by Japan of Siberia at the outbreak of WWl at the behest of the Allies. Molotov personally informed the Japanese

Ambassador in Moscow, Naotake Sato, that Russia declared a state of war between their respectve countries as of midnight 8-9th August 1945. Russian troops by this time had already entered Manchuria. [Herbert Feis, CONTEST OVER JAPAN]

Russia wanted a slice of the action without doing much to earn it. Wouldn't China want a piece of the action if Russia got it so easily? China had a far more legitimate claim.

Japan had a dread of Russian occupation, cognisant as it was of the brutality meted out to the Germans when Russia invaded Germany itself and when Russian armour defeated all before it in dispossessing Japan of Northern China. It preferred by far an occupation by the western Allies.

The Japanese knew that a Russian occupation would be merciless and the War Cabinet always had that threat formost in their considerations. They were only slightly less afraid of an Allied occupation [basically a US one] but nevertheless expected a terrible vengeance to be exacted by them. Surrender to China was out of the question for her vengeance would have been worst of all if indeed the civil war there had not distracted that nation. Japan had no one to whom she could appeal for mediation. She was friendless and isolated and desperate.

Nor did the Allies wish Russia to invade the home islands of Japan. The administrative nightmare of a divided occupation of Berlin and Germany was a significant factor in preventing Russia from another similar occupation. The Allied plans for the rehabilitation of Japan were diametrically opposed to those that could be forseen in any Russian plans. It was a given that the latter would execute the Emperor Hirohito for war crimes.

Thirdly, the prospect of invasion

Japan had prepared well for an Allied invasion of its homeland. It expected it after the Battle of the Marianas [the Marianas Turkey Shoot the Americans called it], and their defeat at Saipan and then Okinawa.
In the home islands, extensive and wide-spread stocks of small and medium arms and ammunition had been stored in secret. In excess of 4000 kamikaze planes were prepared in hidden airfields. Propaganda had ensured that every capable Japanese was to die in defence of their homeland. Estimates of the cost in lives upon an invasion of the islands vary widely but even the most conservative provided a figure close to half a million combined Allied and Japanese killed.

The occupation in this way would have been a tactical and logistical nightmare that could have seen the Allies not only fighting the IJA and every Japanese civilian but perhaps well supplied Russian troops as well. Be assured, Russia was far from an exhausted war-weary nation. Stalin had an almost endless supply of manpower and his factories, moved east away from German reach, were churning out a vast quantity of war materials.

As it was, Russia re-occupied all of Sakhalin and the Kamchatka peninsula [Russian territory anyway] and all the Kurile Islands [mostly Japanese territory]

The situation was coming to the boil and could prove very costly to the Allies if no immediate action was taken. Even after the dropping of the first bomb the Japanese War Cabinet was unbelieving of the power unleashed. There were still hard-line figures arguing for an all out effort in the group and a very real fear among each one of an armed forces rebellion at the very suggestion of a surrender. Home propaganda had left the Japanese incapable of understanding how critical the situation was and how near was utter destruction and utter defeat.

One of the biggest stumbling blocks was the intransigence of the armed forces of Japan. Even after the Hiroshima bomb they fumbled investigations into what sort of bomb it was, physicists were sent to investigate, reports were dilatory and inconclusive. They were not convinced by Allied broadcasts of a nuclear device, an atomic bomb, being dropped on Hiroshima. War Minister, Gen.Korechika Anami and half of the cabinet were insistent on fighting to the death. Principally because the Potsdam terms would not guarantee the life of the Emperor or the national polity.

Eventually and against centuries of tradition, Hirohito himself cast the deciding vote.

JAPAN'S LONGEST DAY written by historians and journalists who lived through the 24 hours prior to the surrender broadcast on 15th August and published by Kodansha International is a chronicle of a nation on the precipice of anarchy and revolution. High government officials and armed services officers were assassinated by fanatical young turks who could not accept the shame of surrender. Assassination attempts were made upon the lives of the emperor's advisors and these young army hot-heads set in motion plans to take over the royal palace.

Several young officers ransacked the studios of NHK from where the the emperor's recording of the surrender speech would be broadcast to the Japanese people. It was touch and go whether the Allies would hear a surrender declaration or a defiant continuance of war declaration.

Biggles, Prime

[spidge]

Welcome Biggles,

I've just been all the way through this topic and have read every post.
One thing that annoys me about some opinions, is that which reflects the Japanese as sinned against, as the victims. The annoyance arises from reading how much a wilful ignorance of the time and the train of events contribute to the formation of such opinions.

Fortunately there were only a couple who held them, so the minority is hardly worthy of continuing mention.

Proves we give "the other" opinion a go here even though those opinions are sometimes formed as you say with the benefit of time.

Some also find it difficult to debate without using the benefit of hindsight.

Cheers

Geoff

[Smudger Jnr]

Biggles,

Hello and welcome to the forum.

A good post and a lively debate ensued from the original question.

Given the high death and injury toll accrued by the American and Allied forces and the fact that the closer to the Japanese Homeland the fighting became worse, it is little wonder that the decision to drop the bomb was made.

Regards
Tom

[Driver-op]

As one of those being trained to take part in the assault on Japan, I was not too bothered about whether the Japs deserved it or not - just pleased it was dropped. The behaviour of the Japs towards their prisoners was unspeakable, unfortunately it reflected on the civilian population and they all got well and truly despised.

Jim

[gliderrider]

Its a basic answer, based on family experiences, and others, but two werent enough.

[Za Rodinu]

First I wasn't aware that the USAAC had nuked Japan to save them from the Reds; secondly, the naval capability in means available to said Reds to perform an invasion in enough scale to overrun Japan seemed to have been lacking.