RGR
Member
One reason I decided to stop posting to this forum is that I never see anyone acknowledge a point well made by an opponent. What consistently happens is that the point is ignored, and the focus of the discussion is shifted to something else -- often, to repeating some other point that has ALSO already been refuted. I don't expect this to change. I came back because I realized (again) that there must be many, many people who lurk here and never post, but who DO pay attention and can tell when a point has been well made. I'm sure everyone is thrilled that I've returned. 
Hapafish twice made the utterly discredited but immortal claim that millions of US soldiers would have been killed in an invasion of Japan, and he stated or implied that the Japanese would not have surrendered without either an invasion or the atomic bombings. Neither claim can withstand an honest examination of the evidence. First, the death estimate is an exaggeration by two orders of magnitude. Second, the Japanese war machine was broken, and its leaders were ready to surrender if only the US would agree not to try the Emperor for war crimes and allow him to keep his seat, which it later did anyway. US leaders knew this because Japanese codes had been broken.
Exaggerations of the cost of the contemplated invasion, if made with any thought at all, are made by those who believe the bombing was an inherently horrible thing, justifiable (if at all) only by a worse horror that was the inevitable alternative. Why else would they exaggerate? People with that belief should give it up if they cannot undermine the evidence or the logic of the case against the bombing. They should not say, "OK, it wasn't millions, but it doesn't matter. However many US lives would have been saved was worth any number of Japanese civilian deaths." Some people here write as if one American life is worth any number of "enemy" deaths -- whether it's of soldiers, armed fanatics in a mob, teenage rock-throwers, old men, women, or children -- is required to prevent it. I am not addressing this post to anyone who believes that. I don't have enough common ground with them to debate anything.
On to the evidence and argument.
One good source I've found on the question of US leaders' motives for the atomic bombings is _Fathering the Unthinkable_ by Brian Easley. Easley's discussion goes on for several pages (Pluto Press ed., 1983, paper, pgs 98-110), noting the relevant events and the views of key participants. One especially telling point he brings up is that the Potsdam Declaration omitted any mention of weapons of mass destruction, of nuclear weapons in particular, and of respecting the Japanese condition regarding the Emperor. Why? "Stalin would have wanted details" about the bomb, and "Japan might possibly have surrendered before the bombs could be dropped ... without allowing [the US] to demonstrate to Stalin the power of the new weapons and the willingness of American administration to use them." Easley cites Charles L. Mee, an historian, who sizes up Truman's efforts toward the end of the war: "'[V]ery little that Truman did could be construed as part of a plan for tranquillity.'" (pgs 104-105)
Howard Zinn, in his _People's History of the United States_ (New York: Harper and Row; 1980 paper ed.), gives an account that belies the purity of U.S. motives. For one thing, "Japan, by August 1945, was in desperate shape and ready to surrender" (p. 413). He quotes New York Times military analyst Hanson Baldwin, who says we almost certainly did not need to nuke the two cities. Zinn describes how the Japanese code had been broken by that time. American intelligence was relaying messages to the effect that the Japanese were ready to surrender if only the US would agree not to try the Emperor for war crimes and allow him to keep his seat, which it later did anyway.
Zinn suggests that perhaps the money and effort invested in developing the Bomb influenced the decision to go ahead and use it. The military's desire to see the effects of nuclear weapons, one uranium-fueled, the other plutonium-fueled, on populated areas was another probable contributing motive. This is supported by the scheduling of the two bombings only one day apart, so that there would be no time for Japan to surrender before the second bomb was dropped. Zinn cites P. M. S. Blackett (_Fear, War, and the Bomb_) and Gar Alperovitz (_Atomic Diplomacy_), who separately argue that political considerations with regard to the Soviet Union definitely played a major role in the decision. Alperovitz quotes Navy Secretary James Forrestal "describing Secretary of State James F. Byrnes as 'most anxious to get the Japanese affair over with before the Russians got in'" (Zinn, p. 415).
In _Bombs for Beginners_, John Stockwell, the highest-ranking former CIA officer ever to resign in protest over US foreign policy, writes:
"Knowing that Japan was facing imminent defeat, Russia declared war in early August. American leaders were desperate to cut Stalin and his cohorts out of the victory.... General Eisenhower was among those who opposed [the bombs'] use.... a demonstration bomb, dropped near Tokyo, would have conveyed the relevant message [to Japan]...[But some US leaders] were obsessed with the fervor of war. They were determined to punish the Japanese and show the world...how powerful the United States was, how tough-minded its leaders were....[p. 6 and 7] The original claim that 250,000 soldiers would be lost [in an invasion] was made, off-the-cuff, by politicians.... Truman had been given a study estimating that the invasion of Japan would be 'relatively inexpensive', costing about 45,000 soldiers' lives" (_The New York Monthly Press_, Gar Alperovitz, 1985)....[Unless Japan surrendered immediately and only to the US,] the United States would have faced a Berlin-type solution, i.e., joint occupation of Japan with the Soviets. (ibid., p 22-23)
Sociologist Lester Kurtz of the University of Texas at Austin writes that public statements by Truman and others [to the effect] that avoiding an invasion saved 500,000 to a million American lives "were probably a deliberate lie," and concludes that "the real target of the bombing was the Soviet Union." He refers to the same briefing paper as Stockwell and Alperovitz, saying the U.S. soldier death estimate given to Truman was about 40,000. He quotes Admiral William D. Leahy, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: "'The use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender'" (Alperovitz, p. E21, in Kurtz, _The Nuclear Cage: A Sociology of the Arms Race_; Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1988 [paperback], p. 22). Finally, Kurtz quotes Thomas Powers, who says General Leslie Groves was convinced within a few weeks of becoming director of the Manhattan Project that "Russia was our enemy and...the project was conducted on that basis" (Powers, _Thinking about the Next War_, New York: Mentor Books, 1984, p 138, in Kurtz, p 22).
