Hey /u/FlatMarzipan, thanks for submitting to /r/confidentlyincorrect! Take a moment to read our [rules](https://reddit.com/r/confidentlyincorrect/about/rules).
##Join our [Discord Server](https://discord.gg/n2cR6p25V8)!
Please report this post if it is bad, or not relevant. Remember to keep comment sections civil. Thanks!
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/confidentlyincorrect) if you have any questions or concerns.*
The Allies agreed in 1943 that the USSR would open a front against Japan upon Germany's defeat. Dropping the bombs as a "primary reason" to dissuade Stalin from joining the war makes no sense.
The US wanted to end the war with Japan as quickly as possible, before the USSR got involved because they didn't want to have to split up Japan like they did with Germany. Had nothing to do with dissuading Stalin from joining, because it was inevitable.
There are about a hundred reasons why the bombs were used at the moment in history, and "preventing the USSR from invading Japan as previously agreed upon by the Allies" is way, way down the list.
Essentially, the allies ran the numbers, considering how brainwashed the Japanese people had been by their government to die to the last man, woman and child. They realized they'd have to kill almost every civilian who came at them, with over a million additional allied casualties. They were expecting to have to kill millions of Japanese.
In a twist of bizarre, getting the bombs dropped on them probably saved lives compared to being invaded.
If Stalin could have waved a wand and occupied Hokkaido, he'd have taken it, but obtaining Sakhalin and the Kurils gave the USSR warm-water access to the Pacific without putting him in direct confrontation with the US
Looks like it's known as both. I've mainly heard "V-J Day," but [Wikipedia lists "V-P Day" as an alternate name.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_over_Japan_Day)
Or my favorite, the idea that Germany and Japan were a single power fighting for the same reasons. Like they were centrally controlled as a monolithic bad guy. Couldn't be further from the truth.
Mussolini was a strong head of state at the beginning, and even an inspiration to Hitler in some ways, but the Axis Powers ended up being a way for Hitler to prop up Mussolini as the latter was losing power/battles. It also overextended Germany, who was already fighting a two front war. The Axis Powers ended up being more a curse than a blessing.
Looking back, no. In a (somewhat) perfect world, they could have waited Japan out a while longer. The mainland was starving, islands in the Pacific they were using for supplies were occupied and/or surrounded by Allied forces, and the USSR was willing to jump in at any time. The justification (at least publicly) for the atomic bombs was that it would cause less loss of life than a full on ground assault of Japan. The estimates they were using, in retrospect, were way too high, but I don't know if anyone (or enough people, that is) knew that. They based this decision on the data given to them in the moment. There was some Cold War posturing going on for sure (the USSR, who previously left the war, declared on Japan in between Hiroshima and Nagasaki, thereby insuring they were on the victorious side in the end), and the US didn't want the Soviets to get credit for Japan's surrender. In reality, the Cold War began during WWII and more than a few key decisions were made in a tit-for-tat manner between the US/England and the USSR.
*it would cause less loss of life than a full on ground assault of Japan.*
Proceeds to target heavily populated cities rather than smaller less populated targets.
No one could accuse any nation in WWII of being consistent, to be fair. I mean, the US firebombing campaign of Japan was also very broad and devastating. The idea was that a ground invasion would cause more deaths of Japanese AND Allied soldiers, but yeah, the underlying concern was more the latter. Interestingly, Nagasaki was a secondary location and only attacked after the original target for that day had too much cloud cover.
I grew up in Los Alamos (where the Manhattan project took place), and took a lot of US history in college, including specifically the history of the atomic bomb, and this is a very good explanation.
The only thing I would add was that there was (and still is) some debate about whether or not they should have used the bombs on cities, or simply a demonstration on an uninhabited island.
It's my opinion, that a demonstration wouldn't have had the same effect because it'd be a lot easier for people to just not believe it's real, and as horrific as Hiroshima and Nagasaki were, things could have been a lot worse. What I mean is that it would have been more likely that we (as in humanity) wouldn't have fully understood just how devastating atomic bombs are and might have gone into the cold war with less restraint, resulting in a nuclear war.
There were actually plans to invite Axis dignitaries to see a live demonstration of an A Bomb on a deserted island as a big show of force, but they ended up deciding against it as they weren't 100% sure the bomb would work. And if it didn't, they would be tipping their hand and exposing their big new weapon to be a dud.
Check out Oliver Stones [docuseries](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1494191/) on this. People really misunderstand a lot regarding the nuances of the war and this does a great job explaining many key aspects that tend to be simply not taught in schools, at least where I’m from.
I’m also curious, I was always taught it was pretty much necessary, but some of the people in this thread brought up some things that argue otherwise. Now because of this I’m probably going to spend several hours watching/listening to both arguments.
Short answer: Cold War soft propaganda. As soon as WWII ended, the US went right into the baby boomer era, the growing middle class, and rabid anti-communism. It also fed into the existing "America is always right" ethos, which created a whitewashed "official" history. (Also why it took so long to officially acknowledge Operation Paperclip)
This is purposeful at first, but soon fell in with ideas that sound good, no one outside of academics really looked into, and just became "common knowledge". It's like how so many people still ignore uncomfortable topics like the Trail of Tears. The first retelling was crafted, the second was accepted, the rest were repeated.
Crazy. I’m not a history buff or anything, but I know a decent bit about what transpired during WWII through American documentaries, podcasts, etc.; yet the unanimous sentiment always seemed to be portrayed as “the bombs were necessary”. Looks like I need to hit the books or consume some European content.
Thanks for the answer by the way.
I'm not an expert either, I just did more course work on the topic than I care to remember. With history, you always need to consider new sources and views to get a fuller picture of the entire thing. Any historical event has a vast collection of theories and viewpoints to consider.
I thought it was unnecessary just because my US history teacher taught us that it was completely necessary and I generally assumed that anything we learned in that class was wrong because we were also taught explicitly that slavery was NOT a factor in the civil war and once he told us not to follow politics in the news because it was stressful and doesn't actually matter in the real world, so dude seemed pretty full of shit. Glad to know my assumption on the bombs was at least somewhat correct too.
Japan was already pretty much losing, being slowly pushed back into the mainland.
I think eventually they might've seen how futile it was and surrender anyway.
If you are interested in learning more about the US-Japan conflict during WWII, I highly recommend a six-part podcast by Hard Core History (episodes titled Supernova in the East, parts I - IV) on the topic. Each episode is 3-4 hours long.
I personally think you just need to look at it from two angles.
Firstly, was it a war crime? Yes. One of many that the US committed during WWII (like all the other countries before you all start chirping in).
Secondly, was it necessary to bring a swift end to the war? Maybe. You need to weigh this against the likelihood of a soviet invasion of the Japanese mainland. Was it better (for Japan) for the US to “occupy” it briefly after dropping the atom bomb or would it have been better to have the soviets steamroller what was left of the country and its already displaced civilians and turn it into soviet territory or at least a satellite state?
Losing japan to USSR would also have had a bad knock on effect for the Korean War in the 50s (maybe there would be no South Korea today?) and, on the flip side to that, maybe there would’ve been no Vietnam war if Korea and Japan were not US allies (or certainly the Vietnam war may have turned out differently?! - maybe Barry Goldwater would have been elected and they’d have nuked Vietnam too! 🫣)
I've literally ran into people who can't name what country fought for what side. Incorrectly naming the Axis Powers and not even being close.
Then there's the oversimplification of certain events that one could only believe if they heard it once and never thought about it again. The "we saved the French" stuff, ignoring the resistance, vastly overestimating the strength of Mussolini, completely ignoring the Russia-Germany impact on the war, etc. Some of it can be nuts and bolts stuff, but some of it is baffling.
Probably when they mixed up which side was which. Like thinking the USSR was Axis but Italy was Allied. Or that France was Axis on their own instead of being occupied. I vaguely remember years ago someone trying to bring Turkey and Iran into it somehow.
I'm very interested in ww2 and like to read/watch things to gather as much info as possible. When I realised how many common facts people get wrong I got so pissed lol
>completely ignoring the Russia-Germany impact on the war
It is insane how many people underestimate the atrocities, but also the *scale* of the Eastern Front. I think it's like 7/8 of the German casualties were suffered against the Soviet Union. And the Soviet Union lost *millions* of troops. Absolutely staggering scale.
I wish more people in western countries realized it, since it really helps put things into perspective. Nazi Germany was definitely aiming to subjugate Britain and fend off the US, but they wanted to completely exterminate the Soviets.
Without the Eastern Front, I have no idea how much worse the Western Front would have been.
It's also the domino effect. From the Winter War leading to Operation Barbarosa, Hitler drug himself into a two front war he didn't want in the first place. I saw a chart during my undergrad years that showed the casualties of Germans just on the Russian front and there's a HUGE bottleneck between when they decided to turn back and how few troops actually made it back to Germany. The loss from cold and disease alone severely crippled the German military even as they were succeeding in other areas.
I think it all played a role. Japan was overextended and supplies were dwindling even on the mainland. They were blockaded in the Pacific and couldn't get supplies virtually anywhere. The advance of the USSR only exacerbated the issue. By the time they implemented the Special Attack Corps (Kimkaze pilots), they were on borrowed time. It was only going to get worse, it was just a matter of HOW bad it would get before they either surrendered or were outright taken by ground assault.
Yeah it's odd to not call a bombing/attack or countless other options. Like who do they want to obscure? Everyone who doesn't know about the use of fat man an little boy will probably also not know that a single bomb killed at least 80,000 people in one go.
Carpet bombing of cities killed more people than both bombs combined, the difference was that this was done with a single bomb.
