japan

[greyrider]

in another thread, there was a someone, who said something like this," the japanese didnt need to get nuked to end the war in the pacific".
tho this site concentrates its efforts on submarine warfare and naval warfare in general, you cant separate pacific land combat from the naval combat in the pacific, they go hand and hand.
i am of the opinion that japan had to get nuked to end the war, i dont know, maybe im wrong, maybe harry truman was wrong, maybe the general staff, field commanders, and chiefs were wrong,
but i dont think so.
the japanese were the toughest enemy america and the allies ever fought, no enemy was like them, they fought to the death. they were courageous, brutal, and masters of the defense,
and worthy of the respect american troops had for them.
they fought with everything they had, when they ran out of ammo, they fought hand to hand, when they couldnt do that, they melted away into the jungles, to continue the fight in alot of places,
in some places they cannibilized dead soldiers, japanese, american, australian, in order to eat to fight and survive another day, what german would do this?
some japanese soldiers did not surrender until the 1970's.
on okinawa alone, there are 20,000 japanese soldiers sealed in caves, who refused to surrender, and over 10,000 us soldiers and marines who could not fight anymore from mental illnesses.
so what i like to do is show from utube, from 2bn442nd RCT, battles recorded from the pacific, so that you could see and hear from those troops in thier own words what it was like to fight the japanese up close.
in my opinion, it was the way the japanese fought, and they themselves, who condemned them to the atomic bomb.
this is real film, of the retaking of guam, 1944, in five parts. this is just one of the many battles fought in the pacific, tho the names of the islands changed, the conduct and execution of the battles
was aways the same, deadly, vicious fights, and i would have to ask, would you condemn these soldiers and marines, themselves extremely brave, that fought on these islands to the invasion of japan, where the japanese would have fought
with an even higher desperation to defend thier homeland.
this is not to take anything away from german forces in europe fighting, because they also fought very well, but they didnt fight like the japanese did, when it got tough for the germans, they surrendered.

the battle for guam

guam part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5Jk0QUowNM
gaum part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DHAIGJEzpJk
guam part 3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUYV8r8dx3g
guam part 4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQaGofC17ZI
guam part 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6MXJMRYR4Q

the battle for saipan

saipan part 1 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNusk-NUoWs&playnext_from=PL&feature=PlayList&p=395D98B55BF42B8F&index=0
saipan part 2 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ks62ez25alg&playnext_from=PL&feature=PlayList&p=395D98B55BF42B8F&index=1
saipan part 3 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_Dvz9tkgI4&playnext_from=PL&feature=PlayList&p=395D98B55BF42B8F&index=2
saipan part 4 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HilugMavRQM&playnext_from=PL&feature=PlayList&p=395D98B55BF42B8F&index=3
saipan part 5 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPm0dyY7it4&playnext_from=PL&feature=PlayList&p=395D98B55BF42B8F&index=4

[Acmark]

I agree, given the circumstances, it was needed. U.S. casualties were estimated at 1 million + if we invaded Japan. At the end of the day in war, it's either them or us. However we must all take into account that "nukes" are a completely different ball game compared to the bombs that were dropped on Japan. The loss of life from the bombs was horrific, but it saved more.

[joegrundman]

People focus too much on the atom bombs. I'd say the entire allied conventional bombing campaign of Japan and Germany is something we still daren't fully face up to.

By the time of the atom bombs, it is well documented that the Japanese were looking for an 'out' from the war, and strange as it may seem, the atom bombs may have provided a 'face-saving' exit, in a land where saving face is very important. Since what nation could continue in the face of such a technological disadvantage, nevermind that they couldn't really continue anyway? This also meant that the question of poor decision making and strategy that had led to Japan's current plight, and the blame for it, need not be so directly faced by the Japanese leadership, since in the end it was an unforeseeable technological breakthrough that defeated them.

It's also worth considering the effect of the Soviet declaration of war and the overwhelming Manchurian offensive on the two main factions in the Japanese government, the 'peace party' and the 'war party'.

The Soviet invasion of Manchuria and the impending collapse of the position in China had eliminated the reason for the pacific war in the first place. The imminent loss of most of the army on the mainland (which throughout the war constituted the majority of Japanese ground forces) also severely damaged the hopes of the 'war party' whose plan was that a slow fighting retreat across Japan and a willingness to expend vast reserves of manpower to inflict casualties would drain allied resolve to fight for unconditional surrender and that a negotiated settlement would be attained as war weariness grew in the USA (Britain was already fully war-weary, and i understand it was growing in the US).

Furthermore the 'peace party' who had been pinning their hopes on a negotiated settlement with Stalin as mediator, had those hopes dashed by the Soviet attack.

So, in short the hopes for an outcome short of unconditional surrender had been severely blunted throughout the Japanese political establishment by the Soviet invasion.

The atom bombs provided the face-saving exit, so the argument goes, which for one reason and another was an agreeable interpretation of events for all parties except Russia, since already the cold war was developing.