The plan to invade Japan
Bck2DFtr
like to know what the Allies planned to do had the Atomic bombs not been
dropped...such as what beaches were to be used as a landing spot, nations
involved, troop numbers, etc. Any help would be greatful. Thanks.
John Yates
to participate in such an invasion. One of the Veterans had obtained
the battle plan for the invasion (it apparently was secret until the
60s) and had it with him. If you have trouble through other sources, I
can try to track him down through the Division Association, but since
I don't know his name, etc. I hope you have another source. But a plan
does exist. I saw it.
Bck2DFtr wrote in message <19990325215624...@ng144.aol.com>...
lwin
> like to know what the Allies planned to do had the Atomic bombs not been
> dropped...such as what beaches were to be used as a landing spot, nations
> involved, troop numbers, etc. Any help would be greatful. Thanks.
I don't know the details, but the Allies staffs were hard at work on
all these details. Remember, virtually everyone involved had no idea
of the existence of the bomb and assumed the invasion would be necessary.
Once the atomic bomb ended the war the invasion plans were shelved and
gladly forgotten. But they were detailed plans, many men knew they'd
be in the first wave where pretty much everyone were expected to be wiped
out.
Per Stephen Ambrose ("Americans at War"): [paraphrased]
Col. Goodpaster, one of the officers working on casualty estimates, took the
number of Japanese troops on Okinawa and compared it to the number defending
Japan's home islands, calculated how many Americans were killed, took into
consideration home advantage and concluded 20 times that of Okinawa, a
half a million.
Good paster assumed the Americans would not want to assume the cost of
occupation that would require 2 million men, and like in Germany, Japan
would be split. The Soviet Union would have had 1/4 of Japan.
The atmosphere in 1945 was not good. Life was cheap. Japanese troops,
underfed and poorly armed, would fight until they had no more food or
ammunition. Then they would fight with bayonets or swords, then with
their teeth. In the whole Pacific war, the largest number of Japanese
POWs held by Americans was 5,000. (The US held 350,000 Germans).
American POWs in Japanese hands suffered a 27% death rate compared to
4% in German camps.
Jeff Joyce
published in 1995 by Simon & Schuster. It covers in detail planning for the
invasion of Japan and the different tactics/weapons being considered
(including atomic bombs and gas weapons).
Jeff
Bck2DFtr wrote in message <19990325215624...@ng144.aol.com>...
>I was just wondering if there was any information on this subject...
Wjho...@aol.com
bck2...@aol.com (Bck2DFtr) writes:
>I was just wondering if there was any information on this subject.
>I would like to know what the Allies planned to do had the Atomic
>bombs not been dropped...such as what beaches were to be used
>as a landing spot, nations involved, troop numbers, etc. Any help
>would be greatful. Thanks.
There were several good articles on this subject. One I have, "An Invasion
Not Found in the History Books," was originally published in a magazine called
"The Midlands" in 1987, written by James Martin Davis, an Omaha attorney whom
the magazine credited as being a military historian. Another article covering
the subject was written by a former U.S. Army officer named J.A.Harrison, who,
after the surrender, inspected the proposed landing sites in Japan and spoke
with officers of the Japanese 16th Area Army who would have been responsible
for the defense of Kyushu.
In essence, both articles indicate that had the A-bomb not ended the war, the
U.S. invasion plan called for two amphibious assaults, one against southern
Kyushu (Operation Olympic) to take place in November 1945 and the other
(Operaton Coronet) against the Kanto plain north of Tokyo in March of 1946.
Both operations would have involved huge numbers of men with an estimate that
the war could have lasted for two more years. Estimates of casualties, since
minimized by revisionists who say the Bomb wasn't necessary, extended to as
many as 1,000,000 American men, not to mention the casualties among the
Japanese armed forces as well as among the estimated 28,000,000 Japanese in
the population who were organized into the National Volunteer Defense Force
and armed with whatever they could find, from ancient firearms to bamboo
spears.
Of the present-day revisionists who claim the Bomb was unnecessary, Harrison
quotes the following: "He jests at scars who never felt a wound."
W.J.Hopwood
John Lansford
>I was just wondering if there was any information on this subject. I would
>like to know what the Allies planned to do had the Atomic bombs not been
>dropped...such as what beaches were to be used as a landing spot, nations
>involved, troop numbers, etc. Any help would be greatful. Thanks.
Go read "The Invasion of Japan: Alternative to the Bomb". The author
researched the US documents related to the planning for the invasions
and the book is very thorough. Everything you are interested in is
covered within it.
John Lansford
The unofficial I-26 Construction Webpage:
http://users.vnet.net/lansford/a10/
Michael
Code name Downfall: The secret plan to Invade Japan- and Why Truman Dropped
the Bomb
by Thomas B. Allen and Norman Polmar
I got my copy from Amazon.com
I was struck by the complexity of the proposed invasion, not to mention the
size of it.
I was also surprised to the extent we has stockpiled chemical and germ weapons
just in case. I wonder if, in our effort to invade and keep our death rate as
low as possible, some general would have felt justified in using them. That
decision would not have gone to Truman like the A-bomb did.
Might re-read it again.
My $0.02 worth.
Michael
Bck2DFtr wrote:
> I was just wondering if there was any information on this subject. I would
> like to know what the Allies planned to do had the Atomic bombs not been
> dropped...such as what beaches were to be used as a landing spot, nations
> involved, troop numbers, etc. Any help would be greatful. Thanks.
>
--
Michael Oswalt <sier...@eskimo.com>
lwin
> including the writer who explained very carefully that the
> casualties would only have been in the neighborhood of 25,000.
To me, 25,000 sounds like an awful lot of telegrams to send out to
mothers and husbands of those lost in action, when there was an
alternative.
mfester
: > minimized by revisionists who say the Bomb wasn't necessary, extended to as
: > many as 1,000,000 American men, not to mention the casualties among the
: Apparently this is an after-the-fact estimate pulled together by
: politicians justifying their decision to drop the Bomb. At least
: your source said casualties, not dead, as is sometimes the case.
In Bruce Lee's _Marching Orders_ is a copy of a memo within the government
discussing the possibility of "the expenditure of 500,000 to 1,000,000
American lives" is mentioned in a memorandum dated June 9 from President
Truman. It's on page 568.
While I personally do not believe the casualties would have approached
that (at least, the dead), it is certainly NOT "after-the-fact estimate.
No doubt they never arrived at a clear estimate, but 1,000,000 did make
its way to the president.
: But I got the most value out of the Anti essays,
: including the writer who explained very carefully that the
: casualties would only have been in the neighborhood of 25,000.
