When I'm 64

[Whimsy]

There were huge thunderstorms on the night of the 5th/6th August in Britain, and most of the population the next morning were talking about the overnight cacophony totally oblivious to the world changing event which took place at the same time on the other side of the world.

 

Even as a trainee God at the time, I did not realise the significance of what had happened. None of us did. We were a bit slack in the thirties and forties.

[Declan]

She also agrees with Albert that the military would have pursued the war relentlessly as they thought that they could win the land war in Japan if it had happened - irrespective of casualties. In her view the bomb forced the Emperor to end the war - and that it was only his word that could do it.

 

I get the impression, from Japanese literature that looks at the end of the war and the post war period, that the people - not just the milatry would have fought on and on. The fifty years or so leading up to the end of WWII had seen Japan become an almost European style nation state but one in which personal goals were deeply invested in the Imperial ones. Japan and Japanese people couldn't surender because their imagination couldn't envisage a post surrender life for themselves.

 

I've read that the Japanese are a bit like British - an Island nation at the edge of a large continental landmass that they are convinced would be a whole lot better if it listen to the British or the Japanese. So the British "fight them on the beaches" attitude of earlier in the war is mirrored in 1945 in Japan because the alternative is unthinkable.

 

So Hirosima and Nagaski convinced the Japanese that fighting on was not an option. And although the reconstruction of Japan was incredibly painful, it was made easier because the vast majority bought into a new set of goals - that of becoming a Liberal Democracy because there was little alternative.

[La_Dolce_Vita]

I don't think it is that surprising or very peculiar. The Japanese would have resisted invasion in the same way as any other nation would. They simply would have gone a little further, as they did, in telling the civilians that it would be their duty to fend off any invasion and attack incoming troops. But as to whether the civilians would have really done so is another matter. But Japan didn't have to surrender unless it was invaded and forced to do so.

 

I've read that the Japanese are a bit like British - an Island nation at the edge of a large continental landmass that they are convinced would be a whole lot better if it listen to the British or the Japanese. So the British "fight them on the beaches" attitude of earlier in the war is mirrored in 1945 in Japan because the alternative is unthinkable.

 

I wouldn't make too much of this to be honest. It is obvious that the Japanese are detached from a Continent like the British. And of course their situation would be similar if an invader came to their shores. Troops would be sent to repulsed an invasion. But the 'fight them on the beaches' thing is just a comment from Churchill reflected the fact that the armed forces would do so. It doesn't reflect any attitude. British civilians would hardly have repulsed an invasion, and I doubt that the Japanese civilians would have done so either.

 

I do wonder what the outcome of a continued blockade of the Island's would have been. The merchant marine was almost non-existent. Without oil and coal the Japanese nation would not have been able to continue military production. And the government was getting more and more unpopular with the people - it wouldn't have lasted much longer in my opinion. The only objection to this is what to do with Japanese troops across the Far East and concern about Soviet intentions. But I think the U.S. had choices. It wasn't JUST invade or drop the bomb.

[manshimajin]

Declan, I think you have made a very astute summary.

 

In English we have a word 'insular' to describe a certain isolated attitude. The equivalent word in Japanese is 'shimaguni' which means 'island country'. The Japanese did see their island status as isolating them from corrupting influences (such as Christianity and foreign ways) and maintained this isolated status up to the mid 19th cenury by laws limiting, for example, European access ironically to Nagasaki. They also, as you say, believed that the sea was a 'moat' that defended their country. The 'kamikaze' was of course the divine wind from God that prevented the invasion of their country by the Mongols in the 13th century - which reinforced a sense of the inability of enemies to succeed in any invasion of the home islands.

 

Maybe this affinity with another island race explains why as they westernised they based their naval practices on those of the Royal Navy - indeed Vickers in particular did enormous amounts of business with them. On the other hand they based their westernised constitution on Imperial Germany with its recognition of an Emperor who could have direct political influence, unlike the UK Crown.

 

If you have not done so already I would strongly recommend reading Max Hasting's book "Nemesis" about the end of the war in the Pacific.

[La_Dolce_Vita]

Maybe this affinity with another island race explains why as they westernised they based their naval practices on those of the Royal Navy - indeed Vickers in particular did enormous amounts of business with them. On the other hand they based their westernised constitution on Imperial Germany with its recognition of an Emperor who could have direct political influence, unlike the UK Crown.

 

Such naval practices really boiled down to shopping around for the best equipment. The British made the best ships and could built quicker than anyone else. And then of course there was the 'tie' between the two countries in the form of the treaty between Britain and Japan regarding the situation if two or more powers attacked Japan.

 

I just think too much can be made of the reasons behind a resistance to invasion being cultural. If they are going to get invaded then of course the military will try and resist and make it incredibly difficult. I do think it the government had an unrealistic idea about the chances of repelling any landing.

