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 LordofHats wrote:
Also Camp 6; People who moral questions concerning the atomic bombings is misguided, as the fundamental moral question involved was identical to those already brushed aside by the Allies when they started fire bombing German and Japanese cities earlier in the war.

Camp 6 would like to motion camp 1 apologize for being a meanie poo poo head, that camp 2 get off its high horse, and that Camp 3 and 4 come over for Pizza and Dr Pepper with assurances no one will be beaten with pillow cases full of hard back first editions.

/thread

Have an exalt lordy!

 Vaktathi wrote:


The Japanese were done, and already attempting to engage in negotiations through the USSR.

The Soviets had no intention of accepting a Japanese surrender. They wanted to really kick start the Communist Revolution in China, which at the time wasn't looking like it was doing well (turns out that a lot of people's assumptions in 1945, turned out to be incorrect. Who knew!). Prolonging the war was in Russia's best interests at the time, especially with Stalin correctly guessing that Truman's presidency was going to be more, aggressive, in its views of the USSR than FDR's.

The Soviet Union's attempt to negotiate with Japan was precisely calculated to distract Japan from the United States on the off chance that Japan might accept unconditional surrender before the USSR had a chance to pursue its own agenda in Asia.

The civilian elements of Japan's government had started to contemplate surrender as early as 1943, but it was not unconditional surrender. It's hard to really gauge the significance of specific events leading to Japan's ultimate surrender. The Imperial Navy seems to have been split on the war at its onset, but the most prominent "anti-war" Naval leaders will dead by 1945. Admiral Yamamoto's death in 1943 effectively silenced them, as none felt safe voicing their reservations with him gone. By 1945, the Army was solely dictating Japanese strategy and they were die hards who were not going to accept surrender. With the civilian government powerless, the Navy silent, and the Army ready to die instead of give up, the only really hope for Japan's surrender in a realistic sense was Hirohito.

The massive defeat of the Kwantung Army in Manchuria, was important for the surrender but not in the way people think. The Army by and large was fine to continue fighting, but the rapid defeat in Manchuria threw the Army Staff into chaos. They were so busy, they did not hold their typical meeting on August 12. This was the same day Hirohito announced to his family he'd decided to surrender. A few members of the Japanese command became privy to this, but many didn't even find out about it until the following day. That extra day was massive for those in the government who favored surrender, because they were able to politically consolidate their position unopposed while all the "no surrender" leaders were distracted doing other things. By August 14th, the pro-Surrender position was so strong, the bulk of Military Brass realized they could not stop the surrender from happening.

This was crucial in the failure of the attempted coup on the eve of Hirohito's address (the split was a top down split, with much of the lower echelons of the military switching to favor surrender, while top brass remained mostly hardline). But its hard to really say what it was that really set him on that path. It's been suggested he began contemplating forcing a surrender after the Tokyo Fire Bombing. The Soviet Declaration of war and the bombing of Nagasaki came on the same day, August 9, and the following day Hirohito recorded the Imperial Rescript Terminating the War.

Hirohito in his life, attributed his final decision to the atomic bomb, but it's within the realm of possibility his attempt might have failed if the Army hadn't been so distracted by the chaos caused by the defeat in Manchuria on the critical day August 12.

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Ghazkuul wrote:
you have about 3 distinct camps in this topic.

Camp 1: People who wish to remind everyone that the US is evil and everything they do is evil.

Camp 2: People who wish to point out that America is great and did amazing things and other horrible atrocities happened at the same time as this

and lastly Camp 3: Realists/Historians: this camp has pointed out that every expert on this from the actual bombing up until now, with 20/20 hindsight has said that if the Allied forces had been forced to fight a Land battle on Japan the casualty figures would have run into the Millions.


So realistically the Mods should just lock this topic because all we have right now is Camp 3 stating a fact, followed by Camp 1 pointing out some random obscure nonsense that makes camp 2 angry and posts further nonsense.

You forgot two more.

Camp 4:- People who think Japan would have folded shortly, nuke or no nuke, and that waiting for a few weeks/month (without invading Japan, thus rendering the continued, somewhat boring repetition of invasion casualty figures irrelevant) would potentially have been the more humane thing to do, but acknowledge that geopolitical aims pushed for an immediate deployment.

This would have been a very likely outcome.

As noted, figures for the expected invasion of Japan don't hold up. The US had total domination of the skies and seas. Japanese industry was smashed, she couldn't produce useable weapons or munitions. Japan's resource base was cut off and destroyed, she had no materials with which to make anything. Fuel was an even more pressing problem, a single US carrier battlegroup used more fuel in a month than Japan had left in her entire strategic reserves. Food was a critical issue, medical care was almost nonexistent, and civil infrastructure was largely obliterated anywhere it mattered.

One can look at the Soviet invasion of Manchuria as to a likely scenario. Much of the best of the Japanese army was stationed there (what was left of it), and it was obliterated and overrun in very short order with (relatively) few casuatlies, with very large number of surrenders relative to earlier battles in the war.

The Japanese were done, and already attempting to engage in negotiations through the USSR. The A-bombs didn't inflict any greater level of damage than firebombings did, in fact somewhat less, they just did it with a single bomb instead of hundreds of bombers, though with what amounted to complete air supremacy it's not like it mattered. What probably made a bigger difference to force the surrender of japan than the A-bombs was the invasion of the USSR. This not only led to the above military humiliation in what was Japan's most important colony, but also cut off their one hope of a negotiated settlement.

Its fun to play what if games with 70+ years of hindsight huh? I highly doubt though that a country that developed and utilized to great success Kamikazi pilots would have given up because they were running low on food stuffs. Furthermore at the time Japan was a self sufficient country as far as food is concerned. We would have had to have bombed farms in order to cause the kind of capitulation you are all talking about.

If you go research the end of the war you will see that Japan had stockpiled a huge amount of boats and planes to use in Kamikaze attacks against an invasion fleet. At the end of the day the actions were done and more likely then not saved millions of lives from a grueling invasion.

Japan was starving because it did not have the ability to feeds its own people after the population boom from its industrialization.

Japan had stockpiled some mini subs, a few aircraft and next to no tanks however these where made with low quality materials and they had no fuel and next to no ammunition for their weapons. They had the will but not the means.