You'll have to pardon me, but I would frankly laugh in the face of
someone who would claim there would be FEWER casualties for an
invasion of Kyushu than there were for the Okinawa invasion.
Just my peculiar sense of humor, I suppose...
Mike (remove "@eyrie.org" to reply)
casita
>politicians justifying their decision to drop the Bomb.
B-29's and Lancasters would have bombed Japan back to the Stone Age with
prosaic methods.
The Reds could have done a lot of the bleeding for The President and WSC,
just as they had in Europe.
Would The President(s) have nuked Germans if The Bomb had been ready sooner,
or if the war had dragged on longer?
Ike said that some believed D-Day to V-Day was going to take years.
Roger Basford
<bck2...@aol.com> writes
>I was just wondering if there was any information on this subject. I would
>like to know what the Allies planned to do had the Atomic bombs not been
>dropped...such as what beaches were to be used as a landing spot, nations
>involved, troop numbers, etc. Any help would be greatful. Thanks.
You could start with "Codename Downfall" by Thomas B. Allen & Norman
Polmar, ISBN 0 7472 5152 5, published in 1995. This contains a lot of
material not available until recently and includes details of proposed
poison gas attacks on the Japanese mainland.
Roger Basford
df
> think.
The book is "The Invasion of Japan: Alternative to the Bomb." The
author is John Ray Skates, and the price at Amazon is $19.57.
Here's a link:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0872499723/danford
Excellent.
= Dan Ford
JCDrews
discussing USN cloning of the V-1 "Buzz Bomb" for launching from USN
subs, mentioned an ACTIVE plan to round up dozens of leftover German
V-2's, assembling some from parts found in underground factories and
duplicating other parts in US and Germany plants, for the purposes of
launchjing them from the decks of ships against Japan. Anybody else
know of this? Apparently several V-1's were actually launched by the
USN, Stateside, in summer of 1945... The major change in the design was
a new more powerful warhead and subsitution of US radio components..
Mike Fester
: >Apparently this is an after-the-fact estimate pulled together by
: >politicians justifying their decision to drop the Bomb.
: B-29's and Lancasters would have bombed Japan back to the Stone Age with
: prosaic methods.
In point of fact, Mr Casita, no nation has been bombed back to the Stone
Age with bombing.
Certainly, Germany did not fall into the Stone under attacks from Lancasters,
B-17s, B-24s, etc., nor did Japan from B-29s, nor North Vietnam with more
explosive tonnage dropped on it than were dropped in all of WWII.
Jon Cohen
OLYMPIC VS KETSU-GO
Marine Corps Gazette, August 1965, Vol. 49, No. 8.
Dr. K. Jack Bauer describes the United States' plans to assault Kyushu in
the fall of 1945, a preliminary to the more massive invasion of Honshu.
Dr. Alan C. Coox authored the italicized portion of the following article,
an account of the Japanese plan to defend Kyushu.
http://www.metalab.unc.edu/pha/war.term/olympic.html
--
______________________________________________
Jon
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Wjho...@aol.com
<d...@christa.unh.edu> writes:
(Re estimated 1,000,000 U.S. casualties if Japan invaded)
>Apparently this is an after-the-fact estimate pulled together by
>politicians justifying their decision to drop the Bomb.
[snip] I got the most value out of the Anti essays,
>including the writer who explained very carefully that the
>casualties would only have been in the neighborhood of 25,000.
>That's about two divisions.
The claim that the 1,000,000 figure was an "after-the-fact estimate...by
politicians justifying their decision," seems quite in line with the views
expressed by the perennial Hiroshima cultists who surface every August and
attract media attention by offering minimal death and casualty invasion
estimates while bashing the U.S. for its "immoral" use of the A-Bombs against
Japan. That such men as Truman and his closest advisors should now be rather
cavalierly accused of later making up inflated casualty estimates to justify
their wartime concurrence in the use of the Bombs is a regrettable way to
promote the present-day ideological agenda of those who were never faced with
the possibility of being potential invasion casualties themselves.
Most of the minimal death and casualty estimates of these Anti-Bomb essayists
have been rather thoroughly discredited in the writings of several noted
historians, among them Donald Kagan, professor of history at Yale in an
article for Commentary Magazine's September 1995 issue; Truman biographer
David McCullough; and Professor Robert P. Newman, author of "Truman and the
Hiroshima Cult"-- (Michigan State University Press--1995)
McCullough notes that estimated invasion losses were given maximum
consideration by Truman's military advisers, with the record of battle
casualties at Okinawa fresh in mind. Their reluctant conclusion: "whatever
the projected toll in American lives in an invasion, it was too high if it
could be avoided." Kagan points out that Truman, in his memoirs, wrote that
an invasion of the Japanese home islands would have entailed the loss of as
much as 500,000 lives not to mention those wounded, and also notes that in
their own respective memoirs Secretary of War Stimson and Secretary of State
Byrnes had both considered 1,000,000 casualties possible--all of these
estimates having been arrived at prior to use of the Bombs, not after.
Professor Newman quotes W.B.Shockley, an expert consultant in SecWar Stimson's
office, as reporting on July 21, 1945 that in an invasion of Japan "....we
shall have to kill at least 5 to 10 million Japanese. This might cost (the
U.S.) between 1.7 and 4 million casualties including 400,000 to 800,000
killed." Newman also quotes Truman's statement in a letter to James L. Cate
dated January 12, 1953 that General Marshall had told him "that such an
invasion would cost at a minimum one quarter of a million casualties, and
might cost as much as a million, on the American side, with an equal number of
the enemy."
No doubt the debate about potential invasion losses will continue, with the
"second-guessers" leading the way. What seems most important, however, is the
judgement of those faced with the decision at the time on the basis of the
knowledge then available to them. On that score, the saving of American lives
far outweighed the balance-sheet mentality which now seems to obsess the
present anti-bomb cultists, and rightfully so.
W.J.Hopwood
John Lansford
>In Bruce Lee's _Marching Orders_ is a copy of a memo within the government
>discussing the possibility of "the expenditure of 500,000 to 1,000,000
>American lives" is mentioned in a memorandum dated June 9 from President
>Truman. It's on page 568.
"The Invasion of Japan" by Starks points out that the "million
casualty" estimate was never arrived at by anyone but Stilwell. The
planners for the invasions estimated that somewhere between 175,000
and 300,000 casualties could be expected for the first invasion, less
for the second one.
>While I personally do not believe the casualties would have approached
>that (at least, the dead), it is certainly NOT "after-the-fact estimate.
>No doubt they never arrived at a clear estimate, but 1,000,000 did make
>its way to the president.