[manshimajin]

Such naval practices really boiled down to shopping around for the best equipment. The British made the best ships and could built quicker than anyone else. And then of course there was the 'tie' between the two countries in the form of the treaty between Britain and Japan regarding the situation if two or more powers attacked Japan.

 

I just think too much can be made of the reasons behind a resistance to invasion being cultural. If they are going to get invaded then of course the military will try and resist and make it incredibly difficult. I do think it the government had an unrealistic idea about the chances of repelling any landing.

It went further than equipment - indeed one could argue that the Germans built the best ships, but not as quickly. In particular German armour and gunnery was superior. The Imperial Japanese Navy had great admiration for the traditions of the Royal Navy and its command structures.

 

You shouldn't dismiss the cultural aspects LDV. Clearly any nation is going to resist invasion. But in Japan there was a belief that their country would somehow be saved by divine intervention. This was reinforced by the military to mobilise resistance and to counter arguments from the 'peace party' that Japan should enter into negotiations with the Allies. Sadly it took a horrific and shocking event to bring people to their senses.

[La_Dolce_Vita]

It went further than equipment - indeed one could argue that the Germans built the best ships, but not as quickly. In particular German armour and gunnery was superior. The Imperial Japanese Navy had great admiration for the traditions of the Royal Navy and its command structures.

 

I don't doubt that the prestige of the Royal Navy had a lot to do with it, because advisors were sent over to Japan. I don't think German ships were necessarily better. German armour didn't differ much except in respect of that of the battlecruisers and armour was not the problem with British ships, and it was the range finder equipment that the German outdid the British in gunnery. They weren't that much different, though certainly prior to 1908-09 it was the British who had the best ships.

 

You shouldn't dismiss the cultural aspects LDV. Clearly any nation is going to resist invasion. But in Japan there was a belief that their country would somehow be saved by divine intervention. This was reinforced by the military to mobilise resistance and to counter arguments from the 'peace party' that Japan should enter into negotiations with the Allies. Sadly it took a horrific and shocking event to bring people to their senses.

 

I don't dismiss the cultural, it just seems that everyone has concentrated on it solely to the exclusion of other factors. I think it important to not look too hard at the differences in Japanese culture at that time, and if anyone is going to do so they should consider that different Japanese people had different ideas and different thinking and were not all into Shinto belief.

Really this is all boils down to how hard the Japanese would have fought if the U.S. invaded. And I do think that shintoism heavily influenced the military to fight on to the very bitter end. Though this says little about how far the Japanese government and elite would have gone to resist. You have the government, the people, the military, etc. All distinct. Shintoism wasn't that influential to overshadow any pragmatism on the part of the government. If it was, then why did the bomb end the war? Why didn't they just wait until a few more hit. Essentially, the Japanese military would have resisted invasion and may have resisted more strongly until unconditional surrended came. But I don't think this is that peculiar.

[Topaz]

Anybody given any thought to the Death railway ?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burma_Railway

 

The Japanese were sadistic torturers there.

[manshimajin]

I think it important to not look too hard at the differences in Japanese culture at that time, and if anyone is going to do so they should consider that different Japanese people had different ideas and different thinking and were not all into Shinto belief.

As the Japanese say themselves - when they are born they are Shinto as it links them to their ancestors, when they get married they are Christian because it is a nice ceremony and when they die they are Buddhist because it is more comforting.

 

Anybody given any thought to the Death railway ?

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burma_Railway

 

The Japanese were sadistic torturers there.

Topaz that is what I was getting at when I said:

 

"These awful events need to placed alongside the Rape of Nanking, the horrific atrocities in Manila, comfort women, treatment of POWs, fire bombing raids on Japanese cities that killed more people than the A bombs, the intention of some Japanese army officer to stage a coup d'etat to continue the war, the failure by the Allies to take many Japanese prisoners etc etc..."

 

Add to that the Japanese treatment of Chinese POWs, the German treatment of Russian and Polish POWs, the Russian treatment of Polish and German POWs and so much more - not even to mention treatment of civilians.

 

Undoubtedly the ending of the war was seen by the survivors in POW camps throughout Asia as salvation - I doubt that they would have argued against the use of the A-Bombs.

 

The only thing to remember at the same time as being grateful for their release is that the people who died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and in all other cities that were bombed in WW II were in the main not the war leaders but the ordinary people, men, women, children and babies.

 

That is to me the horrible thing about it, that to bring the war to an end it was necessary to create destruction of ordinary people on such a scale that even the leaders were forced to accept that they could not go on.

[La_Dolce_Vita]

That is to me the horrible thing about it, that to bring the war to an end it was necessary to create destruction of ordinary people on such a scale that even the leaders were forced to accept that they could not go on.

 

Was it necessary to slaughter civilians? That is something I have wondered. Could not the power of the bombs be expressed in another way to lead to surrender?

