Pope condemns possession of nuclear weapons

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And of course, the Japanese military was completely delusional when it came to American resolve. The only one with any sense was Admiral Yamamoto, and he was killed in action long before Downfall was on the table. Downfall called for nuclear combined arms bombardment, and the United States was in no mood to negotiate with fanatics, because that’s a recipe for another war later. The obligation to pursue peace presupposes that the enemy actually wants peace, not just a chance to rearm and recover. A false peace sows the seeds for worse wars.
 
DOWNFALL did not envision the use of atomic weapons, until Marshall conceived of the idea of using the projected nuclear production from the 3rd bomb on, through the start of OLYMPIC, for use as tactical support in invading Kyushu. He was particularly concerned about the steadily increasing numbers that intel was showing would be facing the invasion, as Japanese build-up on Kyushu inexorably continued (See Drea’s MACARTHUR’S ULTRA). He asked Groves for a projected likely number of bombs available for the purpose, around the end of July. Groves queried some of his number-crunchers, got a suggested total of 6-8, and Marshall’s plan was to hold them for use beyond the forward edge of battle as the troops came ashore. Fortunately, the idea never had to be tested.

Otherwise, I agree with your points. American resolve, Yamamoto, and the need for an unconditional surrender, so that, as Pershing said in disgust after the armistice ended WWI - In 25 years we will have to do it over again.
 
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Cynics could say the same about Isaiah 3:17-24, that this passage is not a description of conditions for Jewish women in WW II slave labor camps. My Episcopal priest wouldn’t buy it and said that the passage referred to an ancient event. But here’s the rub; we find in these lines the term, “that day,” which is a known abbreviation for The Great Day of YHWH. That event did not take place in ancient times, but it may have begun in the 20th century. Jeremiah 25:33 also contains these two words as do many other OT predictions of a world-wide calamity.
 
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edwest211 said:
Very false. The prophecy is clear, the exact means are not.
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Genesis 8:21 precludes the “means” from being anything that could be termed as “an act of God.” Therefore the means of the fire of Isaiah 66:15-16 and Luke 12:49 cannot be any kind of natural event, not a comet strike on the earth, not volcanoes, not a meteor, etc.
By default, only one means is left: global nuclear war, an event which is not an “act of God.”
(Who was it that said, “Scripture cannot be broken” ?)

 
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I see continued assumption on this thread that the USA’s A-bomb attacks on Japan were necessary to induce that country’s surrender. That presumption is not by any means proven, and we will never know it is actually true. The USA could have easily waited days or even weeks to allow the shock of the Russian declaration of war to influence the Japanese leaders. That the USA did not do so, even though the Truman administration knew full well of the imminent Soviet offensive belies the President’s true motivation: as the former Secretary of State Byrnes later admitted; “It was all about the Russians.”

By dropping the A-bomb just prior to the USSR’s declaration of war, the US government made it seem to its as if the Russians were “opportunists,” when, in fact, the Soviet offensive had been agreed upon many months prior. That premature act also allowed the Truman administration to take credit for the surrender through military action. The truth is that Truman’s real contribution to that event was his acceptance of the Japanese request for a conditional surrender.
 
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You should cite some references. Yes, the Russians had planned the attack. Yes, they wanted to invade Japan. The dropping of the two atom bombs signaled a “stay away” to the Russians who had no idea if more atom bombs were available. Once the US took over, they located a Japanese atomic research institute and made it a point to dump their cyclotron in Tokyo Bay. President Truman was just as in the dark as military planners who had only a vague idea of what atomic bombs could do. Truman agreed under conditions that are still vague in the historical record.

From a tactical standpoint, the US was in a very good position to wait. But it didn’t want to.

“The use of this barbarous weapon…was of no material assistance in our war against Japan.” —Adm. William Leahy, Truman’s Chief of Staff
 
They also ended the war, in the shortest time, with the fewest casualties. Time=blood… As I’ve been demonstrating for many years on here. You are a slow and poorly read audience.

Not a research institute.The destroyed cyclotrons were two of Nishina’s, at the Riken research institute, and two other devices from two universities. Nishina objected that the large Riken cyclotron had played no part in weapon research; in fact he had it listed as part of the Ni-Go project, to insure it got funding, for his own use. All cyclotrons mentioned were broken up and dumped in Tokyo Bay.