Probably from Stilwell, who was against an invasion of Japan and made
up that number in his memoirs. There was no basis in the planning for
such a high number of casualties.
John Lansford
>>Apparently this is an after-the-fact estimate pulled together by
>>politicians justifying their decision to drop the Bomb.
>
>B-29's and Lancasters would have bombed Japan back to the Stone Age with
>prosaic methods.
The Japanese were still fighting back even after their industrial
areas were ashes.
>The Reds could have done a lot of the bleeding for The President and WSC,
>just as they had in Europe.
They would have retaken Manchuria, but little else. Or do you think
they could walk on water?
>Would The President(s) have nuked Germans if The Bomb had been ready sooner,
>or if the war had dragged on longer?
If the Normandy landing had failed, or the invasion bottled up in the
bocage, yes, I believe we would have nuked Berlin. Once we liberated
France there wasn't really any need; the collapse of Germany was
assured.
>Ike said that some believed D-Day to V-Day was going to take years.
I'm sure there were "some" who believed all sorts of things. What is
known, however, is that an invasion of Japan was decreed to take place
no later than a year after Germany surrendered. It was this timeline
that drove the need to plan for the invasions.
George Hardy
<7dlva4$1684$1...@nntp6.u.washington.edu> <7dn2hc$1486$1...@nntp6.u.washington.edu>
Organization: Club of Anchor Friends
X-Newsreader: WinVN 0.90.4
It is my opinion that the USA would never have invaded Japan. The
USSR had occupied all of the Sakhalin Peninsula on August 25. They
were ready to invade Hokkaido during the first week of September. We
were still at least a month away from an invasion. Even the surrender
did not deter the Russians. They were "warned off" by Truman. I read
the warning as a threat of war. Others do not. Still the instruction
to back off was clear and firm. From that point, one can date the
beginning of the Cold War, IMHO.
GFH
***************************************************************
http://www.ankerstein.org/
The Anchor Stone Building Set (Anker-Steinbaukasten) Home Page
See what makes me tick.
***************************************************************
Al Kirke
goes
into the staff meetings of the Navy and Army, and the positions taken. The
material
he quotes says that none of the Navy command expected the Japanese home islands
to be invaded, but that planning did proceed ... on the basis that invasion,
however
unlikely, couldn't be an option unless the planning proceded. One quote from a
carrier group commander during the last months of the war was that his aircraft
couldn't find anything in Japan to blow up that was worth more than the cost
of the fuel oil his ships were burning.
Cheers,
Al
George Hardy wrote:
> References: <7dj013$f...@dgs.dgsys.com>
> <7dlva4$1684$1...@nntp6.u.washington.edu> <7dn2hc$1486$1...@nntp6.u.washington.edu>
Drazen Kramaric
wrote:
>If the Normandy landing had failed, or the invasion bottled up in the
>bocage, yes, I believe we would have nuked Berlin.
I think there would be no nuking of Berlin. Berlin was a site of
German government. Who would sign the surrender document if Hitler and
the rest of German leadership have been evaporated? These reasons
guided Americans not to nuke Tokyo.
Instead of Berlin, I would rather expect nuking of Dresden or
Muenchen. Both cities were big and relatively undamaged by
conventional bombing.
Drax
for reply, delete NOSPAM from my e-mail address
lwin
> carrier group commander during the last months of the war was that his aircraft
> couldn't find anything in Japan to blow up that was worth more than the cost
> of the fuel oil his ships were burning.
IMHO, Alperovitz takes very minor so-called "quotes" out of context and
attaches greater importantance to them than they really have. Was this
quote official US policy or just someone's random's thoughts?
But, even if correct, it is totally irrelevent. The viewpoint of the
US Navy or Army was irrelevent. It was the viewpoint of the Japanese
command that mattered, and they had absolutely no intention of surrending
if it meant giving up their land grabs in Asia or submitting to war
crimes trials.
Georg Schwarz
> They would have retaken Manchuria, but little else. Or do you think
> they could walk on water?
no, but surely they did have ships. How do you think they occupied the
souther Kurilian islands? AFAIK they were about to (or already
attempting to?) invade Hokkaido in the closing days of WW II.
--
Georg Schwarz sch...@physik.tu-berlin.de, ku...@cs.tu-berlin.de
Institut fur Theoretische Physik +49 30 314-24254, FAX -21130
Technische Universitat Berlin http://home.pages.de/~schwarz/
casita
>If the Normandy landing had failed, or the invasion bottled up in the
>France there wasn't really any need; the collapse of Germany was
>assured.
I maintain that had Harris wanted to simply kill Germans he would have
pushed WSC for permission to drench the cities of the Ruhr with poison gas.
This would have caused no factory damage vs high personal injury. We had
a 20:1 gas advantage over Hitler. And WSC's patience was worn very thin by
the V-rockets.
And, to Harris's credit, he never did. When you look at the property
damage vs personal injury in Germany, it's very dramatic:
7,500,000 Germans were de-housed vs 305,000 killed.
I think that is an admirable morale versus safety record.
"German shelters, so far as they were available, were excellent. The
Germans built concrete bunkers, some of enormous size, both above and
below ground, designed to protect those taking shelter against even a
direct hit. One such shelter in Hamburg, named "the Holy Ghost" for its
location in the Holy Ghost Palza, sheltered as many as 60,000 people."
USBBS
>I'm sure there were "some" who believed all sorts of things.
Well, D-Day did take years. They could have landed in 42.
The first 20 mins of SPR would have been like the last 2 mins of Butch
Cassidy.
If they did get landed eventually, fast forward to "All Quiet on the
Western Front."
John Lansford
>I think there would be no nuking of Berlin. Berlin was a site of
>German government. Who would sign the surrender document if Hitler and
>the rest of German leadership have been evaporated? These reasons
>guided Americans not to nuke Tokyo.
No it wasn't. There wasn't enough left of Tokyo to justify dropping an
atomic bomb on the remnants; we wanted a city that was undamaged
enough to observe the results after the a-bomb exploded. Tokyo was so
burnt out that square miles of it were gone already.
>Instead of Berlin, I would rather expect nuking of Dresden or
>Muenchen. Both cities were big and relatively undamaged by
>conventional bombing.
When was Dresden firebombed?
Georg Schwarz
> Would The President(s) have nuked Germans if The Bomb had been ready sooner,
> or if the war had dragged on longer?
sure we would; that's what the bomb was made for.
--
Georg Schwarz sch...@physik.tu-berlin.de, ku...@cs.tu-berlin.de
Institut für Theoretische Physik +49 30 314-24254, FAX -21130
Technische Universität Berlin http://home.pages.de/~schwarz/
casita
>Age with bombing.