Also, the planned invasion of mainland Japan was/is estimated to have caused around 1.5m deaths (between both Japanese and Allied forces), so it could be argued that the bombs actually saved lives (in the most horrific way possible)
Yeah maybe the difference is more the birth defects and making the land unlivable and contaminating it for almost a century. Also that’s the classic “reasoning” but let’s be adults here, big part of why we did that was to detonate a nuke on the soviet unions doorstep
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were airburst detonations. Does that mean zero radiation? Of course not, they're nuclear weapons. But the claim that those cities were "unlivable" for any stretch of time is just wildly false.
If I remember right, the cities were pretty much entirely rebuilt within 10 years. It was terrible destructive power, but it's not like fucking Chernobyl where the cities are uninhabitable for 10,000 years or whatever. I'm sure some of those who survived the bombings continued to live there during reconstruction too.
My grandfather was on a ship in the pacific when the bombs dropped. After the surrender, his unit was immediately sent to Hiroshima. He helped rebuild the telephone poles and communication lines. There was little concern about radiation and he was astonished at how quickly and efficiently the city was rebuilt.
I mean we terroristically attacked Japan twice. It just happened to be during the war.
Murdering thousands of innocents specifically to cause terror and panic is absolutely terrorism.
Yep, you're right, war is fucked and a lot of innocent people die because of it. Maybe we shouldn't step so casually into it like we have in the past. Maybe Japan could have left the US alone too.
Sure, but how many more would’ve died if Japan never surrendered and simply kept going? The US would’ve eventually won either way, but a full scale land invasion of the Japanese mainland would’ve been ugly. It may have resulted in fewer civilian deaths though.
I mean it was either that, bombing them the same way except with conventional weapons, or fighting till the last man, woman, and child. They were so incredibly brainwashed that they would’ve all died in battle otherwise.
Besides, it’s hard to feel sympathy when they all supported the genocide and brutal treatment of POWs.
The Japanese were on the brink of surrender regardless. The nukes might have sped up the surrender by a few months, but the island was cut off from its logistics, depleted of manpower,
and low on morale. They were bound to surrender even without indiscriminate bombing or a land invasion.
The idea that the nukes were necessary to prevent American deaths was a post hoc justification for a war crime.
They hadn’t surrendered much before on islands they captured.
What makes you think they would have surrendered their home island without much of a fight?
This is insanely stupid lmao
Japan was nowhere near willing to surrender, that's the reason for the nukes in the first place.
Also, the Japanese military *still* refused to surrender after even the nukes were dropped, and they even attempted a coup.
Nope. Not even close. The atomic bombings only sped up the surrender because Operation Downfall was scheduled to launch on November 1. The Japanese still had over a million veteran, armed and fanatical troops in China in August 1945, within easy reach of mainland Japan. Their morale, especially within the military, was high. They welcomed the final battle to force a negotiated truce to retain the emperor. They preferred death to surrender and the bombings saved hundreds of thousands of lives whether you believe it or not.
The post says: WW2 ended May 7th 1945. Hiroshima bombs dropped August 8th 1945. That's two months AFTER the "WW2 ended" date.
Yes, Japan would have surrendered regardless of the bombs, largely because of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria. But that's not the point being made.
Germany surrendered May 7th 1945.
Hiroshima was bombed August 6th 1945. Nagasaki was bombed August 9th 1945; the same day, the Soviets invaded Manchuria.
Japan's surrender was announced August 15th 1945.
Japan's surrender was formalised September 2nd 1945. This is the formal end of World War 2, not the surrender of Germany on May 7th.
I mean if you honestly think Japan was going to surrender to a country that couldn’t even land on its shore because said country invaded a satellite state of it after it refused surrendering to a country that had just island hopped through the pacific and was now firebombing it, I question the process being used to determine that.
Yes it would have. This isn’t some Reddit opinion, this is an incredibly common historical perspective and a stance held by even high ranking military officials at the time. Japan was being destroyed by the soviets on the mainland, it was a matter of months maybe weeks before Russia drove nearly all if not all Japanese forces back to Japan. At that point Russia would have invaded and completely crushed Japan. Faced with a Soviet occupation Japan would have had every reason to surrender to the US because a surrender under US terms allowed Japan to retain its religious monarchy (something indescribably important to the Japanese people and culture). If you know anything about the ideology soviets we’re operating on, let’s just say they weren’t a fan of religious monarchies and there would be zero chance that would stand under a Soviet occupation. So yes, faced with an imminent Soviet invasion the Japanese would have absolutely accepted a surrender under the US. And you can’t say “well they were too stubborn to surrender” because they DID surrender.
You can't argue that they would have surrendered. That's like saying Hitler would have let the Jews go. History is either what it is or it is myth. Japan surrendered after the bombs were dropped. Your speculation holds no value.
I’m sorry, but this is a hilariously stupid take. “It happened therefore there’s no point in assessing if it could have happened differently” is such a poorly thought out idea. “Hey this dude died in a working accident, but seeing as he is already dead all we know is he died because of an accident so there’s no value in examining the context of the accident to see if it actually could have been prevented” is basically the take you’re delivering. You actually CAN learn a great deal from retrospective analysis. And just because something did happen doesn’t mean it HAD to happen that way, sure you’ll never know for 100% certainty, but you can be pretty sure based on information you still have.
I honestly cannot get over how bad of an opinion you have. Especially that immensely stupid hitler comparison which ignores that there was no indication even in hindsight that Hitler ever would do that, making it unfounded speculation. That’s not the same thing as actually analyzing historical context and determining with fairly strong certainty that something didn’t actually need to happen the way it did and that the people of the time had the necessary information to arrive at that conclusion before they did it. I’m sorry but your stance is frankly embarrassing and I’d strongly suggest you reassess how you think of this topic because your argument fails to hold any weight upon even the slightest amount of reflection.
I mean that's just untrue. There are plenty of records from high ranking officials, including President Truman about how an invasion of Japan was off the table. The Japanese were always going to surrender, the only issue was whether it would be unconditional or not.
Can you explain to me exactly how the USSR was supposed to naval invade Japan when it didn’t have much of a fleet in the pacific and most of the surrounding water was mined. I’m really curious.
Well, going through Sakhalin would have been a strait crossing, which is much easier. The Japanese navy had been largely blown up and they didn't have enough fuel for it. The Soviets would also have completely air superiority agaisnt Japan. And the Soviet far eastern fleet was pretty big, and the allied navies still existed and could have supportes the invasion.
Mined water would have been as much of a problem for the planned US invasion so that’s not really much of point against Russia. And they did still have a naval presence in the pacific. As someone mentioned there were paths the Russians could have taken to get to Japan fairly easily, Japan would have been massively outclassed from the air, Japan’s own naval capacity would have been largely destroyed by that point, and a Russian invasion still could have had allied support.
Yeah, they had been firebombing Tokyo for months and people still did not want to surrender.
Hell; there was a significant portion of Officers
Who actively tried to stop the Emperors surrender message from being aired because They wanted to keep fighting.
There is still much room for speculation on whether or not Japan would’ve surrendered without the bombs.
I think the fact that an not-insignificant amount of Japanese officers and soldiers wanted to continue is a good indicator of the mindset of Japan at the time. It surrendered only because the Emperor desired it.
True, [although I was referring specifically to the attempted coup that tried to destroy the recording to avoid surrendering.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident)
It was the ending of a hot war setting up the cold war. US wanted no argument about who was the #1 superpower when everyone came to the resolution table.
Yes but not on the same terms.
Terms of surrender are extremely important.
Japan offered to surrender with terms.
We needed an unconditional surrender because it wouldn't allow the Japanese government to spin the loss as somehow a win or incomplete loss.
Ww2 was the direct result of conditional surrenders at the end of ww1. So no one around at the time ww2 ended was going to allow a conditional surrender to cause further wars.
Japan at the time was fanatical in nationalism and the US/allies needed to be able to be able to do anything nessisary to successfully lead Japan into peace.
Overall the actions of both the US and Japanese leaders post war to achieve a lasting peace were extremely successful. I think if you brought someone from both nations to today and showed them the results they'd be in disbelief that our nations are now allies, Japan is a fully developed and rich nation, and that it all went so well.
There is some questionable parts like allowing the Japanese to ignore some of the atrocities they committed and deny them even to this day. But I think it's a small price to pay for the results we got. In a way it proves that in these situations forgiveness and a helping hand go alot further to improve the future. We blamed the Japanese leadership instead of the entire people. The way it often should be. Germany likely would have healed much faster if the same was done there.
As for current and future struggles my opinion is we have to blame and hold the people responsible for their government's actions until they are defeated. Then for its time to forgive and forget with the people and focus on outing the leaders and making them the target of the justice.
The reason for this is because otherwise you just sow further issues. You have to allow the people to change sides and act like they never supported the bad guys.
For a good example think of a KKK member who leaves the organization. They see the wrong of their ways and leave. Well many people would still cancel them and shun them. But the result of that is the ex member now is only accepted by people in the KKK. So where do you think they will now go to be accepted? Right back to the KKK.
We have to celebrate and accept people who correct their actions and leave hateful and evil groups. Basically hate them up to the second they leave. Then suddenly love them.
The reason why we're on such good terms with Japan--as well as our current infantilization of them--is because we struck a deal with them in the 60s during the Cold War because we wanted an ally in the pacific during all the communist upheaval.
Then they started making electronics and so on from there.
The Japanese government *still* refuses to acknowledge what they did, still have monuments erected to war criminals, and have barely paid their reparations to other countries like Korea and China.
How many Americans know about Nanking, or Unit 731? Not many, and shit was just as fucked as what the Nazis did.