Please do some research mate. Documentaries like to hype up japan but as far as WW2 goes they had one of the most incompetent forces out there. They only killed 111,000 (mostly disease) americans in the pacific war and that was at the height of their power, how where they going to kill more americans with less of everything?

Regardless of if Japan was going to fight on much longer or not, they where universally starving (every single recount from Japanese Soldiers and Civilians remark how hungry they where) and they had little ammunition and backwards weapons to start with. I doubt they would kill more than 10 thousand in an invasion. The Atom bombs killed more Japanese in a few months than the Pacific war killed americans.

I am very certain the only thing the Nukes achieved was ending the war faster, which I suppose puts me in camp 4.

 Ghazkuul wrote:

Its fun to play what if games with 70+ years of hindsight huh? .

As an actual nineteenth/twentieth century military historian, yes! It's why I picked it as a career choice.

 Ghazkuul wrote:

If you go research the end of the war

I have. Hence my opinion being as it is. I don't generally extend opinions on points of history I know nothing about, it's bad professional practice.

 Ghazkuul wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

 Ketara wrote:

 Ghazkuul wrote:
you have about 3 distinct camps in this topic.

Camp 1: People who wish to remind everyone that the US is evil and everything they do is evil.

Camp 2: People who wish to point out that America is great and did amazing things and other horrible atrocities happened at the same time as this

and lastly Camp 3: Realists/Historians: this camp has pointed out that every expert on this from the actual bombing up until now, with 20/20 hindsight has said that if the Allied forces had been forced to fight a Land battle on Japan the casualty figures would have run into the Millions.


So realistically the Mods should just lock this topic because all we have right now is Camp 3 stating a fact, followed by Camp 1 pointing out some random obscure nonsense that makes camp 2 angry and posts further nonsense.

You forgot two more.

Camp 4:- People who think Japan would have folded shortly, nuke or no nuke, and that waiting for a few weeks/month (without invading Japan, thus rendering the continued, somewhat boring repetition of invasion casualty figures irrelevant) would potentially have been the more humane thing to do, but acknowledge that geopolitical aims pushed for an immediate deployment.

This would have been a very likely outcome.

As noted, figures for the expected invasion of Japan don't hold up. The US had total domination of the skies and seas. Japanese industry was smashed, she couldn't produce useable weapons or munitions. Japan's resource base was cut off and destroyed, she had no materials with which to make anything. Fuel was an even more pressing problem, a single US carrier battlegroup used more fuel in a month than Japan had left in her entire strategic reserves. Food was a critical issue, medical care was almost nonexistent, and civil infrastructure was largely obliterated anywhere it mattered.

One can look at the Soviet invasion of Manchuria as to a likely scenario. Much of the best of the Japanese army was stationed there (what was left of it), and it was obliterated and overrun in very short order with (relatively) few casuatlies, with very large number of surrenders relative to earlier battles in the war.

The Japanese were done, and already attempting to engage in negotiations through the USSR. The A-bombs didn't inflict any greater level of damage than firebombings did, in fact somewhat less, they just did it with a single bomb instead of hundreds of bombers, though with what amounted to complete air supremacy it's not like it mattered. What probably made a bigger difference to force the surrender of japan than the A-bombs was the invasion of the USSR. This not only led to the above military humiliation in what was Japan's most important colony, but also cut off their one hope of a negotiated settlement.

Its fun to play what if games with 70+ years of hindsight huh? I highly doubt though that a country that developed and utilized to great success Kamikazi pilots would have given up because they were running low on food stuffs.

When they don't have fuel for planes, metal for engines or fuselages, or pilots to fly them, it makes it rather hard to resist. There's a reason that bombers over Japan weren't being intercepted anymore.

This isn't even hindsight. They were simply incapable of resistance, and, again, the Soviet advance through what were much of the best remaining (and best supplied) Japanese army units in Manchuria proved that quite decisively, along with the steady progress US forces were making against numerically superior Japanese forces in command of superior positions throughout the Pacific with highly favorable kill ratios for the US.

Furthermore at the time Japan was a self sufficient country as far as food is concerned. We would have had to have bombed farms in order to cause the kind of capitulation you are all talking about.

when the national transportation system was in ruins, it makes it hard to get food to everywhere it's needed, not to mention labor shortages (due to field workers being drafted) and the like. They very much were having issues with food by the end of the war. Shortages were very real and average caloric intake was plummeting at the end of the war.

If you go research the end of the war you will see that Japan had stockpiled a huge amount of boats and planes to use in Kamikaze attacks against an invasion fleet.

They had lots of aircraft, but little fuel and very poor pilots with almost no (sometimes literally no) flying time before their mission. The Kamikaze attacks were never actually effective as an actual combat weapon and did very little (if anything) to slow the advance of US forces. They had a very strong psychological effect on US forces at first, but that withered over time, and out of roughly 2800 Kamikaze attack over the course of roughly a year, they inflicted only about twice as many casualties as the attack on Pearl Harbor inflicted in just a few hours. Quite simply, the Kamikaze just weren't effective and weren't inflicting gargantuan casualties, they were a desperation method resorted to because the Japanese were simply incapable of carrying out effective conventional attacks.

With regards to ships, most of that was largely fantasy in terms of practical use, primarily because they simply didn't have the fuel to use them, and it's a whole lot harder to find suicide crews for ships where you need a whole lot more people. Estimates typically were that, by august of '45, the Japanese Navy only had the capability and fuel to field only a couple dozen destroyers and submarines, combined, for a few days, at best, and the very few remaining capital ships simply could not be deployed, the logistical capability simply was not there, and everything else was at the bottom of the ocean. These were trivially easy forces to overcome. The tiny suicide boats and whatnot were never considered a serious threat.

Likewise, the overwhelming bulk of the Japanese Imperial Army was not there to defend the home islands, but rather spread throughout the Pacific, China, and Korea. What was there was concentrated almost entirely on Kyushu alone, with no strategic reserve, and basically no industrial base with which to effectively resupply these units or equip new forces.

Have you ever seen a late war Arisaka rifle? Not only are they extremely crude, they're often simply either non-functional or so poorly constructed as to be dangerous to operate. The forces being readied to defend Japan made the many of the rear echelon Red Army divisions of 1941 look lavishly equipped.