"The principle German cities have been largely reduced to hollow walls and
piles of rubble."
"The physical destruction from the air attacks ( non-atomic ), approximates
that sufferred by Germany, even though the tonnage of bombs dropped was far
smaller. The attack was more concentrated in time, and the target areas
were smaller and more vulnerable. Not only were the Japanese defences
overwhelmed, but Japans will and capacity for reconstruction, dispersal
and passive defense was less than Germany's."
USSBS.
Georg Schwarz
> Of the present-day revisionists who claim the Bomb was unnecessary, Harrison
> quotes the following: "He jests at scars who never felt a wound."
linking the cost of an invasion of Japan planned for late 1945 and
spring 1946 with the question of the necessity of dropping the bombs in
summer of 1945 assumes that Japan would not have had surrendered by late
1945 without those two bombs having been dropped.
I'd like to point out that this assumption is at least not so strait
forward, one could even argue it's rather doubtful. The Japanese
government at the time of their decision surrender had only a limited
idea of the scope of the bombs as well as of the US ability to drop
further of those if the war was to continue. Also, the damage done by
the two nuclear bombs was rather small compared to the damage being done
by conventional bombing, which did not show any sign of diminishing. So
in my view the bombs were not the reason for the Japanese government to
surrender, they merely tipped the scales in the ongoing debate in favor
of the peace fraction within the Japanese war cabinet. Whether a
continued conventional bombing campaign and naval blockade would have
achieved the same result (and probably have cost at least the same
number of Japanese lives) a few weeks later must remain historical
speculation.
--
Georg Schwarz sch...@physik.tu-berlin.de, ku...@cs.tu-berlin.de
Institut f|r Theoretische Physik +49 30 314-24254, FAX -21130
Technische Universitdt Berlin http://home.pages.de/~schwarz/
Merlin Dorfman
: The American services were enchanted by the V-1 (more so than by
: the much more prophetic V-2). The Northrop company built some
: hundreds of an all-wing buzz bomb for the U.S. Army, though they
: never went into combat service. After the war, the test pilot
: Glen Edwards (for whom Edwards AFB would be named) took part in a
: series of tests in Utah in which *two* captured V-1s were to be
: launched from beneath the wings of a B-17, as stand-off missiles.
IIRC, the US-built V-1s were designated "Loon."
Merlin Dorfman
DOR...@COMPUTER.ORG
Mike Fester
: forward, one could even argue it's rather doubtful. The Japanese
: government at the time of their decision surrender had only a limited
: idea of the scope of the bombs as well as of the US ability to drop
: further of those if the war was to continue. Also, the damage done by
Actually, this isn't true.
The Japanese press announced the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was "probably
atomic", and the Cabinet KNEW that Hiroshima had been wiped out by the
time they convened to discuss surrender.
: the two nuclear bombs was rather small compared to the damage being done
: by conventional bombing, which did not show any sign of diminishing. So
This isn't true, either. Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were essentially useless
at that point.
: in my view the bombs were not the reason for the Japanese government to
: surrender, they merely tipped the scales in the ongoing debate in favor
: of the peace fraction within the Japanese war cabinet. Whether a
This isn't true, either.
In point of fact, there was no "tipped scale". Nobody changed their
vote. The "Big Six" were still divided 3-3 on whether to accept
Potsdam.
What DID change was Suzuki's attitude. He had been in favor of accepting
Potsdam after it was announced, as were some others. However, after discussing
the bombing of Hiroshima and seeing no change in (esp.) Anami's position, and
AFTER getting news of Nagasaki during the debate, Suzuki finally decided to
appeal DIRECTLY to Hirohito to break the dead-lock. The Emperor did so, in
favor of the acceptance of Potsdam.
Assuredly, the Japanese would have surrendered without the atomic weapons.
How soon, and at what cost, though, are not clear.
Mike Fester
: >In point of fact, Mr Casita, no nation has been bombed back to the Stone
: >Age with bombing.
: "The principle German cities have been largely reduced to hollow walls and
: piles of rubble."
Why do you answer each objectin with aan irrelevant quote?
Oh, well
Mr Casita, I suggest you actually READ something about the war, other than
these accounts of bombings.
It MAY put somethings into perspective for you.
Now, I'm sure this will be asurprise to you, but, in the the Stone Age, there
were no:
electricity, automatic weapons, anti-aircraft guns, tanks, agriculture,
running water, radio communications, jets, rockets, etc.
I'm certain that this will also surprise you, but all those are things the
Germans had at their disposal until the war ended.
Now, either you've read some truly inventive accounts of the Stone Age,
or you use words to mean something other than for their more normal
meaning.
casita
and
>: piles of rubble."
>
>Why do you answer each objectin with aan irrelevant quote?
The United States Strategic Bombing Survey ETO and PTO are the most thorough
studies of strategic bombing in WW2.
Hundreds of Officers, enlisted and civilians were mobilised by the US
Government to study the effects of bombing. Some were actually killed in
the process.
>electricity, automatic weapons, anti-aircraft guns, tanks, agriculture,
>running water, radio communications, jets, rockets, etc.
If German industry was still healthy, why was The Marshall Plan needed?
>Now, either you've read some truly inventive accounts of the Stone Age,
>or you use words to mean something other than for their more normal
>meaning.
German and Japanese industry and worker morale was devastated by Strategic
bombing. Both countries needed massive foreign aid to get back on their
feet economically.
They are both doing ok now, and before the bombing offensives were very
powerful, but in 1945 the cities of Germany and Japan were in ruins.
casita
I think the President(s) would have faced condemnation had he made a
conscious decision to atomise to 100,000 Germans.
Yes, I have heard of Hamburg and Dresden, but the high death tolls came
as a great surprise.
That's what gas was made for, but they didn't use it on Germans.
Look at how the GIs agonised over Steamboat Willie?
A soldier who had mown down other GIs and wouldn't hesitate to do it again.
The GI's almost shot each other, and let him go.
I think killing came easier in the Pacific.
For both sides.
casita
>When was Dresden firebombed?
13/14 Feb, 1945.
"The campaign should have begun with an American raid on Dresden on 13 Feb,
but bad weather over Europe prevented any American operations. It thus fell
to Bomber Command to carry out the first raid." Martin Middlebrook.
The USAAF also followed up with attacks, but it is generally accepted that
it was the RAF night raid which caused the most damage.
"Part of the American Mustang fighter-escort was ordered to straffe traffic
on the roads to increase the chaos." Martin Middlebrook.