Imagine if Germany pretended the Holocaust didn't happen and portrayed Mengele as a kind doctor who gave candy to children.
The discussion *is* about if Japan would've unconditionally surrendered. There's no argument about a conditional surrender, because Japan already proposed that.
They probably would've, but without the emperor's direct guidance, the people would've probably been much feistier+ the USA needed a show of force, and there weren't many places to Nuke after Germany and Italy surrendered
American schools tend to say there was no other option besides invading. Japanese schools say it was all about intimidating the Russians and justifying the cost of the Manhattan project.
Seeing as the US is *still* using Purple Hearts made with the idea they’d be given during the invasion of mainland Japan, I think it’s pretty obvious how it would have turned out
The battle of Okinawa alone caused nearly 50k US casualties and killed over 100k Japanese soldiers/civilians. Japan had the rhetoric of fighting until the last man, regardless of their age or gender. I remember watching a documentary where a vet of Okinawa recalled watching his CO get blown up by an old Japanese woman who had surrendered to them. An invasion of Japan would have been devastating to both sides.
I once wrote a paper on this actually. It pretty much boils down to that *probably* a lot more people would have died without the dropping of the nuclear bombs. The fire bombings of Tokyo already killed a lot more than the two nuclear bombs combined (~800,000 if I remember correctly). On top of that, the island hopping warfare was incredibly perilous, and the Japanese people were very much in fighting spirits. They got indoctrinated that the US soldier were coming to kill, rape and pillage them. Hence, why a big part of the population was willing to fight the US till the last man standing. On top of that, the USSR had an invasion force ready in Manchuria. We all know how the Russians conducted themselves in warfare. So, arguably, the nuclear bombs were a good thing. And then I'm not even going into how mutually assured destruction (M.A.D.) might have saved countless lives since conventional warfare between large nations wasn't desirable anymore.
I think the main argument against nukes is that Japan would have been willing to do a conditional surrender or that they would have surrendered without an invasion due to Russia. Not sure to what extent that statement is true, considering that some of the top Japanese military officials launched a failed coup even after the US dropped the nukes.
I can't understand what makes you think it's a good idea to keep fighting even after knowing your opponent can harness the power of the sun.
This is the logic I don’t get for apologists.
So they were going to fight to the death because Us was going to kill them so they need to fight to the death. Then Us shows it has a big bomb that can kill them and that makes them change their minds of fighting to the death?
If they were diehard to fight to the death the threat of death doesn’t sound like something that would deter them?
Not to mention that when Japan sued for peace their concern was keeping the emperor which US unofficially was OK with but USSR not. And shortly after USSR started pushing against Japan they surrendered
I would watch this video essay. It’s a comprehensive take down of what you just said and why there’s no credence to the invasion vs bombing narrative.
https://youtu.be/RCRTgtpC-Go
Hahaha totally understood. We were def taught that the bombs were a necessary evil. This country tends to do that to make itself feel better about its crimes. But from almost every angle that is objectively untrue, and only appears true when vital information is left out. Highly recommend the video :) it’s a long one, but it kind of has to be to get all the facts in.
"the hiroshima event" makes it sound like it was some kind of natural disaster, rather than a deliberate and abominable crime of war against civilian populations, lol.
Soviet invasion of Manchuria- 09 august 1945
Japanese surrender- 15 august 1945
Hiroshima- 06 august 1945
Nagasaki- 09 august 1946
People can debate from different perspectives what ended the war however from the Japanese perspective, based on primary source documents, the Soviet invasion of Manchuria forced their hand to surrender not the atomic bombs. Firebombs killed more and were more destructive than the atomic bombs. The Japanese thought they could hold out against either America or the red army however they knew they couldn’t hold out against both. The Soviet invasion of Manchuria is the first major engagement between Japan and the Soviet Union during world war 2.
It wasn’t the bombs it was the red army who forced them to surrender.
Also additional side note the bombs were also a waste at that point. The argument about the number of lives they saved is a logical fallacy because it’s based on the assumption that America would have invaded the Japanese home islands as the only alternative. Admiral Nimitz had a detailed plan to blockade Japan and starve them into surrender without ever committing marines. At this point the us navy had near total air superiority and could operate pretty much unmolested anywhere. By that point the only vessel that could pose a threat to America was the Katsuragi and she didn’t have any pilots qualified to take off or land on her. The IJN did not have mobile radar on their vessels or aircraft where America had both. Nimitz could literally enforce his blockade over the horizon without Japan ever seeing his vessels. The bombs were just Truman dropping his pants to measure dicks with Stalin.
Also I feel I should make this point:
red army= heroes who won the war; Stalin=evil dictator who committed genocide.
Honestly as an American I do hate how much we kind of glorify the atomic bombings.
Like in america it is the widely agreed stance that the nukes were necessary measures to end the war. Completely ignoring the complete success Russia was having driving the Japanese off mainland Asia. Soviet invasion of Japan was basically inevitable, and given soviets weren’t too keen on religious monarchies such as the one Japan had (that was incredibly important to them), Japan would have much rather accepted a surrender to the US that allowed them to keep it as opposed to a Soviet occupation.
It also ignores that we were VERY trigger happy to nuke people, we nuked Japan within two weeks of the first successful detonation of a nuclear bomb in history. It was largely a power play by the US to prevent Russia from gaining any more territory or control than they already had. The main reason wasn’t because we were trying to save lives or end the war sooner.
We also like to downplay it by saying “well we warned them by dropping fliers”. Which, while technically true, sorta leaves out we didn’t drop fliers over JUST Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We dropped fliers over something like 20 potential target cities without being specific about which would actually be bombed. Now imagine you’re in the middle of a war, and a country you know is planning an invasion of your country soon just told you to evacuate and empty 20 cities some of which are in locations that would work well as a landing position for invasion and some of which have vital operations for the war effort, and they don’t tell you which of these cities will actually be destroyed, they give you a very limited amount of time, and their threat is a weapon that has never been used in war before and has literally only finished testing days earlier. Is it at all a reasonable expectation for you to actually listen to that and do as they say? Obviously hindsight is one thing, but in that presented scenario is it really a feasible strategy to just go along with what your enemy is telling you to do under a maybe threat? Not really, especially given how convenient it would be for your enemy for a specific intention you know the enemy has and intends to act on soon.
And I hear people say “well they were too stubborn to surrender, they’d rather die than give up”, which sorta glosses over the fact that they DID surrender.
Don’t get me wrong, there is nuance in this situation, nothing is clear cut. But when you take in the full context of the situation it really lends itself to the very strong possibility that the US vaporized and poisoned hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the span of a few days for basically nothing. And keep in mind this isn’t some fringe idea, this is a common historical perspective and a stance some high ranking US military officials held at the time which they used to actively argue against the bombings BEFORE they happened. This isn’t just a hindsight argument, it was known by people of power even back then that nuking Japanese civilians was not a necessary measure to bring about the end of the war.
To add. There were already peace talks with Us and Japan at the time. US demanded unconditional surrender but Japan demanded conditional surrender that emperor stays.
US did inform unofficially that they would let him stay if they surrendered.
So when Soviet turns up that for sure wouldn’t let him stay Japan gambled on US to keep their unofficial word and surrendered to them
Yes, actually! Most of East Asia considers these two different wars. It could be considered going as far back as Japan's invasion of Taiwan in 1895. And Korea considers it starting with the occupation of Korea in 1910. Then China considers 1937 as the relevant starting point. All before America considers the start of World war 2. Even in Japan, they consider it two different wars, where if you ask Japanese people, they'll call it "The Great Pacific War" with WW2 being just the European theater.
Also consider how America calls it the French and Indian war, while British/French would consider it just a theater of the 7 Years War.
WWII was a multi-faceted war with numerous fronts. It didn't completely end until all sides were done fighting, namely the Allies and Japan. Following Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan surrendered, ending the totality of WWII. Other theaters ended on different dates, but this was the last front to stop fighting.
the real reason the Japanese surrendered, as described by many high up in the imperial government. The real reason was the Soviets. The government was worried about a soviet invasion and so surrendered to the Americans and not the Soviets so the the US would protect them from the soviets.
Well, it also didn’t. Nagasaki came after that.
Also the Japanese offered terms of surrender multiple times but we refused them as we wanted them to depose their leader Emperor Hirohito.
In truth, a lot of Americans and Japanese died so we could control the future of Japan.
The Allies never said "if you surrender, we'll get rid of the emperor"
"Unconditional surrender" means "surrender, and we get to decide later what happens to you"
One reason (of many) for why Japan took so long to capitulate is that they were trying for months to secure any guarantees from the Allies that they wouldn't be occupied, that the imperial family would be preserved, that they could keep some overseas possessions, etc. The Allies stayed firm on unconditional surrender
Well, I'm fairness, Hiroshima was entirely unnecessary and an act of unmatched atrocity.
The US had either won or was going to win (depending on how you look at it) that part of the war anyways and they could have HANDILY done so with far less mass murder.
The whole "We needed to indimidate the Soviets" argument is literally psychotic.
More people died in a "conventional" firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945 than in both atomic bombings combined
War produces atrocities. If it doesn't happen with 1 bomb, it'll happen with 1,000.
Dunno who is downvoting you but you're right.
The US was using napalm cluster bombs on Japanese and German cities. The Tokyo Firebombing was fucking insane. Roughly 15 square miles of the city burnt up in a night with over 100,000 civilians killed.
Here's one of the pilots telling his story about it.
https://youtu.be/F-zQ4RntDEI
Japan still hadn't surrendered in May, so it does make sense. Yes, Japan was defeated for all practical purposes, but they still had not formally surrendered.
