Did Japan Surrender Because of the Atomic Bomb?
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- Опубліковано 9 бер 2023
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It's common wisdom that the nuclear bombs dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki caused the Japanese surrender at the end of the 2nd World War. However, there has been a fierce historical debate if this narrative omits the role of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria in August 1945 - or if this invasion was actually the main cause for the surrender.
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» SOURCES
Cook, Haruko Taya & Cook, Theodore F., Japan at War: An Oral History, (New York, NY : The New York Press, 1992)
Frank, Richard B, Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire, (New York, NY ; Random House, 1999)
Glantz, David M., “August Storm: The Soviet 1945 Strategic Offensive in Manchuria”, Leavenworth Papers No. 7, Combat Studies Initiative, (February 1983)
Grew, Joseph C., “Report from Tokyo: An Ambassador warns of Japan’s strength”, in LIFE Magazine, (December 7, 1942)
Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi, Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japan, (Cambridge, MA : Belknap Press, 2005)
Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi (ed.), The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals, (Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press, 2007)
Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi, “The Atomic Bombs and the Soviet Invasion: Which Was More Important in Japan’s Decision to Surrender” in Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi (ed.), The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals, (Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press, 2007)
Hatano, Sumio, “The Atomic Bomb and Soviet Entry into the War: Of Equal Importance” in Hasegawa, Tsuyoshi (ed.), The End of the Pacific War: Reappraisals, (Stanford, CA : Stanford University Press, 2007)
Kort, Michael, “Racing the Enemy: A Critical Look”, in Maddox, James, Hiroshima in History: The Myths of Revisionism, (Columbia, MO : University of Missouri Press, 2007)
Maddox, James, Hiroshima in History: The Myths of Revisionism, (Columbia, MO : University of Missouri Press, 2007)
Pape, Robert A., “Why Japan Surrendered”, International Security, Vol. 18, No. 2 (Fall, 1993)
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Okay, the USSR declares war (starts hostilities, whatever) on the SAME DAY the US drops the SECOND bomb. Only someone who has 20/20 hindsight can see that the decision to drop the bombs in the first place was unnecessary.
Is this a side channel? I've noticed that you take quite a long time to release new videos for this channel. If so, what is you main channel?
@Benson Caisip Lots more dead people. Possibly millions of Japanese and tens, if not hundreds of thousands of Allied troops.
@Benson Caisip Same answer.
after carefully looking at certain manga genre and socialist realism, in my opinion communist manga will mostly looked something like shindoL's metamorphosis in style. but many will be k-on fun like that's not in highschool but office work and farm themed manga.
What never ceases to amaze me is that there's basically no middle ground in this debate. It's either bomb or Soviets. Why both can't be factors of the same magnitude?
You make a decent point.
I don’t think the orthodox position is that the Soviets are irrelevant. It is the opposing position that says the bombs are.
The Video points this out at about 22:00. No single person made the decision, which means the "reason" is the sum of a bunch of people making different decisions for different reasons.
This is how I feel too, I feel that if Japan had to face one or the other solo, then they would have attempted to do so, especially since their culture was super radicalized.
Yet when faced with *BOTH* that they would have absolutely *NO WAY* to be able to dish out enough death & suffering to their opposition that the opposition would change peace agreement negotiations, if not even more resolve of complete annihilation &/or unconstitutional surrender. (They especially wouldn't have been able to dish out enough damage to the Soviet into changing their minds, if the Germans couldn't do it when Soviet k/d ratio was astounding, then Japan for sure couldn't at that time)
Because they’re not? The only reason anyone plays down the atomic bomb attacks is to big up the Soviet Unions importance.
As I’ve heard before “history does not happen in a vacuum”, it is rarely just one thing that causes things to happen
Yeah. In reality it was probably a factor of all these things that added up
In the casualty estimates of an invasion of the Japanese home islands, you left out a critical element: There were over 400,000 allied POWs still in Japanese camps, having endured years of torture and starvation. The Americans had decoded Japanese military codes for comms several years prior, and had decoded messages with orders to all the POW camps that ALL of the prisoners were to be summarily executed as soon as the invasion of the Japanese mainland started. So, regardless of the debate on civilian and military casualties of the invaders and defenders, well over 400,000 would have died at the outset.
@@danwarb1 As the video clearly states, Japan had not been trying to surrender. They had made informal overtures to the Soviet Union asking if they could get better terms than unconditional surrender but that was the extent of it.