Again, I should point out that a single US carrier battlegroup used more fuel in a single month than the Japanese Empire had available for both its industry and its national defense. Fighting at that sort of a disadvantage is impossible.

At the end of the day the actions were done and more likely then not saved millions of lives from a grueling invasion.

For which there's very little evidence that resistance capable of inflicting such casualties would have existed, and even at the time the Japanese were being defeated quite decisively in every major combat area and were no longer capable of engaging in air or sea combat at all.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:


The Japanese were done, and already attempting to engage in negotiations through the USSR.

The Soviets had no intention of accepting a Japanese surrender

Absolutely, but the Japanese didn't know that, and USSR was stringing 'em along to prepare their invasion into Manchuria

 Vaktathi wrote:
This would have been a very likely outcome.

As noted, figures for the expected invasion of Japan don't hold up. The US had total domination of the skies and seas. Japanese industry was smashed, she couldn't produce useable weapons or munitions. Japan's resource base was cut off and destroyed, she had no materials with which to make anything. Fuel was an even more pressing problem, a single US carrier battlegroup used more fuel in a month than Japan had left in her entire strategic reserves. Food was a critical issue, medical care was almost nonexistent, and civil infrastructure was largely obliterated anywhere it mattered.

Look up Operation Ketsugō. The Japanese had correctly identified the US landing zones, time table, and objectives. They had also massed reserves that had not been deployed, including tanks equal to the US Sherman, which had been kept in reserve for defense of the home islands. The initial US landing would have been met with a total of 15 divisions, 7 independent mixed brigades, 3 independent tank brigades and 2 fortress units. Compared this to the Normandy Landing, which were only opposed by the German 7th Army, or a force about 1/3rd and big in mostly rear echelon troops.

Thier objective was not to effectively resist. The Japanese military had realized that US moral, not US manpower, was it's weakness. The objective was to cause as many casualties as they could. kamikazis had also never been encountered in the sort of density that the Japanese home islands were ready to provide. While not very effective against warships, they were instead going to try and target lightly armored troop transports and escort carriers, which would have been more effective. Fuel is not a problem if you don;t have to worry about flying home.

 LordofHats wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:


The Japanese were done, and already attempting to engage in negotiations through the USSR.

The Soviets had no intention of accepting a Japanese surrender. They wanted to really kick start the Communist Revolution in China, which at the time wasn't looking like it was doing well (turns out that a lot of people's assumptions in 1945, turned out to be incorrect. Who knew!). Prolonging the war was in Russia's best interests at the time, especially with Stalin correctly guessing that Truman's presidency was going to be more, aggressive, in its views of the USSR than FDR's.

The Soviet Union's attempt to negotiate with Japan was precisely calculated to distract Japan from the United States on the off chance that Japan might accept unconditional surrender before the USSR had a chance to pursue its own agenda in Asia.

The civilian elements of Japan's government had started to contemplate surrender as early as 1943, but it was not unconditional surrender. It's hard to really gauge the significance of specific events leading to Japan's ultimate surrender. The Imperial Navy seems to have been split on the war at its onset, but the most prominent "anti-war" Naval leaders will dead by 1945. Admiral Yamamoto's death in 1943 effectively silenced them, as none felt safe voicing their reservations with him gone. By 1945, the Army was solely dictating Japanese strategy and they were die hards who were not going to accept surrender. With the civilian government powerless, the Navy silent, and the Army ready to die instead of give up, the only really hope for Japan's surrender in a realistic sense was Hirohito.

The massive defeat of the Kwantung Army in Manchuria, was important for the surrender but not in the way people think. The Army by and large was fine to continue fighting, but the rapid defeat in Manchuria threw the Army Staff into chaos. They were so busy, they did not hold their typical meeting on August 12. This was the same day Hirohito announced to his family he'd decided to surrender. A few members of the Japanese command became privy to this, but many didn't even find out about it until the following day. That extra day was massive for those in the government who favored surrender, because they were able to politically consolidate their position unopposed while all the "no surrender" leaders were distracted doing other things. By August 14th, the pro-Surrender position was so strong, the bulk of Military Brass realized they could not stop the surrender from happening.

This was crucial in the failure of the attempted coup on the eve of Hirohito's address (the split was a top down split, with much of the lower echelons of the military switching to favor surrender, while top brass remained mostly hardline). But its hard to really say what it was that really set him on that path. It's been suggested he began contemplating forcing a surrender after the Tokyo Fire Bombing. The Soviet Declaration of war and the bombing of Nagasaki came on the same day, August 9, and the following day Hirohito recorded the Imperial Rescript Terminating the War.

Hirohito in his life, attributed his final decision to the atomic bomb, but it's within the realm of possibility his attempt might have failed if the Army hadn't been so distracted by the chaos caused by the defeat in Manchuria on the critical day August 12.

This thread caused me to look into this, and I found this essay: http://www.japanfocus.org/-Tsuyoshi-Hasegawa/2501/article.html Pretty interesting stuff. It argues that the Japanese surrender was mostly due to the Soviet invasion, because that crushed their last hope of getting out of the war through Soviet mediation, instead of having to surrender to the Americans. The bombs were far less of a shock.
It does seem however that Japan would have indeed ended the war without the nuclear bombings, so Camp 4 wins

 Iron_Captain wrote:

This thread caused me to look into this, and I found this essay: http://www.japanfocus.org/-Tsuyoshi-Hasegawa/2501/article.html Pretty interesting stuff. It argues that the Japanese surrender was mostly due to the Soviet invasion, because that crushed their last hope of getting out of the war through Soviet mediation, instead of having to surrender to the Americans. The bombs were far less of a shock.
It does seem however that Japan would have indeed ended the war without the nuclear bombings, so Camp 4 wins

Yes, the glorious Soviet Union was the only true victor in the Great Patriotic War.

 BaronIveagh wrote:


Look up Operation Ketsugō. The Japanese had correctly identified the US landing zones, time table, and objectives.

They had a pretty good idea of where US forces were going to land, but this was still a pretty large area, and the materiel inferiority was extreme.