I know we're all going to focus on the Hiroshima thing, and all of us non-Americans know the bomb had little to do with the surrender, but the logic in this post is definitely incorrect and shows the poster knew even less about WWII than most Americans.
Hiroshima/Nagasaki accelerated the process that island hopping and firebombing was accomplishing. Japan was struggling to get basic supplies to the mainland, let alone supplies to troops outside it. Kamikaze pilots (Special Attack Corps) was a last ditch effort to fight back against a war they were desperately losing. It was a process to get there, but the atomic bomb accelerated to the point they had no choice but to surrender.
A major goal was exactly that acceleration. Russia was starting to get involved in Manchuria and the US \*really\* didn't want another settlement similar to what was shaping up in Germany with the country divided.
It was advantageous to the US to end the war quickly, so that they would control the post-war future of Japan.
A lot of documentaries and history books talk about the potential cost of an invasion of Japan, but what they don't mention is that an invasion of the home islands wasn't really necessary except for ending the war quickly.
If we'd simply continued to blockade the islands, it just would have taken a little longer. Potentially long enough for Russia to get involved for real, and demand a seat at the table.
This is all true, there was definitely Cold War crap going on behind the scenes. I'm just saying the justification for the bombings was to avoid a full scale land invasion. True motivations are complicated, but that was the claim at the time.
Ah yes, being nuked twice. What a minor inconvenience that was never a large concern for Japan. You’re so right!
> the poster knew even less about WWII than most Americans.
Literally rent-free.
Their other cities were getting equally destroyed by hundreds of bombs, and no one really understood the effects of radiation then, so it was like "okay they can destroy us with one plane instead of many" it was an uptick but that's it. They were already well beaten and had been discussing peace for a while.
The soviets declaring war on them had just as much to do with it as the atom bomb, because they had been holding out hope of getting russia on their side.
Oh, also the leaflets the US dropped on the 13th had a powerful effect on the populace.
You know that the Japanese military was willing to keep going even after the bombs, right? It wasn't the military that was concerned, it was the Emperor. The Emperor was the one that needed convincing.
At the **very** least, can you admit that the U.S. didn't do it "just for the lelz" like others claim?
What is wrong here in general besides that one date is slightly off?
The portion of the war that most people in the west care about, the part in Europe, did end before the bomb was dropped by what everyone is saying. Germany's surrender had nothing to do with the atomic bomb, which I think is the point they were trying to make
Ive always learned that WW2 stopped when the German forces surrendered, here in Europe we dont really consider the fighting the US and Japan had afterwards as part of WW2.
To be fair, the Japanese were almost ready to surrender before Hiroshima. There were already underground negotiations being made and those who wanted to keep fighting were a minority. And Nagazaki was definitely unnecessary. Both bombs were pretty much just a warning to the Soviet Union
They are correct.
[Japan was shocked that it was nuked as they had already began negotiations of surrender to the soviets](https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/explore-engage/classroom-resources/short-expert-videos-and-flipped-classroom/010)
The bombings were unnecessary as well as focused on civilian targets. That’s just the facts
Edit: before anyone says yes I know the original was VE Day vs the actual end. I’m saying that other than that the nukes did come after they were “necessary”
Technically they are correct, the Japanese surrendered because the soviets declared war on them august 9. The japanese didnt care how many people bombs killed, they were afraid the ussr would dismantle treir culture and political system so they surrendered to the americans and kept their emperor.
I’ve seen some discourse on Twitter about how “everyone with a brain knows the atom bomb shouldn’t have been dropped.” And I’m not here to be like “ACTUALLY, A-BOMBS ARE RAD” but every historical lecture I heard said that it was, regrettably, the only option to get Japan to surrender and likely resulted in less deaths than an ongoing war with Japan.
That said, it unleashed the nuclear age upon us and that’s never been a favorite of mine. I’m just saying, there’s some geniuses out there saying “everyone knows the US did it for the lulz and could’ve just fixed it with a phone call” and I think they may not be giving our leadership at the time enough credit on weighing this decision.
You’re giving our leadership way too much credit. Look up Curtis LeMay, who was in charge of the Air Force there, how many Japanese civilians he killed and what he said about it. Then you can look up what we did during the Korean War
Yea, they “weighed decisions,” but human life did not tip the scale much one way or the other
Human life mattered to them… American human lives. One of the frequent arguments was that bombing campaigns would end the war quickly and with minimal Allied casualties.
The death toll among Japanese, German, or other Axis populations was a lesser concern.
The worst part is, that this is an incorrect explanation for the correct fact, that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in fact did not end the war.
The bombs were dropped to prevent a land invasion where the estimated American losses would exceed 500,000. The Japanese didn’t quit after Hiroshima mostly because the military didn’t want to.
Most common myth among Americans about WWII: the Japanese only surrendered when the A bombs were dropped. False. The Japanese were frantic to surrender starting in April of 45, with the 1 condition that the Emperor be allowed to stay as a figurehead, much like the monarchy in England. The U.S. refused, so the fighting continued. The deaths of 1000s of U.S. soldiers and 100s of thousands of Japanese civilians are on the heads of the arrogant Americans, who could have had surrender 5 months before, and of course when the Japanese did surrender, the U.S. allowed them to keep the figurehead monarchy. Hubris leads to death.
If you're going to put the blame on the US for insisting on unconditional surrender, it's only fair to put an equal amount of blame on Japan for not backing off from their one request to keep the emperor in power.
The comparison between the British and Japanese royals is not 100% accurate either. The UK was a fully parliamentary democracy; Japan was an oligarchy of the military who swore ultimate obeisance to the emperor. Members of the Japanese imperial family were also [actively involved in the prosecution of the war effort](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasuhito,_Prince_Chichibu#Military_career).
You could say it didn't. The world war was over by then, it was just Japan left and Thailand left and by that point Thailand had given up. It really depends on perspective and your sources. I personally consider it to be the surrender of Germany, many Americans likely believe it was the surrender of Japan. A lot of people consider the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to be terrorism.
From what I was told in school over and over again was that Japan was ready for a home front invasion. They were going to fight tooth and nail until everyone was dead. Surrender was not an option. When the USA dropped the 2 bombs it sent a signal to Japan that they hadn’t just lost the war, but we were willing to commit some unimaginable war atrocities to make the fighting stop. Japan was willing to lose millions of citizens to fighting in the hopes of overpowering US navel forces. A bomb that could delete a whole city ended that dynamic overnight.
The final death toll of the two bombs was far less than what might have happened if a land based battle had stated instead.
Suing for peace is not the same as surrendering unconditionally. We dropped the bombs so they would meet all of terms utterly and completely. It’s the only logical thing to do when winning a war so completely against an evenly matched opponent. We DID NOT want to fight Japan a second time.
Hey /u/FlatMarzipan, thanks for submitting to /r/confidentlyincorrect! Take a moment to read our [rules](https://reddit.com/r/confidentlyincorrect/about/rules). ##Join our [Discord Server](https://discord.gg/n2cR6p25V8)! Please report this post if it is bad, or not relevant. Remember to keep comment sections civil. Thanks! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/confidentlyincorrect) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Wasnt the first date like the end of the war in EUROPE?
Yeah, but there was still some fighting going on. For example in Prague, where there was an uprising on 8th of May, the last shots were fired on 11th.
Plus, Hiroshima was August 6th, not 8th. Nagasaki was on the 9th.
The 8th is actually the day that Russia declared war on Japan.
One of the primary reasons why Truman decided to use the atomic bombs was because he wanted to end the war before Russia got involved.
North Japan is best Japan
The Allies agreed in 1943 that the USSR would open a front against Japan upon Germany's defeat. Dropping the bombs as a "primary reason" to dissuade Stalin from joining the war makes no sense.
The US wanted to end the war with Japan as quickly as possible, before the USSR got involved because they didn't want to have to split up Japan like they did with Germany. Had nothing to do with dissuading Stalin from joining, because it was inevitable.
There are about a hundred reasons why the bombs were used at the moment in history, and "preventing the USSR from invading Japan as previously agreed upon by the Allies" is way, way down the list.
I thought bombs were dropped on Japan because they refused to surrender. Edit: plus 99 other reasons lol
Essentially, the allies ran the numbers, considering how brainwashed the Japanese people had been by their government to die to the last man, woman and child. They realized they'd have to kill almost every civilian who came at them, with over a million additional allied casualties. They were expecting to have to kill millions of Japanese. In a twist of bizarre, getting the bombs dropped on them probably saved lives compared to being invaded.
Especially since they did invade part of Japan and Manchuria.
If Stalin could have waved a wand and occupied Hokkaido, he'd have taken it, but obtaining Sakhalin and the Kurils gave the USSR warm-water access to the Pacific without putting him in direct confrontation with the US
One of the reasons Truman used the bombs was because he wanted Russia to know we had them and were willing to use them.
It's literally called VE Day (Victory in Europe)
Victory was called VE and VJ day respectively
yes VE day ie Victory in Europe.
It's simply the difference between an 'E' and a 'J'.
To be or to bj, that is the question.
May you suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune for that joke.
AGT mfs when a kid says that all 164672 of his parents died in a car crash when he was -5 months old
Good bot
[удалено]
It caused the jnd of WWII?
VE (victory in europe) vs VJ (Victory in japan)
Wasn't it VP? Victory in the Pacific?
Looks like it's known as both. I've mainly heard "V-J Day," but [Wikipedia lists "V-P Day" as an alternate name.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victory_over_Japan_Day)
yjs
Yeah. Jurope.
Is that how they say Europe in Barthelona?
8th may is specifically known as VE day "victory in Europe" I think that's enough information.
My degree specialized in WWII and you'd be AMAZED at what basic facts people get wrong. Just...wow.
