
Why did Japan surrender? (2011) - luckysahaf
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2011/08/07/why_did_japan_surrender/?page=full
======
Animats
Recommended reading: "Japan's Longest Day", the nonfiction book, not the movie
or novel (Review:
[http://www.warbirdforum.com/end.htm](http://www.warbirdforum.com/end.htm)).
This was written in the 1980s by a group of Japanese historians who
interviewed almost everyone still living who had been directly involved in the
decision to end the war.

The key thing to understand is that nobody was firmly in charge. The 6-member
Supreme War Council, with representatives of the Army, Navy, and the civilian
government was running the war. They had been operating by consensus, despite
severe disagreements. The civilian government was much weaker than the
military. (This stemmed from the February 26, 1936 attempted coup. Long story
there.) The Japanese army and navy never got along. A strong faction in the
Army wanted to continue the war to the bitter end. (They tried a coup against
the Emperor on August 14, 1945, just before the surrender, captured the
Imperial Palace, and almost succeeded.) War Minister Anami (the Army head on
the Supreme War Council) said, after the Hiroshima bomb, "I am convinced that
the Americans had only one bomb, after all." After the second bomb was
dropped, Anami still wanted to fight on, but the Emperor decided otherwise.
Anami committed ritual suicide.

It was a close thing. If Anami had supported the coup, or the coup had
succeeded in capturing the NHK radio station or the Emperor himself, the war
probably would have continued.

~~~
GCA10
Well said. I'm remembering other accounts saying that one of the Navy
commanders at the end was eager to see everything go up in a giant
conflagration if necessary. Some strange, distorted sense of heroism.

In such settings, I think it makes sense to regard the combination of Soviets
and A-bombs as decisive. Most really big events in history have multiple
causes.

------
nabla9
August 6: bombing of Hiroshima

August 7:

1\. Japanese nuclear scientists determine that the bomb was indeed nuclear
device.

2\. Imperial Navy estimates that US has only one or two more bombs and Japan
could endure the attacks.

August 9:

1\. bombing of Nagasaki

2\. USSR declares war to Japan & Manchurian Strategic Offensive started.

3\. Hirohito worried because USSR declared war and held an Imperial conference
that authorized minister Tōgō to surrender with only one condition: status of
the Emperor must be preserved.

August 15: Japan Surrenders

Even after Hirohito made the personal decision to surrender, the intention was
to continue the war if the kokutai (Imperial institution and national polity)
would not be preserved.

~~~
cbd1984
> Even after Hirohito made the personal decision to surrender, the intention
> was to continue the war if the kokutai (Imperial institution and national
> polity) would not be preserved.

And here's where I don't understand the reasoning: Did they seriously think
the kokutai would have been preserved if they _had_ fought on? Did they
seriously think the Allies would have allowed Japan to continue as it had? It
seems the most obvious thing in the world to blockade and bombard the Home
Islands for six to eight months, destroying farmland especially, and then
engage in the beachhead assault that had already been planned.