Hapafish twice made the utterly discredited but immortal claim that millions of US soldiers would have been killed in an invasion of Japan, and he stated or implied that the Japanese would not have surrendered without either an invasion or the atomic bombings. Neither claim can withstand an honest examination of the evidence. First, the death estimate is an exaggeration by two orders of magnitude. Second, the Japanese war machine was broken, and its leaders were ready to surrender if only the US would agree not to try the Emperor for war crimes and allow him to keep his seat, which it later did anyway. US leaders knew this because Japanese codes had been broken.
Exaggerations of the cost of the contemplated invasion, if made with any thought at all, are made by those who believe the bombing was an inherently horrible thing, justifiable (if at all) only by a worse horror that was the inevitable alternative. Why else would they exaggerate? People with that belief should give it up if they cannot undermine the evidence or the logic of the case against the bombing. They should not say, "OK, it wasn't millions, but it doesn't matter. However many US lives would have been saved was worth any number of Japanese civilian deaths." Some people here write as if one American life is worth any number of "enemy" deaths -- whether it's of soldiers, armed fanatics in a mob, teenage rock-throwers, old men, women, or children -- is required to prevent it. I am not addressing this post to anyone who believes that. I don't have enough common ground with them to debate anything.
On to the evidence and argument.
One good source I've found on the question of US leaders' motives for the atomic bombings is _Fathering the Unthinkable_ by Brian Easley. Easley's discussion goes on for several pages (Pluto Press ed., 1983, paper, pgs 98-110), noting the relevant events and the views of key participants. One especially telling point he brings up is that the Potsdam Declaration omitted any mention of weapons of mass destruction, of nuclear weapons in particular, and of respecting the Japanese condition regarding the Emperor. Why? "Stalin would have wanted details" about the bomb, and "Japan might possibly have surrendered before the bombs could be dropped ... without allowing [the US] to demonstrate to Stalin the power of the new weapons and the willingness of American administration to use them." Easley cites Charles L. Mee, an historian, who sizes up Truman's efforts toward the end of the war: "'[V]ery little that Truman did could be construed as part of a plan for tranquillity.'" (pgs 104-105)
Howard Zinn, in his _People's History of the United States_ (New York: Harper and Row; 1980 paper ed.), gives an account that belies the purity of U.S. motives. For one thing, "Japan, by August 1945, was in desperate shape and ready to surrender" (p. 413). He quotes New York Times military analyst Hanson Baldwin, who says we almost certainly did not need to nuke the two cities. Zinn describes how the Japanese code had been broken by that time. American intelligence was relaying messages to the effect that the Japanese were ready to surrender if only the US would agree not to try the Emperor for war crimes and allow him to keep his seat, which it later did anyway.
Zinn suggests that perhaps the money and effort invested in developing the Bomb influenced the decision to go ahead and use it. The military's desire to see the effects of nuclear weapons, one uranium-fueled, the other plutonium-fueled, on populated areas was another probable contributing motive. This is supported by the scheduling of the two bombings only one day apart, so that there would be no time for Japan to surrender before the second bomb was dropped. Zinn cites P. M. S. Blackett (_Fear, War, and the Bomb_) and Gar Alperovitz (_Atomic Diplomacy_), who separately argue that political considerations with regard to the Soviet Union definitely played a major role in the decision. Alperovitz quotes Navy Secretary James Forrestal "describing Secretary of State James F. Byrnes as 'most anxious to get the Japanese affair over with before the Russians got in'" (Zinn, p. 415).
In _Bombs for Beginners_, John Stockwell, the highest-ranking former CIA officer ever to resign in protest over US foreign policy, writes:
"Knowing that Japan was facing imminent defeat, Russia declared war in early August. American leaders were desperate to cut Stalin and his cohorts out of the victory.... General Eisenhower was among those who opposed [the bombs'] use.... a demonstration bomb, dropped near Tokyo, would have conveyed the relevant message [to Japan]...[But some US leaders] were obsessed with the fervor of war. They were determined to punish the Japanese and show the world...how powerful the United States was, how tough-minded its leaders were....[p. 6 and 7] The original claim that 250,000 soldiers would be lost [in an invasion] was made, off-the-cuff, by politicians.... Truman had been given a study estimating that the invasion of Japan would be 'relatively inexpensive', costing about 45,000 soldiers' lives" (_The New York Monthly Press_, Gar Alperovitz, 1985)....[Unless Japan surrendered immediately and only to the US,] the United States would have faced a Berlin-type solution, i.e., joint occupation of Japan with the Soviets. (ibid., p 22-23)
Sociologist Lester Kurtz of the University of Texas at Austin writes that public statements by Truman and others [to the effect] that avoiding an invasion saved 500,000 to a million American lives "were probably a deliberate lie," and concludes that "the real target of the bombing was the Soviet Union." He refers to the same briefing paper as Stockwell and Alperovitz, saying the U.S. soldier death estimate given to Truman was about 40,000. He quotes Admiral William D. Leahy, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff: "'The use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender'" (Alperovitz, p. E21, in Kurtz, _The Nuclear Cage: A Sociology of the Arms Race_; Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1988 [paperback], p. 22). Finally, Kurtz quotes Thomas Powers, who says General Leslie Groves was convinced within a few weeks of becoming director of the Manhattan Project that "Russia was our enemy and...the project was conducted on that basis" (Powers, _Thinking about the Next War_, New York: Mentor Books, 1984, p 138, in Kurtz, p 22).