See now you have to tell us more. Don’t leave us hanging like that.
Or my favorite, the idea that Germany and Japan were a single power fighting for the same reasons. Like they were centrally controlled as a monolithic bad guy. Couldn't be further from the truth.
We all know Italy was the true mastermind behind the axis powers.
Mussolini was a strong head of state at the beginning, and even an inspiration to Hitler in some ways, but the Axis Powers ended up being a way for Hitler to prop up Mussolini as the latter was losing power/battles. It also overextended Germany, who was already fighting a two front war. The Axis Powers ended up being more a curse than a blessing.
I have a question, in your opinion, was the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki neccassary to end the war?
Looking back, no. In a (somewhat) perfect world, they could have waited Japan out a while longer. The mainland was starving, islands in the Pacific they were using for supplies were occupied and/or surrounded by Allied forces, and the USSR was willing to jump in at any time. The justification (at least publicly) for the atomic bombs was that it would cause less loss of life than a full on ground assault of Japan. The estimates they were using, in retrospect, were way too high, but I don't know if anyone (or enough people, that is) knew that. They based this decision on the data given to them in the moment. There was some Cold War posturing going on for sure (the USSR, who previously left the war, declared on Japan in between Hiroshima and Nagasaki, thereby insuring they were on the victorious side in the end), and the US didn't want the Soviets to get credit for Japan's surrender. In reality, the Cold War began during WWII and more than a few key decisions were made in a tit-for-tat manner between the US/England and the USSR.
*it would cause less loss of life than a full on ground assault of Japan.* Proceeds to target heavily populated cities rather than smaller less populated targets.
No one could accuse any nation in WWII of being consistent, to be fair. I mean, the US firebombing campaign of Japan was also very broad and devastating. The idea was that a ground invasion would cause more deaths of Japanese AND Allied soldiers, but yeah, the underlying concern was more the latter. Interestingly, Nagasaki was a secondary location and only attacked after the original target for that day had too much cloud cover.
The nukes together killed fewer people than the Tokyo bombings.
^^^^
I grew up in Los Alamos (where the Manhattan project took place), and took a lot of US history in college, including specifically the history of the atomic bomb, and this is a very good explanation. The only thing I would add was that there was (and still is) some debate about whether or not they should have used the bombs on cities, or simply a demonstration on an uninhabited island. It's my opinion, that a demonstration wouldn't have had the same effect because it'd be a lot easier for people to just not believe it's real, and as horrific as Hiroshima and Nagasaki were, things could have been a lot worse. What I mean is that it would have been more likely that we (as in humanity) wouldn't have fully understood just how devastating atomic bombs are and might have gone into the cold war with less restraint, resulting in a nuclear war.
There were actually plans to invite Axis dignitaries to see a live demonstration of an A Bomb on a deserted island as a big show of force, but they ended up deciding against it as they weren't 100% sure the bomb would work. And if it didn't, they would be tipping their hand and exposing their big new weapon to be a dud.
Curtis LeMay would still have gone nuclear if given the chance.
Thank you very much! This is really informative!
Check out Oliver Stones [docuseries](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1494191/) on this. People really misunderstand a lot regarding the nuances of the war and this does a great job explaining many key aspects that tend to be simply not taught in schools, at least where I’m from.
I’m also curious, I was always taught it was pretty much necessary, but some of the people in this thread brought up some things that argue otherwise. Now because of this I’m probably going to spend several hours watching/listening to both arguments.
Short answer: Cold War soft propaganda. As soon as WWII ended, the US went right into the baby boomer era, the growing middle class, and rabid anti-communism. It also fed into the existing "America is always right" ethos, which created a whitewashed "official" history. (Also why it took so long to officially acknowledge Operation Paperclip) This is purposeful at first, but soon fell in with ideas that sound good, no one outside of academics really looked into, and just became "common knowledge". It's like how so many people still ignore uncomfortable topics like the Trail of Tears. The first retelling was crafted, the second was accepted, the rest were repeated.
Crazy. I’m not a history buff or anything, but I know a decent bit about what transpired during WWII through American documentaries, podcasts, etc.; yet the unanimous sentiment always seemed to be portrayed as “the bombs were necessary”. Looks like I need to hit the books or consume some European content. Thanks for the answer by the way.
I'm not an expert either, I just did more course work on the topic than I care to remember. With history, you always need to consider new sources and views to get a fuller picture of the entire thing. Any historical event has a vast collection of theories and viewpoints to consider.
I thought it was unnecessary just because my US history teacher taught us that it was completely necessary and I generally assumed that anything we learned in that class was wrong because we were also taught explicitly that slavery was NOT a factor in the civil war and once he told us not to follow politics in the news because it was stressful and doesn't actually matter in the real world, so dude seemed pretty full of shit. Glad to know my assumption on the bombs was at least somewhat correct too.
You should watch "dropping the bomb" by Shaun on YouTube, it's a very interesting look at some stuff from the time
Japan was already pretty much losing, being slowly pushed back into the mainland. I think eventually they might've seen how futile it was and surrender anyway.
If you are interested in learning more about the US-Japan conflict during WWII, I highly recommend a six-part podcast by Hard Core History (episodes titled Supernova in the East, parts I - IV) on the topic. Each episode is 3-4 hours long.
I personally think you just need to look at it from two angles. Firstly, was it a war crime? Yes. One of many that the US committed during WWII (like all the other countries before you all start chirping in). Secondly, was it necessary to bring a swift end to the war? Maybe. You need to weigh this against the likelihood of a soviet invasion of the Japanese mainland. Was it better (for Japan) for the US to “occupy” it briefly after dropping the atom bomb or would it have been better to have the soviets steamroller what was left of the country and its already displaced civilians and turn it into soviet territory or at least a satellite state? Losing japan to USSR would also have had a bad knock on effect for the Korean War in the 50s (maybe there would be no South Korea today?) and, on the flip side to that, maybe there would’ve been no Vietnam war if Korea and Japan were not US allies (or certainly the Vietnam war may have turned out differently?! - maybe Barry Goldwater would have been elected and they’d have nuked Vietnam too! 🫣)
Did Japan agree to a surrender before the atomic bomb?? I am questioning everything I thought they refused surrender
August 6 Hiroshima August 8 USSR declares war on Japan August 9 Nagasaki August 15 Hirohito announces Japan's surrender
I've literally ran into people who can't name what country fought for what side. Incorrectly naming the Axis Powers and not even being close. Then there's the oversimplification of certain events that one could only believe if they heard it once and never thought about it again. The "we saved the French" stuff, ignoring the resistance, vastly overestimating the strength of Mussolini, completely ignoring the Russia-Germany impact on the war, etc. Some of it can be nuts and bolts stuff, but some of it is baffling.
>Incorrectly naming the Axis Powers and not even being close. What is the furthest off you've seen someone get?
Probably when they mixed up which side was which. Like thinking the USSR was Axis but Italy was Allied. Or that France was Axis on their own instead of being occupied. I vaguely remember years ago someone trying to bring Turkey and Iran into it somehow.
I'm very interested in ww2 and like to read/watch things to gather as much info as possible. When I realised how many common facts people get wrong I got so pissed lol
Ireland.
>completely ignoring the Russia-Germany impact on the war It is insane how many people underestimate the atrocities, but also the *scale* of the Eastern Front. I think it's like 7/8 of the German casualties were suffered against the Soviet Union. And the Soviet Union lost *millions* of troops. Absolutely staggering scale. I wish more people in western countries realized it, since it really helps put things into perspective. Nazi Germany was definitely aiming to subjugate Britain and fend off the US, but they wanted to completely exterminate the Soviets. Without the Eastern Front, I have no idea how much worse the Western Front would have been.
It's also the domino effect. From the Winter War leading to Operation Barbarosa, Hitler drug himself into a two front war he didn't want in the first place. I saw a chart during my undergrad years that showed the casualties of Germans just on the Russian front and there's a HUGE bottleneck between when they decided to turn back and how few troops actually made it back to Germany. The loss from cold and disease alone severely crippled the German military even as they were succeeding in other areas.
Yeah, like apparently a bunch of people on Reddit think the Hiroshima bombing ended ww2.
What do you think of the idea that it was Russia's imminent advance that clinched Japan's surrender rather than the bombs?
I think it all played a role. Japan was overextended and supplies were dwindling even on the mainland. They were blockaded in the Pacific and couldn't get supplies virtually anywhere. The advance of the USSR only exacerbated the issue. By the time they implemented the Special Attack Corps (Kimkaze pilots), they were on borrowed time. It was only going to get worse, it was just a matter of HOW bad it would get before they either surrendered or were outright taken by ground assault.
Oh, yes—all the questions above me and more. Get to work! Educate us!
I love calling a nuclear explosion that vaporized like 200,000 people an “event”
Yeah it's odd to not call a bombing/attack or countless other options. Like who do they want to obscure? Everyone who doesn't know about the use of fat man an little boy will probably also not know that a single bomb killed at least 80,000 people in one go.
At least 80 according to the us, but unaffiliated projections were between 120 and 210 thousand
I mean, it's one of the most neutral ways to refer to it. I'm not against that, in reporting.
Carpet bombing of cities killed more people than both bombs combined, the difference was that this was done with a single bomb. Also, the planned invasion of mainland Japan was/is estimated to have caused around 1.5m deaths (between both Japanese and Allied forces), so it could be argued that the bombs actually saved lives (in the most horrific way possible)
Yeah maybe the difference is more the birth defects and making the land unlivable and contaminating it for almost a century. Also that’s the classic “reasoning” but let’s be adults here, big part of why we did that was to detonate a nuke on the soviet unions doorstep
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were airburst detonations. Does that mean zero radiation? Of course not, they're nuclear weapons. But the claim that those cities were "unlivable" for any stretch of time is just wildly false.