"It is important to stress that to those who planned and directed it, the
raid on Dresden was no different from scores of other operations mounted
during the years of war. To the staff at High Wycombe ( Bomber Command HQ )
Dresden was simply another German town."
Max Hastings
casita
>continued conventional bombing campaign and naval blockade would have
>achieved the same result (and probably have cost at least the same
>number of Japanese lives) a few weeks later must remain historical
>speculation.
I think the feeling was that now we have the bombs, why not use them?
They weren't ready in time for Germany.
George Hardy
<cas...@home.com> says:
>If German industry was still healthy, why was The Marshall Plan needed?
Well, consider. Germany paid $20B in reparations. Germany's
Marshall Plan aid was about $1.6B -- a loan which was paid back.
so, the short answer is that we, the Allies, were stealing their
wealth. One of the real breaks for Germany was the end of
reparations to the USSR when the Berlin Blockade began. The
USSR was getting 50% of the reparations.
John Lansford
>I think the President(s) would have faced condemnation had he made a
>conscious decision to atomise to 100,000 Germans.
Why? We were in a war. The Germans were still offering strong
resistance in 1944, as shown by their offensive in December. Using the
A-bomb in that year would not have been wrong, considering it would
have probably ended the war half a year early.
>Yes, I have heard of Hamburg and Dresden, but the high death tolls came
>as a great surprise.
>That's what gas was made for, but they didn't use it on Germans.
As a result of knowing how terrible it was in WWI. No one used it; not
even the Germans. The Italians used it in Ethiopia, though.
>Look at how the GIs agonised over Steamboat Willie?
Uhhh, you do know that was a MOVIE, don't you? US and British soldiers
shot German POW's at times, just as Germans shot US and British POW's.
>I think killing came easier in the Pacific.
>For both sides.
When the other side won't surrender, it makes it hard to take
prisoners. The few Japanese that did surrender, however, were taken
care of and treated humanely. There were few who surrendered, though.
John Lansford
>>Whether a
>>continued conventional bombing campaign and naval blockade would have
>>achieved the same result (and probably have cost at least the same
>>number of Japanese lives) a few weeks later must remain historical
>>speculation.
>
>I think the feeling was that now we have the bombs, why not use them?
The alternative to dropping the a-bombs was an expensive and bloody
invasion of the main Japanese islands. In a previous Big Three
meeting, it had been agreed that an invasion of Japan would commence
no later than a year after Germany surrendered. There was absolutely
no evidence that Japan would surrender before that deadline without an
invasion, so one was reluctantly planned.
Then the bomb was tested and used. It was hoped that it would lead to
an invasion-free surrender, and it worked.
>They weren't ready in time for Germany.
That's right. They weren't. So the RAF firebombed Dresden.
Go ahead and reply with your usual horde of quotes.
Mike Fester
: >sure we would; that's what the bomb was made for.
: I think the President(s) would have faced condemnation had he made a
: conscious decision to atomise to 100,000 Germans.
Hunh?
What POSSIBLE reason can you have for believing the US would rather see
10s of thousands of its own boys dead than a bunch of Germans?
: Yes, I have heard of Hamburg and Dresden, but the high death tolls came
: as a great surprise.
Yeah, Hamburg so surprised the UK that they immediately put away their
bombers and never fire-bombed another German city, particularly not one
clogged with refugees and POWs less than 3 months before the end of the
Euorpean conflict.
: That's what gas was made for, but they didn't use it on Germans.
Among a GREAT many other reasons, they were afraid of retaliation.
Germany did, after all, invent the world's first two nerve gases.
dave gower
was that the U.S. used the A-bomb on Japan rather than Germany because
the Japanese weren't white and Germans were. In fact the origin of the
Manhattan project was a fear that Germany would get the bomb first, so
Germany was the intended target from the outset. Ask anyone who went
through the firestorms of Hamburg and Dresden whether the allies would
have nuked German cities if we could.
Georg Schwarz wrote:
>
> casita <cas...@home.com> wrote:
>
> > Would The President(s) have nuked Germans if The Bomb had been ready sooner,> > or if the war had dragged on longer?
>
> sure we would; that's what the bomb was made for.
........................................................................
"One good thing about self-pity...you don't have to doubt its
sincerity."
casita
thorough
>> studies of strategic bombing in WW2.
>Certainly there's some useful stuff in us-bus, but its intention
>was to make the case for an independent air force.
To the criticism that the strategic offensive involved a vast misuse of
resourses there is a simple answer. After the Fall of France, bombing
was the only form of attack by which the UK could directly damage
Germany, not only in 1940, but for years to come. Equally, when the USA
became involved in the war, bombers could be flown to Europe and be in
action long before American ground forces could be brought across in
sufficient numbers to attempt an invasion.
After January 1943, however, the air offensive against Germany was
essentially geared to the strategy decided upon at The Casablanca
Comference. It was to be waged with the object of weakening Germany to
the point where it could not effectively repel an invasion. So in the
end the foremost proponents of the strategic offensive, Portal and
Harris on the British side and Arnold, Spaatz and Eaker on the
American, were never given the resources, around 6,000 heavy bombers,
which they had considered necessary to weaken Germany fatally without
major fighting on land. though Harris relinquished that dream only with
the greatest reluctance, their task became, essentially, to reduce
Germany's industrial capacity, to weaken or destroy the Luftwaffe, and
then to assist, by both tactical and strategic operations, the progress
of the Allied ground forces.
The results of the offensive, which at it's height occupied some 3,000
British and American bombers, have in recent years been seriously
undervalued. Much has been made of the fact that during the peak period
of Allied bombing, German aircraft production actually increased, but a
high proportion of these aircraft were fighters for Reich defence, much
more easily manufactured than bombers, the production of which declined
sharply. In 1939, 31% of German aircraft production consisted of
fighters, 26% of bombers. In 1944, the proportions were 75% fighters,
11% bombers. This in itself was a victory for Allied air power.
The strategic air offensive in fact had profoundly important results.
Thouhg it failed to destroy German morale, it reduced German war
production. Among other effects, it finally brought about a shortage of
oil so acute that fuel could not even be found to give proper training
to the Luftwaffe's new pilots. After the introduction of the long range
fighter it also, through the efforts of the Americans, fatally weakened
the Luftwaffe by attacks on aircraft factories, and by combat in the
skies.