They had also massed reserves that had not been deployed, including tanks equal to the US Sherman

The Type 3? It had about as good a gun, but inferior armor, and there was an absurdly small number of them, something like ~150 (some small variation around that number depending on source) in total were built, and even if US tank numbers had merely been as numerous as they were on Okinawa, they'd be outnumbered something like 50-1. The Japanese ability to keep them in the field, with fuel, ammunition, and spare parts was also highly suspect, and who knows what the condition of their construction was, as manufacturing standards had basically dropped through the floor.

The initial US landing would have been met with a total of 15 divisions, 7 independent mixed brigades, 3 independent tank brigades and 2 fortress units. Compared this to the Normandy Landing, which were only opposed by the German 7th Army, or a force about 1/3rd and big in mostly rear echelon troops.

These forces would also have been spread over a much larger area, responsible for defense of the entire island of Kyushu including the Satsuma peninsula and Ariake Bay, and they weren't concentrated in as small an area as Normandy, if you include German forces spread over roughly the same area, you get the entirety of Army Group B, including the 15th army and the Panzer Group West reserve (with extremely lavishly equipped divisions like Panzer Lehr) and overall far better equipped, supplied, and experienced than the Japanese forces were likely to be in just about every conceivable manner, even if you're just looking at 7th Army.

Thier objective was not to effectively resist. The Japanese military had realized that US moral, not US manpower, was it's weakness. The objective was to cause as many casualties as they could.

Yep, and I won't argue that, but it's unlikely that they would have inflicted the mind-boggling casualty numbers predicted by some of upwards of a million US KIA and the like.

The IJA in Manchuria, including many of what were the best troops Japan had with far more armor and artillery than the home islands had at their disposal, were simply obliterated by the Red Army in extremely short order with relatively few casualties (with the IJA suffering KIA at a nearly 9-1 rate, and wounded at a 26-1 rate, relative to the Red Army). The invasion of Okinawa, in highly unfriendly terrain (which required a whole lot more infantry action and less use of tanks and artillery than would otherwise have been brought to bear) with well dug in Japanese Troops, the US forces still managed to inflict a KIA rate of 4 or 5 to 1. In both of these battles, Japanese forces surrendered in numbers unheard of before (thousands on Okinawa, and hundreds of thousands in Manchuria), and it was clear the morale of the IJA that had proven so intractable in earlier battles was breaking.

kamikazis had also never been encountered in the sort of density that the Japanese home islands were ready to provide. While not very effective against warships, they were instead going to try and target lightly armored troop transports and escort carriers, which would have been more effective.

might have been more effective,but nobody knows for sure. Such vessels were also harder to hit (when you're being shot at and the ship is moving and you're diving at high speed, it can be hard, especially if you've had no previous flight time) and distinguish from other vessels relative to the large full carriers. They'd have also been doing this against a foe with complete air supremacy.

Fuel is not a problem if you don;t have to worry about flying home.

It's less of a problem, but when they can't put ships at sea or maintain logistical networks due to lack of fuel, putting ten thousand aircraft out on suicide runs is going to be difficult too, even if one-way, to say nothing of losses due to likely US attacks on Japanese airfields.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
[This thread caused me to look into this, and I found this essay: http://www.japanfocus.org/-Tsuyoshi-Hasegawa/2501/article.html Pretty interesting stuff. It argues that the Japanese surrender was mostly due to the Soviet invasion, because that crushed their last hope of getting out of the war through Soviet mediation, instead of having to surrender to the Americans. The bombs were far less of a shock.
It does seem however that Japan would have indeed ended the war without the nuclear bombings, so Camp 4 wins

Yup, there's a very good case for the Soviet invasion basically being the nail in the coffin

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

This thread caused me to look into this, and I found this essay: http://www.japanfocus.org/-Tsuyoshi-Hasegawa/2501/article.html Pretty interesting stuff. It argues that the Japanese surrender was mostly due to the Soviet invasion, because that crushed their last hope of getting out of the war through Soviet mediation, instead of having to surrender to the Americans. The bombs were far less of a shock.
It does seem however that Japan would have indeed ended the war without the nuclear bombings, so Camp 4 wins

Yes, the glorious Soviet Union was the only true victor in the Great Patriotic War.

Don't knock it, the Soviet declaration of war was a huge psychological shock, cutting off their one possible negotiated "out", and overrunning the much prized Japanese possessions in Manchuria against what were probably the best and most well equipped troops Japan had left. This was a very huge deal, and the A-Bombs didn't do anything firebombing hadn't already done.

Particularly when it's remembered that it was Russia/USSR that Japan had really been the primary Japanese "great power" nemesis for the previous 40 years before WW2, not the US, and this was a culmination of pretty much all of their worst nightmares.

It's not that the Soviets were "the only true victor", it's that it put the last nail in the coffin, and did it hard.

 Swastakowey wrote:
Japan was starving because it did not have the ability to feeds its own people after the population boom from its industrialization.

Japan had stockpiled some mini subs, a few aircraft and next to no tanks however these where made with low quality materials and they had no fuel and next to no ammunition for their weapons. They had the will but not the means.

Please do some research mate. Documentaries like to hype up japan but as far as WW2 goes they had one of the most incompetent forces out there. They only killed 111,000 (mostly disease) americans in the pacific war and that was at the height of their power, how where they going to kill more americans with less of everything?

Regardless of if Japan was going to fight on much longer or not, they where universally starving (every single recount from Japanese Soldiers and Civilians remark how hungry they where) and they had little ammunition and backwards weapons to start with. I doubt they would kill more than 10 thousand in an invasion. The Atom bombs killed more Japanese in a few months than the Pacific war killed americans.

I am very certain the only thing the Nukes achieved was ending the war faster, which I suppose puts me in camp 4.

10,000 aircraft is "a few?" Thats 10X+ what Britain had in the Battle of Britain.

 Frazzled wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:
Japan was starving because it did not have the ability to feeds its own people after the population boom from its industrialization.

Japan had stockpiled some mini subs, a few aircraft and next to no tanks however these where made with low quality materials and they had no fuel and next to no ammunition for their weapons. They had the will but not the means.