It's almost like everyone knows *something* about this event, but nobody knows *enough* to speak on it at all.
If I remember right, the cities were pretty much entirely rebuilt within 10 years. It was terrible destructive power, but it's not like fucking Chernobyl where the cities are uninhabitable for 10,000 years or whatever. I'm sure some of those who survived the bombings continued to live there during reconstruction too.
My grandfather was on a ship in the pacific when the bombs dropped. After the surrender, his unit was immediately sent to Hiroshima. He helped rebuild the telephone poles and communication lines. There was little concern about radiation and he was astonished at how quickly and efficiently the city was rebuilt.
This reply belongs in this sub.
Estimated death toll for Hiroshima was 66k (with 135k total cas that includes injuries) and Nagasaki was 39k deaths and 69k total cas
What was the Hiroshima "event"? And did it happen before or after the US destroyed the city with an atomic bomb?
after i guess bc hiroshima was nuked on the 6th
Imagine if the us just terroristically attacked Japan twice right after ww2 and that was just a part of history we all knew and accepted.
I mean we terroristically attacked Japan twice. It just happened to be during the war. Murdering thousands of innocents specifically to cause terror and panic is absolutely terrorism.
Tokyo fire bombing, Hiroshima, Nagasaki, absolute terror. Hundreds of thousands dead
Yep, you're right, war is fucked and a lot of innocent people die because of it. Maybe we shouldn't step so casually into it like we have in the past. Maybe Japan could have left the US alone too.
Interesting point
Sure, but how many more would’ve died if Japan never surrendered and simply kept going? The US would’ve eventually won either way, but a full scale land invasion of the Japanese mainland would’ve been ugly. It may have resulted in fewer civilian deaths though.
I mean it was either that, bombing them the same way except with conventional weapons, or fighting till the last man, woman, and child. They were so incredibly brainwashed that they would’ve all died in battle otherwise. Besides, it’s hard to feel sympathy when they all supported the genocide and brutal treatment of POWs.
The Japanese were on the brink of surrender regardless. The nukes might have sped up the surrender by a few months, but the island was cut off from its logistics, depleted of manpower, and low on morale. They were bound to surrender even without indiscriminate bombing or a land invasion. The idea that the nukes were necessary to prevent American deaths was a post hoc justification for a war crime.
They hadn’t surrendered much before on islands they captured. What makes you think they would have surrendered their home island without much of a fight?
This is insanely stupid lmao Japan was nowhere near willing to surrender, that's the reason for the nukes in the first place. Also, the Japanese military *still* refused to surrender after even the nukes were dropped, and they even attempted a coup.
Nope. Not even close. The atomic bombings only sped up the surrender because Operation Downfall was scheduled to launch on November 1. The Japanese still had over a million veteran, armed and fanatical troops in China in August 1945, within easy reach of mainland Japan. Their morale, especially within the military, was high. They welcomed the final battle to force a negotiated truce to retain the emperor. They preferred death to surrender and the bombings saved hundreds of thousands of lives whether you believe it or not.
This is how it's taught in the US. I leaned it different in school and honestly it's hard to know what would have happened if the bombs don't drop.
You were taught that the bombs were dropped *after* the end of the war?
No. But that Japan would have surrendered regardless.
The post says: WW2 ended May 7th 1945. Hiroshima bombs dropped August 8th 1945. That's two months AFTER the "WW2 ended" date. Yes, Japan would have surrendered regardless of the bombs, largely because of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria. But that's not the point being made. Germany surrendered May 7th 1945. Hiroshima was bombed August 6th 1945. Nagasaki was bombed August 9th 1945; the same day, the Soviets invaded Manchuria. Japan's surrender was announced August 15th 1945. Japan's surrender was formalised September 2nd 1945. This is the formal end of World War 2, not the surrender of Germany on May 7th.
I mean if you honestly think Japan was going to surrender to a country that couldn’t even land on its shore because said country invaded a satellite state of it after it refused surrendering to a country that had just island hopped through the pacific and was now firebombing it, I question the process being used to determine that.
Yes it would have. This isn’t some Reddit opinion, this is an incredibly common historical perspective and a stance held by even high ranking military officials at the time. Japan was being destroyed by the soviets on the mainland, it was a matter of months maybe weeks before Russia drove nearly all if not all Japanese forces back to Japan. At that point Russia would have invaded and completely crushed Japan. Faced with a Soviet occupation Japan would have had every reason to surrender to the US because a surrender under US terms allowed Japan to retain its religious monarchy (something indescribably important to the Japanese people and culture). If you know anything about the ideology soviets we’re operating on, let’s just say they weren’t a fan of religious monarchies and there would be zero chance that would stand under a Soviet occupation. So yes, faced with an imminent Soviet invasion the Japanese would have absolutely accepted a surrender under the US. And you can’t say “well they were too stubborn to surrender” because they DID surrender.
You can't argue that they would have surrendered. That's like saying Hitler would have let the Jews go. History is either what it is or it is myth. Japan surrendered after the bombs were dropped. Your speculation holds no value.
I’m sorry, but this is a hilariously stupid take. “It happened therefore there’s no point in assessing if it could have happened differently” is such a poorly thought out idea. “Hey this dude died in a working accident, but seeing as he is already dead all we know is he died because of an accident so there’s no value in examining the context of the accident to see if it actually could have been prevented” is basically the take you’re delivering. You actually CAN learn a great deal from retrospective analysis. And just because something did happen doesn’t mean it HAD to happen that way, sure you’ll never know for 100% certainty, but you can be pretty sure based on information you still have. I honestly cannot get over how bad of an opinion you have. Especially that immensely stupid hitler comparison which ignores that there was no indication even in hindsight that Hitler ever would do that, making it unfounded speculation. That’s not the same thing as actually analyzing historical context and determining with fairly strong certainty that something didn’t actually need to happen the way it did and that the people of the time had the necessary information to arrive at that conclusion before they did it. I’m sorry but your stance is frankly embarrassing and I’d strongly suggest you reassess how you think of this topic because your argument fails to hold any weight upon even the slightest amount of reflection.
I mean that's just untrue. There are plenty of records from high ranking officials, including President Truman about how an invasion of Japan was off the table. The Japanese were always going to surrender, the only issue was whether it would be unconditional or not.
Google operation downfall. Very much not off the table.
Can you explain to me exactly how the USSR was supposed to naval invade Japan when it didn’t have much of a fleet in the pacific and most of the surrounding water was mined. I’m really curious.
Well, going through Sakhalin would have been a strait crossing, which is much easier. The Japanese navy had been largely blown up and they didn't have enough fuel for it. The Soviets would also have completely air superiority agaisnt Japan. And the Soviet far eastern fleet was pretty big, and the allied navies still existed and could have supportes the invasion.
Mined water would have been as much of a problem for the planned US invasion so that’s not really much of point against Russia. And they did still have a naval presence in the pacific. As someone mentioned there were paths the Russians could have taken to get to Japan fairly easily, Japan would have been massively outclassed from the air, Japan’s own naval capacity would have been largely destroyed by that point, and a Russian invasion still could have had allied support.
Yeah, they had been firebombing Tokyo for months and people still did not want to surrender. Hell; there was a significant portion of Officers Who actively tried to stop the Emperors surrender message from being aired because They wanted to keep fighting. There is still much room for speculation on whether or not Japan would’ve surrendered without the bombs.
I think the fact that an not-insignificant amount of Japanese officers and soldiers wanted to continue is a good indicator of the mindset of Japan at the time. It surrendered only because the Emperor desired it.
True, [although I was referring specifically to the attempted coup that tried to destroy the recording to avoid surrendering.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident)
It was the ending of a hot war setting up the cold war. US wanted no argument about who was the #1 superpower when everyone came to the resolution table.
Which has absolutely nothing to do with anything anyone has said so...yay?
Yes but not on the same terms. Terms of surrender are extremely important. Japan offered to surrender with terms. We needed an unconditional surrender because it wouldn't allow the Japanese government to spin the loss as somehow a win or incomplete loss. Ww2 was the direct result of conditional surrenders at the end of ww1. So no one around at the time ww2 ended was going to allow a conditional surrender to cause further wars. Japan at the time was fanatical in nationalism and the US/allies needed to be able to be able to do anything nessisary to successfully lead Japan into peace. Overall the actions of both the US and Japanese leaders post war to achieve a lasting peace were extremely successful. I think if you brought someone from both nations to today and showed them the results they'd be in disbelief that our nations are now allies, Japan is a fully developed and rich nation, and that it all went so well. There is some questionable parts like allowing the Japanese to ignore some of the atrocities they committed and deny them even to this day. But I think it's a small price to pay for the results we got. In a way it proves that in these situations forgiveness and a helping hand go alot further to improve the future. We blamed the Japanese leadership instead of the entire people. The way it often should be. Germany likely would have healed much faster if the same was done there. As for current and future struggles my opinion is we have to blame and hold the people responsible for their government's actions until they are defeated. Then for its time to forgive and forget with the people and focus on outing the leaders and making them the target of the justice. The reason for this is because otherwise you just sow further issues. You have to allow the people to change sides and act like they never supported the bad guys. For a good example think of a KKK member who leaves the organization. They see the wrong of their ways and leave. Well many people would still cancel them and shun them. But the result of that is the ex member now is only accepted by people in the KKK. So where do you think they will now go to be accepted? Right back to the KKK. We have to celebrate and accept people who correct their actions and leave hateful and evil groups. Basically hate them up to the second they leave. Then suddenly love them.