The American Armed Forces are still using Purple Hearts made specifically for
the invasion of the Japanese Home Islands. They're all new-old stock, to use
the common phrase; that's how serious the plan was.

~~~
hga
They're still using Purple Hearts from the first batch MacArthur ordered,
which was 1/4 of what he expected to need. And he didn't believe the solid
intelligence that revealed Operation Olympic, the initial invasion of the home
island Kyuushuu, was not going to work (too many divisions moved to that
island, 6,000 or so kamikazes (an underestimate) would be ready and would not
have to navigate all the way down to Okinawa ... many people don't know that
the Battle of Okinawa was the single most expensive in lives for the US
Navy...).

Those planning Operation Downfall, the overall one to capture the home islands
(well, the regime would fell after the 2nd invasion of the main island), who
didn't know about the Manhattan Project were planning to make liberal use of
chemical weapons. Those who did ... well, if the 2nd bomb failed, there's a
very good chance future production would be reserved for Olympic, with up to 8
of them being used....

As for their strategy, they started the war with an assumption that we weren't
tough enough to see it through. It's said that the truth didn't sink into the
IJNavy until we lost 2 Rear Admirals (2 stars) in a single night action off of
Guadalcanal, in a body of water that earned the name Ironbottom Sound, so many
USN and IJN ships were sunk there.

So when it came to the home islands, they hoped they could make it expensive
enough we'd give up before the regime fell. Even after we'd firebombed all
their major urban centers minus Kyoto (politically critical for the Emperor)
and the 4 a-bomb targets and alternates....

It's a _very_ good thing for the world everything came together in that August
and they surrendered. And if I had a time machine, I'd never ever try to
change anything in history going up to that point, the horror of those
a-bombs, even if each caused less loss of life than the first Tokyo
firebombing (in only it and one other attack did everything come together
including the weather and winds).

------
jihokoo
Maybe Hasegawa's interpretation has new implications regarding nuclear
deterrence theory, but not how the author suggests. The idea that the nuclear
bombings were not decisive factors in Japan's surrender does not mean that
nuclear weapons do not serve as a deterrence. Nuclear weaponry advanced so
much in the aftermath of WW2 that now nuclear countries can literally reduce
entire nations to pixie dust. And the potential of MAD (Mutually Assured
Destruction) all but guarantees that nuclear countries will never attack each
other for fear of nuclear escalation.

~~~
pmoriarty
_" the potential of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) all but guarantees that
nuclear countries will never attack each other for fear of nuclear
escalation."_

I would feel a lot more secure in the efficacy of MAD if war was rational in
the first place. History shows it is anything but.

It hasn't even been 100 years since the last nuclear weapon was used
offensively, but already the world has come dangerously close to starting a
nuclear war.

Numerous accidents involving nuclear weapons have happened. Critical and very
dangerous errors were made in detecting that nuclear war had already begun
when it hadn't. Countries with nuclear weapons have come close to going to war
with each other (India and Pakistan, Cuban Missile Crisis). Weapon-grade
nuclear material and nuclear weapons have gone missing. The American nuclear
weapon launch codes were all 0's for something like 20 years.

It is an open question how a nuclear power will react to having a nuclear
weapon exploded on their soil (potentially by terrorists under a false-flag
operation) but it likely won't be a calm and measured response against the
perceived perpetrator. If this happens in a poweder-keg like the Middle East,
the ensuing chaos could easily draw in other nuclear powers.

Crumbling nuclear-weapons and launch-detection infrastructure in the former
Soviet republics is still a major concern because of continued and increasing
potential for accidental launches of weapons still aimed at their former Cold
War foes, not to mention the renewed possibility of a second Cold War that has
been in the news recently, and Putin's overt threats of the use of nuclear
weapons.

~~~
jihokoo
I don't think its right to judge the rationality of decisions based on their
outcome. The question is whether war was a rational decision at the time. From
a realist perspective anything decision is rational if it can lead to an
improvement in the chances for survival. If war leads to a relative increase
in my power even if I may lose soldiers and resources, then its worth it.

If country A has 100 soldiers while country B has 20 soldiers, even if the
cost of war is a 2 to 1 loss in soldiers, war would result in the absolute
power of country A.

In a conflict between two countries with nuclear weaponry, the core logic is
the same, but the paradigm is different. Nuclear warfare can erase both
countries off the face of the earth. This follows from the fact that to combat
nuclear attacks, countries started adopting hair-string triggers to destroy
the adversary before they can send more warheads their way... except now every
country is doing the same thing. In this case, forget the relative nonsense,
anyway you cut it, nuclear warfare is not rational for countries because it
will end their survival.

My belief is that MAD is sound. And my underlying assumption is that countries
tend to think rationally when dealing with international relations. Regardless
of leadership, countries do whats best for them an overwhelming majority of
the time. Case in point, how often has the U.S. (the bastion of freedom)
voluntarily helped countries/people when the U.S.' interests were not directly
involved? Also, observe how a seemingly crazy country like North Korea plays
the game shrewdly by varying is strategy depending on its adversary.

I agree that there is a threat that nuclear weapons will get in the wrong
hands and, in that case, I think its more than probable that disaster would
ensue. But the safety and standards for handling infrastructure degradation
has improved significantly since the early days of nuclear weapons (when many
were lost to the ocean and never recovered) . As for Putin's threats, its
nothing a good back and forth of denouncing and condemning can't fix.

------
vaadu
"If killing large numbers of civilians does not have a military impact, then
what, Wilson asks, is the purpose of keeping nuclear weapons?"

The writer stupidly jumps from the idea that if nukes have less than a major
impact then they have no impact. Does anyone think the UK or USSR would not
have surrendered if the Germans had nukes?

If the US had today's nukes on 8 Dec 1941 the war would not have lasted nearly
as long. Every island stronghold, port, airfield, city and fleet would have
been taken out early. the remnants would have been mopped up by the Marines.

