Firstly, you expressed it as if it was taken from the report rather than an interpolation of your own. This gives a false impression and an unearned credibility; on that basis alone it makes perfectly good sense not to add it.
The report was giving its opinion of when the war would have ended without the dropping of the a-bombs. That assesment would logically be made based on the conditions that held in 1945 except for the dropping of the bomb. It is safe to assume that it was not talking about when Japan would have given up had some very unlikely things occured such as Godzilla intervening in the war or the US deciding to stop bombing.
It also makes sense not to add it, because it has nothing to do with the truth but is a carry-over of a myth which you refuse to let go of. Japan was helpless; she was cut off from gas, oil, food, and supplies. 66 cities had already been burned to the ground. It was obvious enough that the whole country could be burned up from the air--entirely at the American pleasure. There was no doubt that they could bomb from the air till there wasn/t anything living or moving.
No its not based on the belief that Japan is not hopeless or on anything about the conditions in Japan at all, but rather on the language of the report and the logic of the situation the authors in when they wrote it. They give no indication that they where trying to figure out what would have happened had we stopped attacking Japan, and I can't think of any reason why they would want to create such a report, let alone a reason why they would want to create such a report without mentioning this odd assumption.
Turning back to the overall issue of Japan's surrender and away from the narrower issue of the assumptions of the authors of the strategic bombing report - Japan was in bad shape and could not stop us from bombing them. However if we stopped bombing them then they would hardly have to stop the bombers. If they where seeking to surrender it was because the destruction the bombers where causing and the problems caused by the blockade. Stop those things and there is no reason for Japan to surrender that hadn't been around since early 1944. Even as early as Midway it could have been clear to people that where paying attention that Japan could not win. But the hard-liners thought it suited there perceptions of honor better to go down fighting even if caused millions of Japanese deaths. There where some who opposed the surrender even after the atom bombs where dropped and Russia had joined the war against them. If we had simply left Japan alone (no a-bombs, no invasion, no conventional strategic bombing, and perhaps no blockade) then there would probably have not been enough defectors from the hard-liners to make a surrender happen. If we had left them alone for a month or two as a test they would still have been in a hopeless position but its quite possible that the pause could have kept resistance going long enough to mean that we would have had to kill more Japanese in order to compel surrender. Bombing pauses for negotiation are usually a bad tactic.
Japan's military was more fanatical in many ways then Germany's but while some Germans might have wanted to negotiate peace it didn't happen until Berlin was occupied and Hitler was dead. When the US fought the Vietnamese communists we always had the ability to level North Vietnam either quickly with nukes, or slowly with heavy conventional bombing, but that didn't effect their will to fight because they knew we would not do it. Japanese military units had fought to the last man time and time again. They where training civilians to try and take out at least on American soldier before they where killed. There was no overwhelming evidence that an actual surrender was imminent, let alone evidence that this surrender would have happened merely because of the superior power of American armed forces even if we stopped attacking with those forces.
Why don't you just accept the fact that the war was over, and that Japan wanted to discuss the terms, but America did not?
Some within Japan wanted to discuss terms, other powerful forces did not. If we just stopped attacking the forces that did not want to surrender would be strengthened. In any case it was US policy to impose an unconditional surrender. You can attack that policy as immoral other otherwise wrong if you wish but while that policy existed any decision about attacks to be made on Japan would have to be made in that context.
"The worst case scenario was 5 or more months of heavy bombing and total blockade and/or a massive invasion."
So you disagree with the Report, and with all the reports...
I don't agree completely with the report but this was not an example of disagreement. The report said the war would be over by the end of the year without dropping the bomb and without an invasion. That would have meant the worst case scenario envisioned by the authors of the report was 5 more months of heavy bombing and near total blockade. And of course such plans and projections can easily be off (and they often are, probably more often then not) so a real worse case scenario would be even worse, but sticking with the opinion presented in the report still gives a worst case scenario that is exactly as I described it.
gg>Yes, Sireee! The SBR commissionmed by the US Secretary of War to address US interests was out to lunch when it said the worse that would have happened was surrender by the end of December WITHOUT invasion, without even Russia!!
I'm not sure that it said without Russia. It did say without dropping the bomb or an invasion, but it did not say without continued bombing and blockade. "By the end of December" would have been almost 5 more months. Also we where talking about worst case scenarios and since such projections are often not completly accurate it could have been even a bit longer, without being at all out to lunch. If the bomb wasn't dropped and neither the US or Russia invaded and Japan surrenderd in February I don't think people would have looked at the report and said "Wow they where out to lunch when they wrote that." It would still have been considered a pretty accurate assesment of the reality Japan faced. It would have been a lot more accurate then most estimates about wars. Also while we where waiting until December I wonder what Russia would have been doing. Or would you have had the US navy intercept and stop an invasion of Hokkaido after we had been pushing the Russians to enter the war against Japan.
"To clarify"
Nothing to clarify.
I see that you don't want to directly answer the question even as a hypothetical but that is certainly your prerogative. I suppose I could consider you answer to be something along the lines of "The conditions that you list did not occur (and perhaps in your opinion would be unlikely to ever occur) so you don't want do argue about them. If that is how you feel it is certainly your prerogative. If it is not then I apologize for any misrepresentation of your opinion.
Tim |