From his I WAS THERE. Leahy also had a moral objection to the invasions. See O’Brien/THE SECOND MOST POWERFUL MAN IN THE WORLD/chap. 25 (He speaks well of Frank and Giangreco, there). And see HIROSHIMA IN HISTORY: THE MYTHS OF REVISIONISM/ed. Maddox, esp. chap 1, pp. 14-16 (written by the editor), and his WEAPONS FOR VICTORY, p. 4 and pp. 120-121. Recall that it was Leahy, in an attempt to dampen the bombs utility in the eyes of the decision makers, declared before the Trinity test that the idea was ridiculous and that the bomb would not function, citing his expertise in explosives (meaning he had been the captain of a battleship and a gunnery expert). Note that there is no evidence he ever made any statements such as he expressed in his memoirs, before 1950. Some of the citations above will help you recall. While you have the books out, read them front to back. Good for you.

If this continues, so will I. Bought two relevant books in the past two weeks. Have two more to order shortly. Books. Good for you.
 
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You are perceptive. But not accurate. Japan would have surrendered, in some sense, at some point, eventually. The question was what would the total cost be.

It was all about a number of things, not reductionist. It was about ending the war in the fastest manner, with the fewest casualties, with a requirement of unconditional, not negotiated, surrender, to allow a total restructuring of the Japanese society, and to keep the Soviets from expanding the Iron Curtain, duplicating eastern Europe. When the first bomb was dropped, the Soviets, realizing they were going to miss the train, advanced their plans to begin the attack (in Manchuko/China) by a week. And kept that conquest going, for roughly two weeks after the Japanese had surrendered, causing casualties of over 90,000, in gaining their new conquests. Against feeble resistance. One can calculate what an invasion, anyone’s invasion, against the Home Islands would have added.

Two planes. Two bombs. End of war. No more killing. Good.

Maybe stick to your OT prophecies.
 
GKMotley said:
Two planes. Two bombs. End of war.
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Thanks for your reply. However, I must maintain my assertion that it is unproven that the two A-bomb attacks on Japan had much, if anything, to do with Hirohito’s decision to order Japan’s surrender. The Russian declaration of war is known to have come as a great shock, and Truman’s acceptance of the request that the emperor be a part of the new Japanese government may well have been the deciding factor.
 
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You are very welcome. You may maintain whatever erroneous ideas you wish. I don’t engage in this exercise (for 15 years now), to convince folk, who know little or nothing of the history, of the fatuity of their assertions. I do it as a hobby. Dubious, doubtful, debatable or downright risible points need to be corrected, as a matter of course. I can explain history to others, I never expect to do much more… Though, in truth, I have made some small progress, in isolated incidents.

OTOH, as noted above, Byrnes’ letter made no assertion whatsoever that the Emperor, in person or in office, would necessarily be a part of Yamato’s ( 大 和) future. As Bix (you will recall Bix) stated, the answer “…deliberately left unclarified the future of both the emperor and the imperial institution”. Ambiguous it was. Before conveying the letter to the Emperor, Matsumoto very slightly weasel-worded one sentence to make it more palatable. But it was what it was.

This is not, as I have said, my favorite topic. But is one that inevitably gets my participation, when I run across it. I’m well positioned to do what I do.

And it’s stirred me again. Now there are 5 additional titles to be ordered. Some good can come from anything.

.
 
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There seem to have been three factors that may have motivated the Japanese leadership which occurred in the roughly the same time frame: 1. The unexpected declaration of war by the USSR, 2. The destruction of two more Japanese cities, this time by a new type of weapon, 3. The suggestion by the Truman administration that the Emperor might be allowed to remain.

If the atomic attacks had occurred without either the declaration of war by the USSR or the intimation that the Emperor might be immune from prosecution, and Japan had then surrendered, we could rightly conclude that these attacks had motivated that surrender.
Conversely, if the USSR had declared war and the Truman administration had made its concessions, and these events did not produce a surrender, but a subsequent atomic attack did, then we could conclude the same once again.

Many Japanese cities had already been obliterated by fire-bombing raids. The destruction of two more, even by a new type of weapon, was really nothing all that new. Therefore, I regard the belief that the USA’s atomic attacks were instrumental in persuading the Japanese to surrender to be “wishful thinking” by those who find it hard to accept the idea that these attacks were a mistake.
 
Best post you’ve ever made on the subject.