~~~
Sharlin
I don't think the USSR would have even _considered_ surrendering had the
Germans had two 15 kiloton nukes and used those against them.

~~~
thrownaway2424
Indeed. The USSR was already down ~5 million people, why would it have made a
difference for the Germans to kill a few tens of thousands more? That would
just make the Russians even more angry.

------
chaostheory
> Hasegawa’s ability to read three languages, Bernstein says, gives him a
> unique advantage over other scholars. Hasegawa spent years working through
> primary documents, with a deep understanding of linguistic and cultural
> nuance. His knowledge was especially valuable because historians of the
> period face such fragmentary and contradictory evidence, in part because the
> Japanese destroyed many documents.

> But therein lies the weakness of the Hasegawa interpretation as well,
> Bernstein says. After a long war and in the space of a few days, the
> Japanese leadership was hit with two extraordinary events - Hiroshima and
> the Soviet invasion - and sorting out cause and effect, based on incomplete
> documentation, may prove impossible.

There's something else barely examined in the article as well (beyond 2
sentences). I would imagine that totalitarian governments will behave
differently from democratic republics when their own people are dying.

~~~
jihokoo
The article also poses the idea that its unlikely that the U.S. would
surrender a war after a city was destroyed.

Article also gives the example of UK not giving up after German bombing in
WW2.

~~~
frozenport
Don't forget that France surrendered.

~~~
Guthur
France likely surrendered because their home country defense force was
defeated and their capital overrun, the countries administration had little
chance of extracting itself from the rest of France before being completely
overrun.

This does not always mean surrender; think Napoleon's invasion of Russia. The
difference for Russia in my opinion is that they had a large homogeneous land
mass upon which to move and maintain their administration.

~~~
frozenport
I think it was the large number of casualties the soviets were wiling to
tolerate, I doubt the French would have encouraged the loss of a million as
was incurred during Stalingrad. Consider also that the large land mass was a
liability as it had to be defended, for example from Japan.

~~~
yareally
The USSR had time, resources (human and material) and the land buffer to keep
fighting. The farther Germany pressed into the USSR, the more Germany's
resources and supply lines were stretched and the Soviets eventually realized
that.

Similar reasons cost Napoleon dearly ~130 years before.

Also, Stalin's massive ego wouldn't allow a city named after himself to be
taken by the Germans. That's the primary reason that particular city suffered
the high casualties that it did. Stalin once told Churchill at the Tehran
Conference that "when one man dies it is a tragedy, when thousands die it's
statistics."[1]

[1]
[http://books.google.com/books?id=8fp1A2s6aQwC&pg=PA510&dq#v=...](http://books.google.com/books?id=8fp1A2s6aQwC&pg=PA510&dq#v=onepage&q&f=false)

------
moo
The imminent Soviet invasion of Manchuria surely played a role in the U.S.
decision to use the atomic bomb, end the war quickly to end the prospect of
post war Soviet occupation of Japanese held territory.

~~~
tomohawk
At the Potsdam Conference (24 July) Truman told Stalin that the US would use
nukes against Japan as a goad to get Stalin to enter the war against Japan.

It appears to have worked.