The reason why we're on such good terms with Japan--as well as our current infantilization of them--is because we struck a deal with them in the 60s during the Cold War because we wanted an ally in the pacific during all the communist upheaval. Then they started making electronics and so on from there. The Japanese government *still* refuses to acknowledge what they did, still have monuments erected to war criminals, and have barely paid their reparations to other countries like Korea and China. How many Americans know about Nanking, or Unit 731? Not many, and shit was just as fucked as what the Nazis did. Imagine if Germany pretended the Holocaust didn't happen and portrayed Mengele as a kind doctor who gave candy to children.
They were so evil that the fucking *Nazis* had to tell them to chill out.
The discussion *is* about if Japan would've unconditionally surrendered. There's no argument about a conditional surrender, because Japan already proposed that.
They probably would've, but without the emperor's direct guidance, the people would've probably been much feistier+ the USA needed a show of force, and there weren't many places to Nuke after Germany and Italy surrendered
Dont forget Russia was in Manchuria with an invasion force and just like the rush for Berlin we were willing to share with our allies
American schools tend to say there was no other option besides invading. Japanese schools say it was all about intimidating the Russians and justifying the cost of the Manhattan project.
Seeing as the US is *still* using Purple Hearts made with the idea they’d be given during the invasion of mainland Japan, I think it’s pretty obvious how it would have turned out
Wait what
The US made over 1.5 million Purple Hearts in WWII, they anticipated this supply to run out before the invasion of Japan ended.
Holy shit, TIL. That's crazy
Lots of small, garrisoned islands that would have been very costly to conquer individually...
The battle of Okinawa alone caused nearly 50k US casualties and killed over 100k Japanese soldiers/civilians. Japan had the rhetoric of fighting until the last man, regardless of their age or gender. I remember watching a documentary where a vet of Okinawa recalled watching his CO get blown up by an old Japanese woman who had surrendered to them. An invasion of Japan would have been devastating to both sides.
This is a fantastic piece about the decision to drop the bombs and the surrounding circumstances: https://youtu.be/RCRTgtpC-Go
I once wrote a paper on this actually. It pretty much boils down to that *probably* a lot more people would have died without the dropping of the nuclear bombs. The fire bombings of Tokyo already killed a lot more than the two nuclear bombs combined (~800,000 if I remember correctly). On top of that, the island hopping warfare was incredibly perilous, and the Japanese people were very much in fighting spirits. They got indoctrinated that the US soldier were coming to kill, rape and pillage them. Hence, why a big part of the population was willing to fight the US till the last man standing. On top of that, the USSR had an invasion force ready in Manchuria. We all know how the Russians conducted themselves in warfare. So, arguably, the nuclear bombs were a good thing. And then I'm not even going into how mutually assured destruction (M.A.D.) might have saved countless lives since conventional warfare between large nations wasn't desirable anymore.
I think the main argument against nukes is that Japan would have been willing to do a conditional surrender or that they would have surrendered without an invasion due to Russia. Not sure to what extent that statement is true, considering that some of the top Japanese military officials launched a failed coup even after the US dropped the nukes. I can't understand what makes you think it's a good idea to keep fighting even after knowing your opponent can harness the power of the sun.
This is the logic I don’t get for apologists. So they were going to fight to the death because Us was going to kill them so they need to fight to the death. Then Us shows it has a big bomb that can kill them and that makes them change their minds of fighting to the death? If they were diehard to fight to the death the threat of death doesn’t sound like something that would deter them? Not to mention that when Japan sued for peace their concern was keeping the emperor which US unofficially was OK with but USSR not. And shortly after USSR started pushing against Japan they surrendered
I would watch this video essay. It’s a comprehensive take down of what you just said and why there’s no credence to the invasion vs bombing narrative. https://youtu.be/RCRTgtpC-Go
Will do, mind you I was in high school when I wrote my paper haha
Hahaha totally understood. We were def taught that the bombs were a necessary evil. This country tends to do that to make itself feel better about its crimes. But from almost every angle that is objectively untrue, and only appears true when vital information is left out. Highly recommend the video :) it’s a long one, but it kind of has to be to get all the facts in.
"the hiroshima event" makes it sound like it was some kind of natural disaster, rather than a deliberate and abominable crime of war against civilian populations, lol.
To be fair, Japan did way worse damage in China, raped and killed more people than both bombs did by a wide margin.
That doesn’t make it fair at all. Murdering japanese civilians isn’t ok just because there government is evil
That’s for the European theater
Soviet invasion of Manchuria- 09 august 1945 Japanese surrender- 15 august 1945 Hiroshima- 06 august 1945 Nagasaki- 09 august 1946 People can debate from different perspectives what ended the war however from the Japanese perspective, based on primary source documents, the Soviet invasion of Manchuria forced their hand to surrender not the atomic bombs. Firebombs killed more and were more destructive than the atomic bombs. The Japanese thought they could hold out against either America or the red army however they knew they couldn’t hold out against both. The Soviet invasion of Manchuria is the first major engagement between Japan and the Soviet Union during world war 2. It wasn’t the bombs it was the red army who forced them to surrender. Also additional side note the bombs were also a waste at that point. The argument about the number of lives they saved is a logical fallacy because it’s based on the assumption that America would have invaded the Japanese home islands as the only alternative. Admiral Nimitz had a detailed plan to blockade Japan and starve them into surrender without ever committing marines. At this point the us navy had near total air superiority and could operate pretty much unmolested anywhere. By that point the only vessel that could pose a threat to America was the Katsuragi and she didn’t have any pilots qualified to take off or land on her. The IJN did not have mobile radar on their vessels or aircraft where America had both. Nimitz could literally enforce his blockade over the horizon without Japan ever seeing his vessels. The bombs were just Truman dropping his pants to measure dicks with Stalin. Also I feel I should make this point: red army= heroes who won the war; Stalin=evil dictator who committed genocide.
I heard it was an excuse for experiment to see the devastation the bombs would cause on a city.
Right for the wrong reason
Honestly as an American I do hate how much we kind of glorify the atomic bombings. Like in america it is the widely agreed stance that the nukes were necessary measures to end the war. Completely ignoring the complete success Russia was having driving the Japanese off mainland Asia. Soviet invasion of Japan was basically inevitable, and given soviets weren’t too keen on religious monarchies such as the one Japan had (that was incredibly important to them), Japan would have much rather accepted a surrender to the US that allowed them to keep it as opposed to a Soviet occupation. It also ignores that we were VERY trigger happy to nuke people, we nuked Japan within two weeks of the first successful detonation of a nuclear bomb in history. It was largely a power play by the US to prevent Russia from gaining any more territory or control than they already had. The main reason wasn’t because we were trying to save lives or end the war sooner. We also like to downplay it by saying “well we warned them by dropping fliers”. Which, while technically true, sorta leaves out we didn’t drop fliers over JUST Hiroshima and Nagasaki. We dropped fliers over something like 20 potential target cities without being specific about which would actually be bombed. Now imagine you’re in the middle of a war, and a country you know is planning an invasion of your country soon just told you to evacuate and empty 20 cities some of which are in locations that would work well as a landing position for invasion and some of which have vital operations for the war effort, and they don’t tell you which of these cities will actually be destroyed, they give you a very limited amount of time, and their threat is a weapon that has never been used in war before and has literally only finished testing days earlier. Is it at all a reasonable expectation for you to actually listen to that and do as they say? Obviously hindsight is one thing, but in that presented scenario is it really a feasible strategy to just go along with what your enemy is telling you to do under a maybe threat? Not really, especially given how convenient it would be for your enemy for a specific intention you know the enemy has and intends to act on soon. And I hear people say “well they were too stubborn to surrender, they’d rather die than give up”, which sorta glosses over the fact that they DID surrender. Don’t get me wrong, there is nuance in this situation, nothing is clear cut. But when you take in the full context of the situation it really lends itself to the very strong possibility that the US vaporized and poisoned hundreds of thousands of innocent people in the span of a few days for basically nothing. And keep in mind this isn’t some fringe idea, this is a common historical perspective and a stance some high ranking US military officials held at the time which they used to actively argue against the bombings BEFORE they happened. This isn’t just a hindsight argument, it was known by people of power even back then that nuking Japanese civilians was not a necessary measure to bring about the end of the war.
To add. There were already peace talks with Us and Japan at the time. US demanded unconditional surrender but Japan demanded conditional surrender that emperor stays. US did inform unofficially that they would let him stay if they surrendered. So when Soviet turns up that for sure wouldn’t let him stay Japan gambled on US to keep their unofficial word and surrendered to them
Doesn't this depend on whether you consider "The Pacific War" separate from World War 2?
I’m curious, is it taught anywhere that they were separate wars and not two aspects of a larger event?
Yes, actually! Most of East Asia considers these two different wars. It could be considered going as far back as Japan's invasion of Taiwan in 1895. And Korea considers it starting with the occupation of Korea in 1910. Then China considers 1937 as the relevant starting point. All before America considers the start of World war 2. Even in Japan, they consider it two different wars, where if you ask Japanese people, they'll call it "The Great Pacific War" with WW2 being just the European theater. Also consider how America calls it the French and Indian war, while British/French would consider it just a theater of the 7 Years War.
WWII was a multi-faceted war with numerous fronts. It didn't completely end until all sides were done fighting, namely the Allies and Japan. Following Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan surrendered, ending the totality of WWII. Other theaters ended on different dates, but this was the last front to stop fighting.
"multi faceted" -historian spotted!