Please do some research mate. Documentaries like to hype up japan but as far as WW2 goes they had one of the most incompetent forces out there. They only killed 111,000 (mostly disease) americans in the pacific war and that was at the height of their power, how where they going to kill more americans with less of everything?

Regardless of if Japan was going to fight on much longer or not, they where universally starving (every single recount from Japanese Soldiers and Civilians remark how hungry they where) and they had little ammunition and backwards weapons to start with. I doubt they would kill more than 10 thousand in an invasion. The Atom bombs killed more Japanese in a few months than the Pacific war killed americans.

I am very certain the only thing the Nukes achieved was ending the war faster, which I suppose puts me in camp 4.

10,000 aircraft is "a few?" Thats 10X+ what Britain had in the Battle of Britain.

Cool but they had no trained pilots left, their planes (like most of their weaponry) was no adequate, very limited fuel (you know, the whole immediate reason they started the war) and ultimately they had no way to protect their bases from being destroyed. The Americans would have been idiots to let these planes take off.

So yea, it's all well and good me owning 100 cars, but if none of them have batteries and all need fuel they are kind of useless to me...

For those that can only think in numbers, here is an interesting article on the Japanese Air Forces from beginign to end. Please note the end... www.historynet.com/japans-fatally-flawed-air-forces-in-world-war-ii-2.htm

Planes were hidden in underground tunnels.

 Frazzled wrote:
Planes were hidden in underground tunnels.

Some were.

But how do underground tunnels help ALL the other ailments facing the Japanese Military? I suspect they don't birth pilots from these tunnels, nor do these tunnels have fountains of fuel and ammunition I think? Caves only limits what woes their forces had, but even then they had many bombs designed for this.

It is also worth noting they likely did not have under ground runways so planes would still have to be pushed out of storage into the airfield and be prepped for take off (provided they have the resources). It is also worth noting that Japanese planes are incredibly outdated at this point, especially when made from sub standard resources and poor/no fuel.

10,000 Japanese planes looks scary on paper, but in practice and with some context they are not.

Planes would likely not cause half a million military deaths as it is anyway... Most would kill nothing either being shot down or missing the targets. A lot of Kamikaze planes crashed mid flight due to complications and inexperience. For these home island defenders many pilots would be flying a plane for the first time too. Its a bit far fetched to say they would do much damage. Especially after kamikaze attacks are being expected by the US.

Some were stored in tunnels and the lke, not all, and they couldn't be deployed directly from such storage tunnels. They had lots of planes, but the ability of the Japanese to make effective use of those is highly questionable.

Can they fuel them? Can they get people that can at least fly them to a target? How many can even hit their targets? Are the planes airworthy and were they constructed properly? Can they get to to an airstrip to take off? Can they get through to a target through complete enemy air supremacy? All of these are gigantic issues in the deployment and use of those aircraft as Kamikaze weapons,

Realistically, many, likely most, of these aircraft would never have gotten airborne, either for issues of fuel, no runway accessibility, lack of pilots, airframe failures or engine issues due to poor construction, etc. Of those that did, many would run into navigation issues with extremely novice pilots, many more would be shot down, and many would simply miss. With the earlier Kamikaze attacks drawn from often (though not always) experienced pilots and generally well built aircraft, only between one in five and one in seven actually managed to hit a target, and very few of those sunk anything. With worse pilots and questionable aircraft, it's likely these rates would have been much lower.

Even if you want to apply the exact same casualty rate from the earlier attacks to those ten thousand kamikaze plans, you're talking a grand total of roughly twenty five thousand casualties inflicted on American forces. Not an insignificant number of killed and maimed people, but not the devastatingly crushing casualties that some are describing, and certainly *far* less than what one would otherwise expect from an air fleet of that size.

I also find this idea of 10,000 planes hard to accept. When Iwo Jima happened they had 3000 aircraft apparently (of course these aircraft could not aid the defense of the island), most of those were being used elsewhere or were waiting for the invasion of Japan. Could Japan build more than 7,000 planes (because many of those 3,000 were used in other island defenses and in mainland china) in that amount of time? They could not even replace aircraft losses throughout the war.

I wonder how true that number even is... something to look into I think.

you seem to underestimate the Japanese significantly. Almost every single Kamikaze pilot throughout the war were the novices/untrained volunteers, if you were good you flew air cover for them otherwise you were a living guidance system. As far as the Kamikaze boats? Im assuming you have never been on a naval ship before but the idea of a bunch of motor boats and such vessels loaded with bombs streaking in from a harbor or hidden in a shoal would literally scare the crap out of the navy. At night the only way to stop these would be visual observation from search lights, something they didn't want to use because then the Kamikaze pilots could hone in on targets more easily. So realistically they would have caused massive casualties. Once the Islands were actually invested by troops the Japanese population would have fought as well as the trained soldiers. The soldiers who fought the US were fanatics. If you dont believe me go read "With the Old Breed". Your entire argument is based upon what you think might have happened and how the equipment might have worked instead of what past experiences had proven would happen. Okinawa and Iwo Jima are/were considered Japanese Islands, and in the case of Okinawa a home island. for those two battles the Japanese fielded around 120-140k Men. The US Fielded more then 600,000. Japan lost 98,000 to 130,000+. The US lost 27,000 KIA and 74,000 WIA. A lot of those WIA would have returned to duty, maybe even before the invasion, the point being that those islands weren't even a part of the Main Islands and we still suffered over 100k Casualties.

" By August, the Japanese Army had the equivalent of 65 divisions in the homeland but only enough equipment for 40 and only enough ammunition for 30"

"In addition, the Japanese had organized the Patriotic Citizens Fighting Corps, which included all healthy men aged 15 to 60 and women 17 to 40 for a total of 28 million people, for combat support and, later, combat jobs. Weapons, training and uniforms were generally lacking: some men were armed with nothing better than muzzle-loading muskets, longbows or bamboo spears; nevertheless, they were expected to make do with what they had.[28][29] One mobilized high school girl, Yukiko Kasai, found herself issued an awl and told, "Even killing one American soldier will do. .."

Against trained soldiers the Casualty rate is 1:1 with Japan losing almost all to KIA and the US losing only about 1 in 5 to KIA the rest to WIA. Lets be generous and say that against this army the casualty rate would have been 10:1. The US would still have lost over 1million men. Fanaticism is a scary thing.