Quite interesting how the Americans and British were willing to go deep into Germany to lead that country to surrender, yet the costs of forcing a Japanese surrender were not worth invasion. Do you think the Americans and British would have allowed a bomb to be dropped on Germany if a bomb was ready?

[queenie]

Not one mention, until now, that it was 64 years ago today that America dropped an atom bomb on a formerly pristine Japanese town called Hiroshima and killed, instantly, thousands of people, men women and children. Many still suffer from injuries suffered on that day and since.

Two days later they dropped another on Nagasaki, also not an industrial target, with the same loss of life.

The largest and worst war crime of all time.

History channel tonight at 9.

 

I've had a bit of a history lesson reading this thread, but, I hope that regardless of the reasons of the allies and the position of the japanese at this time, we can spare a thought for the victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

[Nosferatu]

That is to me the horrible thing about it, that to bring the war to an end it was necessary to create destruction of ordinary people on such a scale that even the leaders were forced to accept that they could not go on.

 

Was it necessary to slaughter civilians? That is something I have wondered. Could not the power of the bombs be expressed in another way to lead to surrender?

Quite interesting how the Americans and British were willing to go deep into Germany to lead that country to surrender, yet the costs of forcing a Japanese surrender were not worth invasion. Do you think the Americans and British would have allowed a bomb to be dropped on Germany if a bomb was ready?

It is hard to make a direct comparison to the invasion of Germany and the proposed invasion of Japan due to a number of factors .The most obvious difference is geographical , Germany being basically landlocked other than on its Northern coast whereas Japan's 2 closest neighbours are Korea and Russia at around 150m and 75m away across the sea . Therefore the logistics involved would be vastly different and more complex.

Germany given that they started the war had been at war since 1939 and a fair portion of its industry had been wiped out by heavy bombing campaigns which also targeted civilian targets in order to weaken the morale of the German citizens. Its army having failed to secure Russia was severly weakened and demoralised .

The German Navy was pretty much useless once the U-boat threat was eliminated and the Luftwaffe had never really recovered from the Battle Of Britain .

Japan by comparison due to its later entry to the war had not suffered to the same degree as Germany with major bombing raids only coming to the main islands at the end of 1944 . Japan had however suffered heavy losses during 'war in the Pacific' but their honour code and the imperial rule had instilled a 'rather die than be defeated' attitude as proven in the Battle of Okinawa . The latter said to be one of the key factors that had the number crunchers forecasting horrific casualties for both the US and Japanese armies and the Japanese civilians . The firebombings of Tokyo were the first attempts to try and persuade Japan to surrender. With Japan still fighting moths later the allied command must have felt they had no choice but to drop the atomic bomb .

As for the choice of target , a tricky one if you just bomb some random fields in the middle of nowhere then nobody would really have appreciated the scale of destruction after all a full load of incendiary bombs would cause a huge fire and possibly leave a similar size scorch mark behind , drop the nuke out at sea nobody sees it . Try to pick and industrial or military area and its probably in a city anyway .

As for dropping a nuke on Germany , I suspect that if Hitler hadn't attacked Russia and looked like he was about to invade Britain then Churchill would have been very willing to nuke Berlin. Bomber Harris most certainly would have been .

[bluemonday]

Yes but the Japanese mindset at the time must also be a major consideration.

A whole people willingly fighting for the 'divine' emperor to defend their homeland is a different proposition to Germany where some were left no choice but to fight out of fear of their own.

[Albert Tatlock]

With Japan still fighting moths later the allied command must have felt they had no choice but to drop the atomic bomb .

Yes it was a bit OTT - 64 years later you can get a spray at Tesco's for moths these days.

[Vulgarian]

The power of Japanese propoganda on its civilians should not be underestimated when talking about the possible outcomes of a land invasion of Japan, as an alternative to the atomic bombs.

 

Nationalist propaganda was of course used to strengthen and maintain the people's support for the war, as was done in other countries, but along with that were more militaristic ideals about honour and duty to the emperor. As invasion of mainland Japan was imminent the government distributed copies of the military code to civilians, which forbade surrender or retreat (although i don't think it explicitly encouraged suicide). This was used with stories about Americans raping women and killing children for very potent effect. It created a belief amongst the civilian population that suicide was preferable to surrender.

 

The battle of Okinawa has been mentioned. During the battle the Japanese military distributed hand-grenades to civilians and ordered them to commit suicide, which many did. This would not have been possible without the influence of propaganda. Can you imagine British people doing the same if Germany invaded? They'd tell the government where to stick their hand-grenades.

 

Another one was the Battle of Saipan where hundreds of civilians, under no apparent orders, threw themselves off cliffs instead of surrendering when America invaded the Island. They had been told stories of the barbarism of american soldiers towards prisoners.

 

A land invasion of Mainland Japan would definately have been more costly in military lives, and if the above incidents are any indication, it may have been vastly more costly in civilian lives.