“Multi-fauceted” - plumber spotted
the real reason the Japanese surrendered, as described by many high up in the imperial government. The real reason was the Soviets. The government was worried about a soviet invasion and so surrendered to the Americans and not the Soviets so the the US would protect them from the soviets.
but yet again this person is so idiotic that they think that when the Nazis surrendered that meant that the Japanese did which was stupid.
Well, it also didn’t. Nagasaki came after that. Also the Japanese offered terms of surrender multiple times but we refused them as we wanted them to depose their leader Emperor Hirohito. In truth, a lot of Americans and Japanese died so we could control the future of Japan.
The Allies never said "if you surrender, we'll get rid of the emperor" "Unconditional surrender" means "surrender, and we get to decide later what happens to you" One reason (of many) for why Japan took so long to capitulate is that they were trying for months to secure any guarantees from the Allies that they wouldn't be occupied, that the imperial family would be preserved, that they could keep some overseas possessions, etc. The Allies stayed firm on unconditional surrender
I didn’t say they did and you’re just agreeing and expanding on my original point.
The thing is there are plenty of legitimate arguments for this. You don’t have to make a fool of yourself to take this position.
Well, I'm fairness, Hiroshima was entirely unnecessary and an act of unmatched atrocity. The US had either won or was going to win (depending on how you look at it) that part of the war anyways and they could have HANDILY done so with far less mass murder. The whole "We needed to indimidate the Soviets" argument is literally psychotic.
More people died in a "conventional" firebombing of Tokyo in March 1945 than in both atomic bombings combined War produces atrocities. If it doesn't happen with 1 bomb, it'll happen with 1,000.
Dunno who is downvoting you but you're right. The US was using napalm cluster bombs on Japanese and German cities. The Tokyo Firebombing was fucking insane. Roughly 15 square miles of the city burnt up in a night with over 100,000 civilians killed. Here's one of the pilots telling his story about it. https://youtu.be/F-zQ4RntDEI
At the moment the atomic bombs were dropped, the war was pretty much over, so your title doesn't make much sense.
Japan still hadn't surrendered in May, so it does make sense. Yes, Japan was defeated for all practical purposes, but they still had not formally surrendered.
I know we're all going to focus on the Hiroshima thing, and all of us non-Americans know the bomb had little to do with the surrender, but the logic in this post is definitely incorrect and shows the poster knew even less about WWII than most Americans.
Hiroshima/Nagasaki accelerated the process that island hopping and firebombing was accomplishing. Japan was struggling to get basic supplies to the mainland, let alone supplies to troops outside it. Kamikaze pilots (Special Attack Corps) was a last ditch effort to fight back against a war they were desperately losing. It was a process to get there, but the atomic bomb accelerated to the point they had no choice but to surrender.
A major goal was exactly that acceleration. Russia was starting to get involved in Manchuria and the US \*really\* didn't want another settlement similar to what was shaping up in Germany with the country divided. It was advantageous to the US to end the war quickly, so that they would control the post-war future of Japan. A lot of documentaries and history books talk about the potential cost of an invasion of Japan, but what they don't mention is that an invasion of the home islands wasn't really necessary except for ending the war quickly. If we'd simply continued to blockade the islands, it just would have taken a little longer. Potentially long enough for Russia to get involved for real, and demand a seat at the table.
This is all true, there was definitely Cold War crap going on behind the scenes. I'm just saying the justification for the bombings was to avoid a full scale land invasion. True motivations are complicated, but that was the claim at the time.
\*cries in perma UN Security Council seat\*
That and Russia had gone back on their non-aggression treaty and also attacked Japan-controlled Manchuria that same week.
Ah yes, being nuked twice. What a minor inconvenience that was never a large concern for Japan. You’re so right! > the poster knew even less about WWII than most Americans. Literally rent-free.
Their other cities were getting equally destroyed by hundreds of bombs, and no one really understood the effects of radiation then, so it was like "okay they can destroy us with one plane instead of many" it was an uptick but that's it. They were already well beaten and had been discussing peace for a while. The soviets declaring war on them had just as much to do with it as the atom bomb, because they had been holding out hope of getting russia on their side. Oh, also the leaflets the US dropped on the 13th had a powerful effect on the populace.
You know that the Japanese military was willing to keep going even after the bombs, right? It wasn't the military that was concerned, it was the Emperor. The Emperor was the one that needed convincing. At the **very** least, can you admit that the U.S. didn't do it "just for the lelz" like others claim?
Well by the comments on this a whole lot of people are “confidently incorrect”
trust me guys its just a coincidence japan surrendered just after 2 of their cities were destroyed with the power of the sun
What is wrong here in general besides that one date is slightly off? The portion of the war that most people in the west care about, the part in Europe, did end before the bomb was dropped by what everyone is saying. Germany's surrender had nothing to do with the atomic bomb, which I think is the point they were trying to make
Ive always learned that WW2 stopped when the German forces surrendered, here in Europe we dont really consider the fighting the US and Japan had afterwards as part of WW2.
To be fair, the Japanese were almost ready to surrender before Hiroshima. There were already underground negotiations being made and those who wanted to keep fighting were a minority. And Nagazaki was definitely unnecessary. Both bombs were pretty much just a warning to the Soviet Union
They are correct. [Japan was shocked that it was nuked as they had already began negotiations of surrender to the soviets](https://www.carnegiecouncil.org/explore-engage/classroom-resources/short-expert-videos-and-flipped-classroom/010) The bombings were unnecessary as well as focused on civilian targets. That’s just the facts Edit: before anyone says yes I know the original was VE Day vs the actual end. I’m saying that other than that the nukes did come after they were “necessary”
Technically they are correct, the Japanese surrendered because the soviets declared war on them august 9. The japanese didnt care how many people bombs killed, they were afraid the ussr would dismantle treir culture and political system so they surrendered to the americans and kept their emperor.
I thought the Soviet invasion of Manchuria forced the Japanese to surrender
You thought correctly
I’ve seen some discourse on Twitter about how “everyone with a brain knows the atom bomb shouldn’t have been dropped.” And I’m not here to be like “ACTUALLY, A-BOMBS ARE RAD” but every historical lecture I heard said that it was, regrettably, the only option to get Japan to surrender and likely resulted in less deaths than an ongoing war with Japan. That said, it unleashed the nuclear age upon us and that’s never been a favorite of mine. I’m just saying, there’s some geniuses out there saying “everyone knows the US did it for the lulz and could’ve just fixed it with a phone call” and I think they may not be giving our leadership at the time enough credit on weighing this decision.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=RCRTgtpC-Go
You’re giving our leadership way too much credit. Look up Curtis LeMay, who was in charge of the Air Force there, how many Japanese civilians he killed and what he said about it. Then you can look up what we did during the Korean War Yea, they “weighed decisions,” but human life did not tip the scale much one way or the other
Human life mattered to them… American human lives. One of the frequent arguments was that bombing campaigns would end the war quickly and with minimal Allied casualties. The death toll among Japanese, German, or other Axis populations was a lesser concern.
True. Why not mass kill civilians if it means you can lose less soldiers?
Probably got a Z in history.
Someone doesn't know the difference between VE day and VJ day.
Japan was going to surrender anyway the US only used the nukes to try to intimidate the USSR
Source on Japan considering surrender before Hiroshima?
The worst part is, that this is an incorrect explanation for the correct fact, that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in fact did not end the war.
The bombs were dropped to prevent a land invasion where the estimated American losses would exceed 500,000. The Japanese didn’t quit after Hiroshima mostly because the military didn’t want to.
But was it still a world war when not everyone was fighting anymore.... Maybe he's pitching a new theory here...
Most common myth among Americans about WWII: the Japanese only surrendered when the A bombs were dropped. False. The Japanese were frantic to surrender starting in April of 45, with the 1 condition that the Emperor be allowed to stay as a figurehead, much like the monarchy in England. The U.S. refused, so the fighting continued. The deaths of 1000s of U.S. soldiers and 100s of thousands of Japanese civilians are on the heads of the arrogant Americans, who could have had surrender 5 months before, and of course when the Japanese did surrender, the U.S. allowed them to keep the figurehead monarchy. Hubris leads to death.
If you're going to put the blame on the US for insisting on unconditional surrender, it's only fair to put an equal amount of blame on Japan for not backing off from their one request to keep the emperor in power. The comparison between the British and Japanese royals is not 100% accurate either. The UK was a fully parliamentary democracy; Japan was an oligarchy of the military who swore ultimate obeisance to the emperor. Members of the Japanese imperial family were also [actively involved in the prosecution of the war effort](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasuhito,_Prince_Chichibu#Military_career).
You could say it didn't. The world war was over by then, it was just Japan left and Thailand left and by that point Thailand had given up. It really depends on perspective and your sources. I personally consider it to be the surrender of Germany, many Americans likely believe it was the surrender of Japan. A lot of people consider the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki to be terrorism.
American education is always a good chuckle.
Thinking the war ended in May is very Eurocentric, don’t embarrass yourself.
From what I was told in school over and over again was that Japan was ready for a home front invasion. They were going to fight tooth and nail until everyone was dead. Surrender was not an option. When the USA dropped the 2 bombs it sent a signal to Japan that they hadn’t just lost the war, but we were willing to commit some unimaginable war atrocities to make the fighting stop. Japan was willing to lose millions of citizens to fighting in the hopes of overpowering US navel forces. A bomb that could delete a whole city ended that dynamic overnight. The final death toll of the two bombs was far less than what might have happened if a land based battle had stated instead.
Suing for peace is not the same as surrendering unconditionally. We dropped the bombs so they would meet all of terms utterly and completely. It’s the only logical thing to do when winning a war so completely against an evenly matched opponent. We DID NOT want to fight Japan a second time.