This was far from being all. In the final stages, the offensive
destoyed communications in Western Germany and utterly disrupted German
troop movements. It caused Luftwaffe units to be moved from the Eastern
Front, so that only only 32% of it's forces were engaged there in 1944
as compared with 65% in 1941. In its last year, it kept 2,000 or more
German fighters and more than 20,000 antu- aircraft guns, many of which
could have been used as anti-tank guns, pinned down to defend the
Reich. As intended, it threw Germany on the defensive, and the
combination of daylight attacks by the USAAF and night attacks by the
RAF finally proved irresistable. The mature judgement of Albert Speer,
Hitler's armaments minister, ran thus: "The real importance of the air
war was that it opened a Second Front long before the invasion of
Europe. That front was the skies of Germany.....This was the greatest
lost battle on the German side."
Ref: Oxford Companion to WW2
Oxford Press ISBN 0198662254
Mike Fester
: Spaatz was told that the third bomb would be dropped on Sapporo.
: This in opposition to the conventional wisdom, which names
: Kotura? as the target.
Actually, Kokura/Kita-kyushu was the primary target for the second
mission. Cloud cover over the aiming point forced Bock's Car to turn
and head for the secondary target, Nagasaki.
casita
>Go ahead and reply with your usual horde of quotes.
Thank you.
Lethal gas was ready.
http://www.codoh.com/incon/incongasmemo.html
"Time has wrought the myth that the purpose of the raid on Dresden was to
kill civilians in the largest possible numbers and in particularly horrible
ways. The truth is that the attack was a routine operation. The huge death
toll was a result of a freak, catostrophic firestorm just like the one that
devasted Hamburg in the Summer of 1943. The mixture of High Explosive to
incendiary bombs was typical of the raids of the period. The Dresden raid
was planned and carried out in precisely the same manner as hundreds of
operations before and dozens after."
"Reap the Whirlwind: The untold story of 6 Group, Canada's Bomber force
in WW2"
by Spencer Dunmore and Wm. Carter Phd. ISBN 0771029241
"It is important to stress, that to those who planned and directed it, the
raid on Dresden was no different from scores of other operations mounted
during the years of war. Bomber Command's attacks had reached an
extraordinary pitch of technical efficiency, but it was impossible to
anticipate the firestorm which developed, multipying the usual deaths and
destruction by a hundredfold. To the staff at High Wycombe ( Bomber Command
HQ ) Dresden was simply another German town."
"Bomber Command" by Max Hastings pg 342 ISBN 6071680706
The bombloads are a matter of public record.
The bombloads Hamburg received in July, 1943 and Dresden in Feb, 1945 were
"typical of the raids of the period."
I am still waiting to hear an explaination of _how_ the RAF caused so many
casualties at Hamburg and Dresden.
English cities had been Blitzed with "firebombs" and Terror-Rockets fired
at London, launched by men who faced no risk themselves in the killing of
others.
The bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were specially developed at Los
Alamos and used only by Presidential order. They harnessed the basic power
of the Universe and were something new that had never been seen on the face
of this Earth. What opposition did Enola Gay or Bocks' car run into?
Read about the Nuremburg Raid. 96 strategic bombers were shot down and 8
more were written off in England in a single night.
Bomber Command are used as the whipping boys for WW2.
I am of the opinion that had they resorted to lethal gas on Germany, and
God forbid nukes or Terror-Rockets, they would have faced universal
condemnation.
The nukes only weighed about 5 tons each and look at how many people they
killed.
The RAF and USAAF poured 2.7 million tons of bombs on Nazi occupied Europe
during the war, 50% of which fell on Germany itself.
I would say that the civilian deaths in Europe, per ton delivered,
represents an admirable safety record.
"I want fire everywhere. Thousands of them! Then they'll unite in one
gigantic area conflagration. Goering has the right idea. Explosive bombs
don't work. But, it can be done with incendiary bombs--total destruction
of London!"
Adolph Hitler-1940.
Georg Schwarz
> Actually, this isn't true.
>
> The Japanese press announced the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was "probably
> atomic", and the Cabinet KNEW that Hiroshima had been wiped out by the
> time they convened to discuss surrender.
that's correct; still noone, let alone the Japanese government, at that
time knew about the particular (long term) dangers of a nuclear bomb. I
believe at that time to most people it was just a news, enormously
powerful explosive. So in this respect it was different from
conventional bombing only by the fact that it had taken just a dingle
bomb. Conventional bombing of other cities cost more lives than the
nucluar bombs.
>
> : the two nuclear bombs was rather small compared to the damage being done
> : by conventional bombing, which did not show any sign of diminishing. So
>
> This isn't true, either. Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki were essentially useless
> at that point.
and so were other cities after being firebombed conventionally (probably
Tokyo was little more than rubble at that time). As I said the dangers
of nuclear fallout etc. were not very much known (even years later the
US military conducted experiments in the US that set free considerable
radioactivity over inhabited areas.
>
> : in my view the bombs were not the reason for the Japanese government to
> : surrender, they merely tipped the scales in the ongoing debate in favor
> : of the peace fraction within the Japanese war cabinet. Whether a
>
> This isn't true, either.
>
> In point of fact, there was no "tipped scale". Nobody changed their
> vote. The "Big Six" were still divided 3-3 on whether to accept
> Potsdam.
it was the emporor how decided to step in and put an end to war by
capitulating.
>
> What DID change was Suzuki's attitude. He had been in favor of accepting
> Potsdam after it was announced, as were some others. However, after discussing
> the bombing of Hiroshima and seeing no change in (esp.) Anami's position, and
> AFTER getting news of Nagasaki during the debate, Suzuki finally decided to
> appeal DIRECTLY to Hirohito to break the dead-lock. The Emperor did so, in
> favor of the acceptance of Potsdam.
>
> Assuredly, the Japanese would have surrendered without the atomic weapons.
> How soon, and at what cost, though, are not clear.
that's basically not different from what I said. We'll never know for
sure.
--
Georg Schwarz sch...@physik.tu-berlin.de, ku...@cs.tu-berlin.de
Institut für Theoretische Physik +49 30 314-24254, FAX -21130
Technische Universität Berlin http://home.pages.de/~schwarz/
Mike Fester
: <mfe...@iisc.com> wrote:
Just a coupla things...
: that's correct; still noone, let alone the Japanese government, at that
: time knew about the particular (long term) dangers of a nuclear bomb. I
They wouldn't've been concerned about them in any event. Remember, they
were ready to sacrifice millions of their children to fight a "Decisive
Battle".
: > : surrender, they merely tipped the scales in the ongoing debate in favor
: > : of the peace fraction within the Japanese war cabinet. Whether a
: > In point of fact, there was no "tipped scale". Nobody changed their
: > vote. The "Big Six" were still divided 3-3 on whether to accept Potsdam.
: it was the emporor how decided to step in and put an end to war by
: capitulating.