Still wrong.

The Japanese surrendered unconditionally, to what the careful wording did not imply or state. Bix is not the only one who will tell you so. There was no intimation at all as to what might or might not happen to Hirohito. He could have been tried as a war criminal, and/or deposed for another member of the imperial house. Though, as Byrne’s letter did state explicitly, there was one function he had to perform, first and immediately. The only statement about what might eventually happen was that “The ultimate form of government of Japan shall, in accordance with the Potsdam Declaration, be established by the freely expressed will of the Japanese people”. Whatever that might be. Which was whatever we wanted it to be. And so it was.

The Russian declaration of war and attack (advanced by a week in order not get left out of dividing up the spoils) did only one thing, as of the point of the Aug 9-10 gozen kaigan when it occurred. It removed the illusion the Japanese had, as to the ability of a non-belligerent Soviet Union , to ease them into a non-conditional surrender. IOW, it proved what Sato had been telling Togo all along: surrender, to the Potsdam Declaration. Now. And at the identical point, the Supreme Council for the Conduct of the War was faced with Nagasaki. Two cities destroyed, in minutes, by 2 planes. Multi-hundred plane raids were one thing. This was another.

Whatever you regard is not of any particular consequence. Uninformed opinions are often like that.That being so, why is this the best post you ever made? You have moved a tiny bit away from your reductionism. As a reward, in addition to Frank’s DOWNFALL, I’ll suggest another title. Kort/THE COLUMBIA GUIDE TO HIROSHIMA AND THE BOMB. Like Frank, like many other books, it would do you much good.

I think the next order will be for Dower’s CULTURES OF WAR. His WAR WITHOUT MERCY and EMBRACING DEFEAT are good.
 
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TY. I apologize for my lack of expertise in this field. However, I know that I read somewhere that the Japanese knew that they would be completely lost without their Manchurian and Korean territories. That makes two things that the USSR’s military advances accomplished.

Thanks for the books noted. I prefer Long’s “Life Before the Revolution,” and “The OSS and Ho Chi Minh, Unexpected Allies,” by Bartholomew-Feis, books which relate to a theater that I had a personal experience in.
 
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The Pope, no doubt, understands that chicken hawks like John Bolton are determined force Iran to a war with the United States and that down the line nukes will resolve the issue.
 
You are very welcome. As to your last para, if that means what I think it does, my thanks for your service.

As to your first para, no one has any level of expertise, with respect to subjects like this, in any sense of the word, without a good deal of weight-lifting, to get it. That means books, for depth of information and it means multiple books, from all aspects of the field of scholarship related to the topic, to the degree that contentious viewpoints make that necessary. And it takes time. I happened to be in an excellent position to do such things, beginning, roughly 1994, and still going. A life-long book collector, focusing since I was 10 on WWII as one of my main areas, 14 years in the book selling business, including rare and collectible titles, and the means and background to seriously pursue any subject area that I become seriously interested in. The bombs are only one such topic, but without a doubt the one in which I most often confront folks whose background in the area is minimal and limited to keyboard clicks. And, being a touch O-C, here I am, repeatedly.

"Their " Manchurian and Korean territories were theirs only from direct, brutal imperial conquest, over the preceding 30+ years And the Japanese knew that they were not going to be theirs much longer. They represented the first fruits of the reason that Japan went to war originally: to build an Eastern empire, and to replace all such Western colonial masters, by assuming Japans proper role as an imperial power, in like image, supreme in the Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere, i.e. The Japanese Empire. They held such territory they conquered before the tide was reversed, by the sword and direct subjugation.

When the handwriting was on the wall, the 6 members of the Supreme Committee for the Conduct of the War, the true power center in the nation, were roughly split between realists and hardliners. The realists insisted only on the preservation of the kokutai, the one condition, before surrender. The hardliners, led by General Anami, held for.multiple additional conditions: that the military would disarm itself, that the Japanese government would conduct any necessary war trials, that the Home Islands would not be subject to occupation, and that Japanese would be permitted to keep some of their territories, Korea and Manchuko in particular. Those 5 hardline conditions rapidly shrank to four, as the fact that at the very least, the territory conquered by the sword would not be held, when the sword was removed. Henceforth, the hardliners were known as the Four Condition faction, not Five.

There is much more history here. But I have been alerted that you and I have been taking too much.
 
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