A couple of points to make:

1: Volunteer is a highly contested term for the Kamikazes both by written accounts and survivors. See here:

http://www.historynet.com/a-kamikaze-who-lived-to-tell-the-tale.htm

http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/11/kamikaze-pilots-chosen/

So yea no.

Then the naval Kamikaze "special operations" was considered a failure by Japanese high command. The mini subs for Japanese defense were not kamikaze subs. These subs were very similar (but very shoddy) to the ones who attacked Pearl Harbor.

One final note on Kamikazes, was after their initial success most of them bar aircraft were considered failures. Kamikaze planes are not scary, if anything I would rather my fleets attacked by one use planes instead of being bombed by conventional means. All planes sent on kamikaze missions aren't gonna fight you again.

Also on the note of casualties, most allied casualties were to sickness or disease and so on.

pwencycl.kgbudge.com/C/a/Casualties.htm

That is the power of Japanese Military fighting. Plenty of dead Chinese, not so much for the Americans. Japan was simply not able to fight modern enemies which was evedent from not only the Pacific but also from the battles with Soviet Russia which led to many Japanese being captured (most of them) and they quickly fell apart and discontinued fighting. The same likely would happen on Japan.

America would have cause surrender in an invasion (ignoring the fact they planned to use the atom bombs during the invasion) just like the Soviets did in Manchuria. The nuke wasn't needed and nor did it save more people. USA killed more people with those 2 Atom bombs than Japanese killed Americans the whole conflict. Seems far fetched to say Japanese would be able to do more damage with a weaker all round force armed with rubbish. However I do not deny the Atom bomb was faster and cheaper (since they already spent so much on the bomb).


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As for the number of Planes I found this:

With regard to the 12,700 Japanese aircraft available to strike our Army and Navy forces. I would like to tell you of my first hand encounter with the so called strike force. When I flew into Miazuguhara Air Force Base in Kumigaya, Japan on 6 September 1945, I together with Agents of the 441 CIC Detachment found over two thousand new Japanese military aircraft of various types bombers, fighters etc. The only problem they were only fuselages, not a single engine anywhere to be found Upon concentrated investigation it was determined Japan was unable to produce the raw materials to build any engines. Interesting, they had thousands of airplanes that couldn't fly.

Fred Waterhouse 3-07-07

Which is exactly what I imagined it would be. Like having useless cars.

On Okinawa, there were lots of issues with the battlefield itself preventing US forces from pressing their materiel advantage to its fullest (hard to use tanks in mountains and mud), but even there, the Japanese weren't inflicting the same rate of casualties that the Germans did during the allied drive from Paris to the Rhine, where allied casualties were about 1.5 for every 1 German casualty. The fanaticism by the end of the war was waning. While some units fought more desperately, others were breaking. In Okinawa the US took thousands of prisoners where previously such could almost often be counted on two hands (sometimes literally). The Kwantgung army in Manchuria (often regarded as Japan's best) folded quite dramatically and yielded gargantuan numbers of prisoners to the Red Army.

Kamikaze attacks were not successful at stopping or slowing US forces for the preceding year that they'd been used, nor did they ever cause outrageous casualties. There's significant doubt that they'd ever be able to actually get most of those aircraft or boats into action. If they're having to leave their remaining carriers and capital ships in dock due to a lack of fuel, supplying ten thousand aircraft and lots of boats with fuel (assuming such planes and aircraft are actually usable and not empty hulls and have actually workable engines), even on one-way trips, is going to be extremely circumspect, and ensuring they had fighter cover was a nonexistent prospect (they had neither the fuel for escort runs, nor the pilots, and the aircraft were not being purposed for such). Again, there's a reason the Japanese no longer intercepted bombers.

As for the "Patriotic Citizens Fighting Corps", well, that's something that was never going to be particularly dangerous when they were issuing bamboo spears to old men and woodworking awls to teenage girls. Looking at equivalent units in other nations and their generally abysmal performance (outside a couple rare notable exceptions), such as the Volkssturm (who received fair amounts of automatic weapons and anti-tank rockets), assuming massive casualties inflicted by the PCFC is rather unrealistic, and Japanese civilians had shown a far greater propensity to flee, commit suicide, or surrender than fight in previous instances of encounter.

 BaronIveagh wrote:

 Iron_Captain wrote:

This thread caused me to look into this, and I found this essay: http://www.japanfocus.org/-Tsuyoshi-Hasegawa/2501/article.html Pretty interesting stuff. It argues that the Japanese surrender was mostly due to the Soviet invasion, because that crushed their last hope of getting out of the war through Soviet mediation, instead of having to surrender to the Americans. The bombs were far less of a shock.
It does seem however that Japan would have indeed ended the war without the nuclear bombings, so Camp 4 wins

Yes, the glorious Soviet Union was the only true victor in the Great Patriotic War.

In the Great Patriotic War (which is what in the West they incorrectly call the 'Eastern Front'), yes. But in the war against Japan, the US deserves most credit. The US had already practically won. The Soviet Invasion was just the final drop that forced the Japanese to surrender, by closing their last other way out.

 Ghazkuul wrote:
Im assuming you have never been on a naval ship before but the idea of a bunch of motor boats and such vessels loaded with bombs streaking in from a harbor or hidden in a shoal would literally scare the crap out of the navy. At night the only way to stop these would be visual observation from search lights, something they didn't wa

Speaking purely in my capacity as a naval historian ( as that's actually my specific field of study) the concept is really nothing to worry about, and certainly wouldn't take 'scare the crap out of' the American/British Navies. They were well used to it, and it was a standard risk. You see,torpedoes had been capable of doing tremendous damage by whacking ships below the waterline out of nowhere since the 1890's, and fleets were generally dispersed in such a way to avoid any big ships being hit, as well as being constructed with additional features to ensure they survived that sort of hit as best possible. With regards to small ships getting close, technological evolution in quick firers and then machine guns in the same 1890-1910 period quickly put an end to the idea of small boats with torpedoes/explosives getting anywhere near during daytime (that's the reason the French Jeune Ecole naval strategy went out of fashion:- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeune_%C3%89cole). With regards to night-time, the problem with night is that it works two ways. Either you illuminate your own boat so you can see what you're doing and where you're going, or you fumble around blindly, which makes it nigh on impossible to hit your target. If there are any sorts of reefs, you're just asking to run aground, and if you hit any sort of ocean current, your boat will have to make enough noise to resist it that you'll give away your advance regardless.