Actually, the Emperor never decided to step in. He'd wanted the war ended
MUCH earlier.
What changed was Suzuki decided to convene the council in the presence of
the Emperor BEFORE they'd made a decision ('cause they were incapable of
making one.) After each member was given a chance to speak, he asked
Hirohito to make the decision, a definite breach of protocol, but one
of which Hirohito approved.
Teal Ray
>> > They would have retaken Manchuria, but little else. Or do you think
>> > they could walk on water?
<snipsies>
>> souther Kurilian islands? AFAIK they were about to (or already
>It wasn't possible, by 1945, to land against a defended shore
>without a huge effort and specialized equipment,
<snipsies>
> The importance of the Russian participation was mostly
>psychological. The Russians rolled up the Kwantung Army, but that
>was a hollow shell by 1945, >Still, the Russian declaration and high-speed
occupation of
One thing that occurs to me suddenly at this point: does not the
overthrow of the Kwantung army at least potentially presage the
overthrow of the whole army in China, not directly but through the
potentially overwhelming reinforcement of the communists in China by
Russia:? (at that time I believe ( OK so it is High School textbook
time ) they were still training Chinese communists in Russia, and
certainly Stalin was careful not to dissuade their interest while it
served his. It is my opinion, based on a few references, that the army
in China had nrever managed more than a city+ communication routes
control, and was therefore capable of being strangled by all-out
assault accompanied by a propaganda war preventing peasants from aiding
the Japanese.
The Japanese rule in China, potentially completely cut off from the
mainland was surely limited to months not years? If this is the case I
think it would have been a more important factor in shutting-up the
voices who wanted to continue the war than we can understand, for the
losses of even what was achieved in 1895 and 1905 would be humiliating:
not to mention the loss of the land army. I haven't thought it all out
yet but it seems to me the Russians were lopping off certain parts of
these guys anatomy which reminded them they had nothing left, really,
to fight for. Their history had finished the moment they realised their
colonial adventure was over, and I doubt any of the people left in
power in 1945 could have carried on if they lost everything that was
gained by the generation of their grandfathers, 50 years before:. dying
bravely is one thing, living in shame another.
Teal.
-------------------------------
A non-sensical poet wrote:
Okay, so shoot me.
Anyway, I believed it when I wrote it.
That's more than some I know
Shoot me down in flames
Who believes I won't live again.
casita
>10s of thousands of its own boys dead than a bunch of Germans?
If you think they are bitter now over getting sprinkled with 4 lb
firestarters and cookies, how do you think they would react to getting
nuked? Or gassed? Or terror-rocketed?
Bomber Command is still taking flak. The fallout from Lancasters dropping a
couple of nukes on Germany would have been worse.
The Germans didn't mind using lethal gas. I think Zyclon-B was a favorite.
You go on about Hamburg and Dresden getting fire-bombed.
Can you tell me one British or German city that was not fire-bombed in an
air raid?
Can you tell me a single target that Bomber Command did not make a Maximum
Effort to destroy?
>From 1942 on Harris was publicly ordering his crews to "fly into the belly
of the beast and burn his black out." Did any high ranking Allied military
or political leaders object to this newsreel?
"The Norwegians never cared about the economic importance of a target. Just
how many Germans per acre." CO 76 Sqn.
Essen was saturated with 39,907 tons versus
Dresden got 2,978 tons. Harris wanted Essen because it was the Krupp
Works.
It was a very heavily defended target. 7,000 people were killed at Essen.
Many were factory workers. The population was 648,000.
You would have nuked them? How many would that have killed?
Bomber Command reduced Essen's population to 310,000 because the people
finally
decided to live in a quieter place. Let them hate BC all they want. At
least my way they live to see the peace.
I would expect them to hound BC no matter what anyway. Perhaps they should
have just thrown rolled up newspapers out of the Lancasters. I know they
used to dump conterfeit ration coupons on them. Anyone picking one up was
liable to be shot.
>Yeah, Hamburg so surprised the UK that they immediately put away their
>bombers and never fire-bombed another German city, particularly not one
>clogged with refugees and POWs less than 3 months before the end of the
>Euorpean conflict.
Yeah, you are claiming that "the Germans fought bitterly to the end, even
as their cities were being bombed and their cities overrun by three large
armies."
Are you claiming, in the face of such resistance , that anyone knew when
it was going to end? Are you claiming the Russians did not formally request
strategic air attacks against Germany's Eastern cities? Are you claiming
that Gen Marshall did not publicly assert that Dresden had been bombed at
the specific request of the Russians?
You mention the UK, are you claiming Operation Clarion, in that same month
was not consciously terroristic? Are you claiming Clarion was not an
American Operation?
Are you claiming that the Mustangs who mowed down survivors with machine
guns on the streets of Dresden in broad daylight were RAF?
Friedrich Vystrcil
> >What POSSIBLE reason can you have for believing the US would rather see
> >10s of thousands of its own boys dead than a bunch of Germans?
>
> If you think they are bitter now over getting sprinkled with 4 lb
> firestarters and cookies, how do you think they would react to getting
> nuked? Or gassed? Or terror-rocketed?
> Bomber Command is still taking flak. The fallout from Lancasters dropping a
> couple of nukes on Germany would have been worse.
You object the usage of nuclear waepons, but you are very fond of
"conventional" bombing. I still don't understand the reason behind this
motivation. Maybe I have missed some posts since the reliability of my
news server is not so good. To me it doesn't matter much, if one or
thousand bombs kill many people. I don't like either of these
choices.
> The Germans didn't mind using lethal gas. I think Zyclon-B was a favorite.
Oh dear. A while ago I seem to remember you have compared Dresden to
Dachau. I have asked you about the connection between these two
places. I have got no answer. Could you please be so kind to explain at
least this time this sentence to me? I am always willing to learn
something new. Do you think it's smart to bring in the Holocaust every
time if it suits your needs? It's a far too terrible event as to abuse
it when one runs out of arguments on an unrelated topic.
> You go on about Hamburg and Dresden getting fire-bombed.
> Can you tell me one British or German city that was not fire-bombed in an
> air raid?
> Can you tell me a single target that Bomber Command did not make a Maximum
> Effort to destroy?
> >From 1942 on Harris was publicly ordering his crews to "fly into the belly
> of the beast and burn his black out." Did any high ranking Allied military
> or political leaders object to this newsreel?
>
> "The Norwegians never cared about the economic importance of a target. Just
> how many Germans per acre." CO 76 Sqn.
Propaganda. What do you expect would have happened if any leader did object?
End of career, maybe? Be honest, why should they care for their enemy?