~~~
moo
Churchill is quoted as saying the U.S. wanted the Soviets out of the war. At
the Tehran Conference in Nov 1943 and at the Yalta Conference in Feb 1945,
Joseph Stalin had agreed to declare war on Japan three months after Germany
would be defeated. Stalin was told something at Potsdam because the Soviets
were still allies, but not that the weapon was atomic.

------
moo
A bigger obfuscation is the cause of WWII. We are given the history of WWI,
geopolitical alliances, assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, harsh Treaty at
Versailles, collapse of German currency, WWII continuation of WWI, failure of
Chamberlain appeasement, German Soviet non-aggression pact. No mention of
German genocide of African Herero and colony in South-West Africa ( Namibia ),
Italian occupation and war against Ethiopia, and Russo-Japanese War. The Axis
powers shared that they were late to the game of Western imperialism and they
came into conflict with the long standing imperialists.

~~~
peterfirefly
Getting back Elsaß wasn't really all that unreasonable. Annexation of the
Sudetenland wasn't, either: it was overwhelmingly German, it used to be in the
Holy Roman Empire, it was now a minority in a country created to cater to
Slavs. A merger between Austria and Germany wasn't unreasonable, either.
Getting back the land Poland stole/was granted after WWI was, again, not
entirely unreasonable. Protecting the German cities of Danzig and Stettin was,
again, not unreasonable.

Furthermore, much of the rhetoric about the Jews sounded awfully much like the
current rhetoric about the rich, the banksters, the international finance, the
1%, etc.

Other things we usually don't hear about is how scary Socialism was in Germany
from, say, 1917 to 1933. Have you heard about the Bavarian Soviet Republic,
for example?

------
rdl
"Why/how did WW1 end" is an interesting question, too.

Aside from cursory school classes and then some reading, I've never really
looked into it in great detail.

The elementary school version is "tanks broke the stalemate, and the US/UK
rolled through to victory", but it was a lot more nuanced than that, with
internal revolutions in multiple countries. WW1 clearly could have kept going
for some extended period longer than it did.

~~~
GCA10
It's fascinating. I just finished "To End All Wars," by Adam Hochschild. He
points out that Germany's military was doing quite well in July 1918 ... but
that blockades had ruined Germany's ability to feed its people. Folks were
getting by on 1000 calories/day; starvation was common, and with the
Bolsheviks having stirred up Russia, socialist/pacifists were totally tired of
fighting. After modest military setbacks, Germany's will to fight collapsed.

Large German units started surrendering to small Allied forces. Yes, tanks and
the U.S. arrival helped clinch everything. But the meltdown inside Germany was
quite amazing. Think of the U.S.'s final decision in 1973-75 to get out of
Vietnam no matter what. And then multiply that breakdown of the warrior
mentality by 100.

The Kaiser lost control of his country in the war's final weeks, and the
German authorities naively hoped that they would get an OK
armistice/settlement if they called it quits. When they didn't, that created
such deep German resentment over the next 20 years that a resumption of the
war became inevitable.

~~~
agumonkey
As if WW 1 and 2 are in fact a single event with a strange picnic pause in the
middle.

~~~
ArkyBeagle
It's a stretch, but some have linked those two with the Franco-Prussian War as
well.

Bismarck predicted:

"Jena came twenty years after the death of Frederick the Great; the crash will
come twenty years after my departure if things go on like this"

"One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in
the Balkans".

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_von_Bismarck#Forced_to_res...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Otto_von_Bismarck#Forced_to_resign)

------
nefreat
There's a thread on reddit a while ago that explains this quite well.
[http://np.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/2j3xar/til_tha...](http://np.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/2j3xar/til_that_japans_surrender_following_the_bombing/cl89wv1?context=3)

------
the_watcher
Interesting. Perhaps I need to actually read Hasegawa's work, but this piece
skips over a pretty important possibility (to me): that while the atomic bombs
did not, on their own, convince the Japanese to surrender, they may have been
major factors in the Soviets deciding to enter the war on the side of the
Allies.

~~~
iand
You mean enter the war against Japan? USSR were already on the Allies side
fighting the Nazis in Europe.