Their operational record speaks for themselves, quite frankly, they crippled (i.e. didn't sink) a single destroyer and a transport, and sank a few light landing craft, vessels which are designed by their very nature to be light and operate at a distance from the main ships. With regards to one of those landing craft sinkings, it took the sacrifice of fifty (that's correct, fifty) of those boats just to get in close to something that was already practically on the beach. Why? Because they got shot to pieces by the aforementioned rapid fire guns. The destroyer that was damaged? No casualties.

The correct way of doing things was the German style E-boats, which caused some severe casualties and disruptions by firing torpedoes from a distance. I would guess (I do not know) that the reason the Japanese built suicide boats instead is because torpedoes are highly intricate pieces of technology to manufacture, and require many advanced parts (gyrocompasses and suchlike) and they simply didn't have the supplies. It was just much easier to strap in a load of basic explosive into a speedboat. Unfortunately, whilst it might be cheaper, and easier to source the material, the tactics and munitions are of such inferior calibre that it was never going to be a successful strategy against any half-competent fleet.

Japan built very few of these suicide subs. What I find most interesting though is that the crew of these kamikaze subs were told to bail out at the last minute. How one hops out of a Submarine while it heads to it's target is beyond me. The men who manned them had to have known that their trip in these subs was likely going to be a one way trip.

The Type 3? It had about as good a gun, but inferior armor, and there was an absurdly small number of them, something like ~150 (some small variation around that number depending on source) in total were built, and even if US tank numbers had merely been as numerous as they were on Okinawa, they'd be outnumbered something like 50-1. The Japanese ability to keep them in the field, with fuel, ammunition, and spare parts was also highly suspect, and who knows what the condition of their construction was, as manufacturing standards had basically dropped through the floor.

Japanese tanks were very few and obsolete. Soviets used old BT-7 tanks (45mm cannon, paper-thin armour) aganst them in Manchuria, because even T-34 was overkill for them in most situations. Note, that crushed in Manchuria Japanese tanks were from elite troops.

I don't think only bomb or only Soviet attack caused Japan to surrender. There were many factors - loosing food sources, loosing fleet and air forces, revealing of kamikadze tactic failed, no weapons, no ammo, shock from Manchuria defeat, shock from Tokyo bombing, shock from atomic bombing. They were ready to die causing damages to attackers, but not just dying.

 CptJake wrote:
It may be speculation, but it is based on facts. The defenders of Saipan, Guam, Okinawa, Iwo Jima and many other places didn't up and surrender when it was clear they had lost. The Divine Wind that killed many US sailors was not the tactic of a people prone to surrender. Fighting for the home islands was not going to be easy. Yes that statement is speculation, but it is a lot more logical than 'they would have given up because the war was getting harder' which is basically the position you put forth.

No, I haven't put that position forward. Why would you try to enter a discussion if you aren't even reading what the other person is writing? Seriously, what do you get out of that?

Anyhow, just in case you actually read this, my point is that there simply can't be an expected scenario. A society under invasion is inherently unpredictable, and that goes doubly so for a conformist, closed society like Japan's, where the response is likely to be absolute resistance until breaking point causes a complete collapse. And who knows where that breaking point would be?

Interpreting what we can from higher level political commentary within Japan's government, we certainly know they weren't completely confident that the citizenry would fight until the end. And we know that the military's control of government had weakened, so from that we can begin to guess that perhaps terms with a new government were possible.

But that's all still guesswork. Invasion might have led to a backs against the wall mentality, firmed support behind the military government and produced the bloodbath so many people claim to 'know' was inevitable.

I just... really fething hate it when people are so certain about hypotheticals that were really unpredictable. That kind of false certainty is at its core really lazy.


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 Kanluwen wrote:
But we're not talking about murder charges, and we're not talking about courts.

It was a war. Don't like it? Too bad.

Seriously, this idea that war means you can do whatever is just complete and total bs and it just needs to die as fast as possible.

If nothing else, Roosevelt & Truman, Churchill and plenty of other leaders battled with the morality of their decisions on a daily basis. Trying to argue that it's war and it means you can kill who you want, how you want is fething offensive to their legacies.


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 whembly wrote:
I'm glad we used the nukes to force Japan to surrender.

It. Ended. The. War.

Further analysis on whether it's wrong, or we could've achieved victory in other manner is simply engaging in "Monday Morning Quarterbacking".

Perspective folks... for many of us, this monday morning quarterbacking is a luxury as there's no telling that some of us would be here now, as our ancestors could've died in the eventual land invasion.

No, declaring it ended the war (and that it couldn't have ended any other way) is Monday Morning Quarterbacking (or as we call it Monday’s Expert). It’s using what hindsight to wipe away uncertainty and unknowns.

Talking about what happened, why the decision was made, and what might have happened with different approaches isn’t being Monday’s Expert, it’s just talking about history.

It’s only when you start getting really certain about your opinion, and claiming you know how different alternatives would have worked out, and therefore what the best approach would have been that you get in to problematic territory.


Oh, and thanks for the chart about nukes. That was awesome, and something I’d always suspected but never known for sure.


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 Ghazkuul wrote:
and lastly Camp 3: Realists/Historians: this camp has pointed out that every expert on this from the actual bombing up until now, with 20/20 hindsight has said that if the Allied forces had been forced to fight a Land battle on Japan the casualty figures would have run into the Millions.

Absolutely fething not. No genuine expert is going to claim any kind of certainty on something like that. You are perhaps thinking of self-proclaimed internet experts, who's analysis begins with 'Iwo Jima was bloody' and ends with 'therefore...' Actual studies on this will talk about Japan’s record of fighting to the end, but then also consider extremely complex political situation in Japan, the overtures already advanced through the Soviet embassy and the incredible destruction already inflicted on Japan’s infrastructure.

And if anyone goes through all of that, and then ends by giving a definite prediction that they know would have happened, then they’re not doing history, they’re trying to sell you a political conclusion.