> Essen was saturated with 39,907 tons versus
> Dresden got 2,978 tons. Harris wanted Essen because it was the Krupp
> Works.
> It was a very heavily defended target. 7,000 people were killed at Essen.
> Many were factory workers. The population was 648,000.
> You would have nuked them? How many would that have killed?
> Bomber Command reduced Essen's population to 310,000 because the people
> finally
> decided to live in a quieter place. Let them hate BC all they want. At
> least my way they live to see the peace.
Yesterday I watched a documentation about the Dresden fire storm.
Actually it was more about bombing in general. It also discussed the
attacks of London, Coventry at some length. Besides some other
interesting facts they had interviews with Bomber Command crews. One of
them told about a planned raid to a town (he didn't mention the name).
After the briefing they have been called surprisingly to a second
briefing. An intelligence officer explained them, that most people had
left the target for another town nearby. So they have changed the
target of this mission to the other town, where the refugees thought
that it would be a "quieter place". Probably they took the factories
with them, so they were still making up a legitimate target. But it was
not intented to bomb civilians, I guess.
Another former bomber command member stated, that he is proud of what he
did and that he is sure that he helped to save lives because bombing has
helped to end the war sooner. I understand his feelings (no irony here!).
They had a job to do, it was not their duty to question orders.
> I would expect them to hound BC no matter what anyway. Perhaps they should
> have just thrown rolled up newspapers out of the Lancasters. I know they
> used to dump conterfeit ration coupons on them. Anyone picking one up was
> liable to be shot.
> >Yeah, Hamburg so surprised the UK that they immediately put away their
> >bombers and never fire-bombed another German city, particularly not one
> >clogged with refugees and POWs less than 3 months before the end of the
> >Euorpean conflict.
> Yeah, you are claiming that "the Germans fought bitterly to the end, even
> as their cities were being bombed and their cities overrun by three large
> armies."
> Are you claiming, in the face of such resistance , that anyone knew when
> it was going to end? Are you claiming the Russians did not formally request
> strategic air attacks against Germany's Eastern cities? Are you claiming
> that Gen Marshall did not publicly assert that Dresden had been bombed at
> the specific request of the Russians?
Does this mean that only the Russians are to blame for Dresden? What
about the explanations, that the city has been destroyed to break the
morale of the population or other often stated reasons? I still think
it had a lot to do with hate and revenge (which were understandable
feelings in these days).
> You mention the UK, are you claiming Operation Clarion, in that same month
> was not consciously terroristic? Are you claiming Clarion was not an
> American Operation?
You like comparisons. Does this one imply, that also RAF bombing campaigns
were "consciously terroristic"?
> Are you claiming that the Mustangs who mowed down survivors with machine
> guns on the streets of Dresden in broad daylight were RAF?
Pointing out wrongdoings of others is IMHO not a good defense.
BC received bad press. Maybe because some actions were questionable?
Best regards
Fritz
Mike Fester
: >What POSSIBLE reason can you have for believing the US would rather see
: >10s of thousands of its own boys dead than a bunch of Germans?
: If you think they are bitter now over getting sprinkled with 4 lb
: firestarters and cookies, how do you think they would react to getting
You are confused, Casita.
They are not bitter over getting "sprinkled with ... cookies"; they are
annoyed at having thousands of their children burned to death in their
sleep, in one case a mere 3 months before the end of the war.
: Bomber Command is still taking flak.
I was unaware that they were unable to handle it, Mr Casita.
: You go on about Hamburg and Dresden getting fire-bombed.
Actually, Mr Casita, I "go on" about your bizarre contention that killing
children with incendiaries is somehow preferable to killing them with nuclear
weapons.
[Long, boring, pointless meanderings about targets deleted.]
: >Yeah, Hamburg so surprised the UK that they immediately put away their
: >bombers and never fire-bombed another German city, particularly not one
: >clogged with refugees and POWs less than 3 months before the end of the
: >Euorpean conflict.
: Yeah, you are claiming that "the Germans fought bitterly to the end, even
I did.
However, you again evade the point. Your statement was
"Yes, I have heard of Hamburg and Dresden, but the high death tolls came
as a great surprise."
To which I replied as above.
Now, if it is your contention that the RAF did NOT mean to kill that many
women and children, you are left to explain why they did not cease fire-
bombing civilian areas after Hamburg.
If it is NOT your contention, then wheter or not they were surprised is
irrelevant.
dave gower
attack was as serious a psychological blow as the dropping of the Atomic
Bomb. It meant, as you say, the loss of all possessions and armies on
the Asian Mainland, and that was bad enough. But the real blow was that
they had been hoping that they could use the U.S.S.R. as a channel to
negotiate more favourable surrender terms. When the Soviets turned into
an active enemy it really crushed their hopes.
With respect, I think your final comment reflects an attempt to
understand WW2 Japanese military thinking through the eyes of 1999
Western values. The core of Japanese belief was that the Emperor was
devinely destined to rule the world, and that it was every Japanese
warrior's duty to be prepared to die in this service. Loss of
territories, or other setbacks, did not free these men of this
obligation, no matter how disastorous the events. That is why the
Emperor's Aug 15 radio speech urging surrender was so important. It
removed the mandate to continue the struggle in a way that nothing else
could.
Whether the Emperor would have made such a speech in the absence of
the Atomic bomb we will never know.
Teal Ray wrote:
>
> One thing that occurs to me suddenly at this point: does not the
> overthrow of the Kwantung army at least potentially presage the
> overthrow of the whole army in China, ...
>
> The Japanese rule in China, potentially completely cut off from the
> mainland was surely limited to months not years? If this is the case I
> think it would have been a more important factor in shutting-up the
> voices who wanted to continue the war than we can understand, for the
> losses of even what was achieved in 1895 and 1905 would be humiliating:
> not to mention the loss of the land army.... Their history had finished the moment
> they realised their
> colonial adventure was over, and I doubt any of the people left in
> power in 1945 could have carried on if they lost everything that was
> gained by the generation of their grandfathers, 50 years before...
>
-
Brad Meyer
>>: "The principle German cities have been largely reduced to hollow walls
>>: and piles of rubble."
>>Why do you answer each objectin with aan irrelevant quote?
>The United States Strategic Bombing Survey ETO and PTO are the most thorough
>studies of strategic bombing in WW2.
>Hundreds of Officers, enlisted and civilians were mobilised by the US
>Government to study the effects of bombing. Some were actually killed in
>the process.
And they were written in order to support the seperate Air Force, and
thier conclusions slanted toward that goal.
Brad Meyer
"It is history that teaches us to hope"
-- R.E. Lee