~~~
hga
But after a very sharp action which the IJArmy lost very badly, commanded in
part on the other side by an obscure Soviet general named Zhukov
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgy_Zhukov](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgy_Zhukov)
who unlike his two counterparts managed to avoid the 1941 purge), they signed
a neutrality pact, reaffirmed after Operation Barbarossa, that they
scrupulously observed. Being faced with another even more bloodily minded
opponent certainly didn't hurt the surrender decision.

------
thomasmarriott
'...Moreover, the enemy has begun to employ a new and most cruel bomb, the
power of which to do damage is, indeed, incalculable, taking the toll of many
innocent lives. Should We continue to fight, not only would it result in an
ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would
lead to the total extinction of human civilization...'

— Hirohito, August 14,1945

------
foobarqux
The article below from Foreign Policy magazine is much better

[https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:vdqHpr...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:vdqHprkireYJ:foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-
bomb-didnt-beat-japan-stalin-did/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=ca)

------
htns
Hundreds of Japanese cities were leveled by firebombing. Having a town nuked
every few weeks was not such a big consideration against that background. If
only they had trucked on for a few more months we wouldn't have to read these
articles.

~~~
jeffdavis
There's a difference between "leveled" and "nuked", especially before guided
weapons existed.

------
crazychrome
help me to interpret this: amongst 60 comments of this article, nobody
mentioned China despite the fact China had fought against jp for 8 years
(since 1937, or 14 years since 1931) and (arguably), pinned down jp Army,
given the original jp's plan was "conquer China in 3 months".

------
comeonnow42
The comparisons made in this article and comments below seem to all but forget
one major fact that completely changes everything. That is, Atomic bombs are
NOT the same as carpet bombing say Tokyo. Why? RADIATION. If the major cities
and sites of Japan suffered a disaster due conventional bombing The thinking
would be – afterward we rebuild. You don't think that when your left with a
radiation zone. So the theory that atomic bombs would have carried the same
level of concern due to simply looking at leveled cities and that carpet
bombing does the same as nukes is short sighted to say the least.

~~~
pmoriarty
I was under the impression that the long-term effects of radiation and nuclear
weapons weren't well known at the time of the Japanese surrender. If that's
so, it is unlikely such concerns as you describe played much of a role.

------
sandworm
Lol. This topic is just about the most sensitive things I can imagine. The
concept that America "won" both the pacific and European wars is an integral
part of American identity. Shortly after the war, with the rise of the cold
war, US students were brought up on the one narrative. Any suggestion that the
Soviets were a driving force in ending the war forces them to confront deeply
held beliefs regarding the use of force and violence generally.

Another aspect not covered in the OP is the efficiency of US nukes. Much/most
of the damage done was not from the bombs. If you measure damage through the
heat energy released, most came from the burning of the cities rather from the
fission in the bomb itself. The firebombing of a city releases as much energy
as a nuclear explosion, doing a comparable amount of damage. At the time, a
firebombing raid required fewer resources than a nuke. So, from an energy
standpoint, the nukes were not an economical means of destroying Japanese
cities.

Why then were they used? Why were they used in the pacific and not in europe?
(Insert massive screaming rants here.)

~~~
Someone
The trinity test was in july 1945, two months after the surrender of Germany.

We don't know whether atomic bombs would have been used on, say, Berlin or the
Ruhr area (maybe even tactically, to speed up the allied advance in the west),
but I think the USA would have used one, if only to send a message to the
soviets.

~~~
walshemj
That's what they where designed for and if d day had stalled they would have
been used in the rhur.

There is also strong evidence that Stalin wanted to get to berlin first to
grab some of the German nuclear materiel in Berlin