 Swastakowey wrote:
I also find this idea of 10,000 planes hard to accept. When Iwo Jima happened they had 3000 aircraft apparently (of course these aircraft could not aid the defense of the island), most of those were being used elsewhere or were waiting for the invasion of Japan. Could Japan build more than 7,000 planes (because many of those 3,000 were used in other island defenses and in mainland china) in that amount of time? They could not even replace aircraft losses throughout the war.

I wonder how true that number even is... something to look into I think.

According to Wikipedia, Japan produced 28,000 planes in 1944 so they could have lost 2/3rds of them and still have 10,000 left. 1944 was their best year of output. The fact that production fell to 8,000 in 1945 reflects the success of the Allied naval and air campaigns. There's no doubt that US planes ranged pretty freely over Japan in 1945 so the 10,000 defenders while it sounds scary obviously wasn't cutting the mustard.

Of course, 10,000 planes includes all types such as liaison and reconnaissance, not just fighters and bombers. As pointed out by others, you need aircrew, fuel, spare parts and so on as well, to keep planes going.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_aircraft_production

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:
I also find this idea of 10,000 planes hard to accept. When Iwo Jima happened they had 3000 aircraft apparently (of course these aircraft could not aid the defense of the island), most of those were being used elsewhere or were waiting for the invasion of Japan. Could Japan build more than 7,000 planes (because many of those 3,000 were used in other island defenses and in mainland china) in that amount of time? They could not even replace aircraft losses throughout the war.

I wonder how true that number even is... something to look into I think.

According to Wikipedia, Japan produced 28,000 planes in 1944 so they could have lost 2/3rds of them and still have 10,000 left. 1944 was their best year of output. The fact that production fell to 8,000 in 1945 reflects the success of the Allied naval and air campaigns. There's no doubt that US planes ranged pretty freely over Japan in 1945 so the 10,000 defenders while it sounds scary obviously wasn't cutting the mustard.

Of course, 10,000 planes includes all types such as liaison and reconnaissance, not just fighters and bombers. As pointed out by others, you need aircrew, fuel, spare parts and so on as well, to keep planes going.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_aircraft_production

Found a fair bit of evidence that many stock piled planes didn't have engines etc. Which doesn't help unless there is a strong breeze. But yea they had a lot of planes (12,000 apparently), just with no real means to use them.

The US Pacific Command estimated an invasion of Japan would result in literally over a half million casualties. Not a crazy number considering how die hard and hard fought invasions of half a dozen craphole Islands in the pacific were, much less a homeland.

Add on the mass suicides of families at Okinawa, the minimum cost of ANY invasion of the Japanese home islands would put the rest of the pacific war to shame.

Dropping the atomic bombs was the most moral possible thing to do. It stopped the killing as quickly and painlessly as possible.

 welshhoppo wrote:
I know that it was probably the best way to end the war.

Most efficient way to end the war in terms of saving American troops lives, but not the best. but one of the most appalling acts of any war. One of the largest deliberate targetings of a civilian population. I don't differentiate between that and terrorist bomb attacks on civilian centres -both result in the same thing: slaughter of non-combatants and the spreading of terror. A lot of people justify it by saying it happened during war, as if that makes it any more ok. Well I don't believe whatever Gods folks believe in, come judgement, would see it that way. And religious beliefs aside I like to think the "justifications" for it don't make it past most of our moral compasses.

 sebster wrote:



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 Ghazkuul wrote:
and lastly Camp 3: Realists/Historians: this camp has pointed out that every expert on this from the actual bombing up until now, with 20/20 hindsight has said that if the Allied forces had been forced to fight a Land battle on Japan the casualty figures would have run into the Millions.

Absolutely fething not. No genuine expert is going to claim any kind of certainty on something like that. You are perhaps thinking of self-proclaimed internet experts, who's analysis begins with 'Iwo Jima was bloody' and ends with 'therefore...' Actual studies on this will talk about Japan’s record of fighting to the end, but then also consider extremely complex political situation in Japan, the overtures already advanced through the Soviet embassy and the incredible destruction already inflicted on Japan’s infrastructure.

And if anyone goes through all of that, and then ends by giving a definite prediction that they know would have happened, then they’re not doing history, they’re trying to sell you a political conclusion.

Well, if we are talking casualties in total; then yeah ... millions would be fairly easy. Military casualties solely on the allied side - probably not. Invading a nation and ripping up it's infrastructure - especially considering it's a net food importer means that a whole lot of civilians are going to be starving to death and/or dying of disease, and in a nation of 70 odd million people 'millions dying' is not that unlikely.


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 thegreatchimp wrote:

 welshhoppo wrote:
I know that it was probably the best way to end the war.

Most efficient way to end the war in terms of saving American troops lives, but not the best. but one of the most appalling acts of any war. One of the largest deliberate targetings of a civilian population. I don't differentiate between that and terrorist bomb attacks on civilian centres -both result in the same thing: slaughter of non-combatants and the spreading of terror. A lot of people justify it by saying it happened during war, as if that makes it any more ok. Well I don't believe whatever Gods folks believe in, come judgement, would see it that way. And religious beliefs aside I like to think the "justifications" for it don't make it past most of our moral compasses.

 welshhoppo wrote:
I I really think that a bomb dropped of the coast of Japan first as a warning would have been best

Too right. Or warn the city to evacuate. But no, that didn't happen becasue it was aprtially a test, and part of the they wanted to see its effects on a civilian population.

Lets just hope nothing like it is ever even considered again

"Warn the city to evacuate". That is utter ignorant nonsense. First of all, how do you exactly evacuate 200k people? Where do they go? Do they have cars? Since WW2 Japanese people sure didn't for the most part. Trains? Enough to move 200k people?

And then why would you evacuate? Because your enemy, who you've been fighting tooth and nail for 4 years, says so? Incidentally, in cities producing bombs and planes needed for you to continue the war?

Hogwash. There was no way to save either city. There's no magic humane option that'd work. Save for the choice made.

As for this comment about 'a test', that's utter nonsense. A giant fireball, it's attendant shockwave and thermal flash were all very damned apparent what that'd do to Japanese cities, particularly since more people already died to a single night of firebombing in Tokyo.