@@danwarb1they definitely were not trying to surrender. We have minutes of the meetings of the ministry cabinet before and after the first atomic bomb, and in both cases they deadlocked. They couldn’t reach an agreement and only after the emperor himself intervened (which was something that had no precedent) could the stall be resolved. By that time Nagasaki had already been bombed and the soviets had invaded Japanese territory.
@@RollTide1987 Wrong, they were trying to surrender. They Just didn't want an unconditional surrender after they saw what happened to Germany. The knew this through the SSR and the Japanese code they had cracked.
You are missing a lot of important information. Japan's war cabinmate knew they had already lost. They were running low on supplies in food, protective equipment, ammunition and other important military necessities. This was due to the naval blockade and the conventional bombing. There agriculture, manufacturing and importation was completely disrupted, so they new they had no way out.
Half wanted to accept an unconditional surrender, while the other half wanted to stay in the fight to try to get Japan a conditional surrender, which would result in protecting the emperor. They tried to achieve this goal in two ways:
First was to make the cost of maintaining the war too costly for the Americans and its allies, which would force the Americans to the negotiation table and accept some of Japan's conditions.
Second was to negotiate with the SSR (Soviet Socialist Republic) and convince them to act as a mediator, and in return the SSR was to get back the territory Japan took from them.
The second option was the most likely to work, the USA had already made a secret deal with the SSR to join the fight in return for a site at the negotiation table where they would get back there lands and have a say in what happens to Japan.
The confirmation of the successful test of the atomic bomb reached president Harry S. Truman while attending Potsdam Conference in Germany. This was 16 hours before the first atomic bomb was dropped on Japan. They rushed the dropping of the bomb because they didn't want the SSR to have a site at the negotiation table.
US intelligence at this point in time knew Japan was looking for a way to surrender as they had already cracked the Japanese code, so all military transitions where known to the Americans. In addition to that, they also knew through the RRS that Japan was trying to get the SSR to negotiate for favorable terms for Japan's surrender so as for their emperor to stay in power and not to get persecuted for war crimes. They also wanted a Japanese runed war crime persecution body for Japanese solders.
With all that, it is reasonable to conclude that the atomic bombs were not necessary.
@@luntha.correct
Lots of these youngsters nowdays have been brainwashed into thinking Us was a war hero
Japan literally surrender because Russia declared war on them
Them 2 bombs pretty much dropped after the war ended as a showcase of power towards ussr
During this Russia and Japan were in talks for peace
The way the japanese treated POWs was dispicable.
US casualties on Okinawa were around 49,000 including 12,000 dead. US casualties on the little island of Iwo Jima were 24,000 including 6,000+ dead. An estimate of only 20,000 US casualties during an invasion of the Japanese mainland seems ridiculously low. Kyushu is just one of four islands that make up the bulk of the Japanese mainland.
That estimate basically assumes Japan suffers mass-surrender of troops shortly after the invasion. Which is quite unrealistic in and of itself, and ignores the fact that, you know, it's flipping Japan in 1945 and significant chunks of the population would've fought a hideous guerilla war.
@@nvelsen1975 it is however what happened when the Soviets invaded Manchuria - the Japanese army simply disintegrated with little resistance
To everyone replying that Manchuria and Okinawa arent comparable - maybe, maybe not but you need to seriously have another look at the history of the Japanese Empire... By 1945 MORE JAPANESE lived in Manchuria than in Okinawa...
And even if you somehow give Okinawa the status of "Japanese home island" (which is debatable at the time) then the Japanese army / navy still fought even more vicious on previous much less important Islands. Okinawa also was the first time the US saw mass surrender of Japanese troops even if it was not on the scale the Soviets saw.
Its in the end its all speculation but maybe dont jump to conclusions without knowing some of the facts first...
@@bingobongo1615 that's Manchuria opposite happened on Okinawa and jima which are more important. Population was brainwashed to fight till last breath
@Bingo Bongo Manchuria isn't Japan and if you don't understand the importance of home, no wonder you love commie propaganda.
@@bingobongo1615
Yep, they did.
Turns out fighting untrained forced-conscripts who see themselves as Chinese or Korean, fight less hard than Japanese who've been brainwashed from childhoood to regard racist murder as the highest virtue and victory through extermination of 'lesser races' as a minimum.
We're going to be seeing kids like that if within the next 5 years Putin is not eliminated and continues preparing children for the 'führer's war agaist Ukraine'
I think the Allies had something to do with Japan surrendering.
Ah yes, Potential History bros.
Might be a long shot
@@DOSFS So glad you got the reference.
Yeah. "We are going to lose. We get to decide to who lose." The bombs were a threat to the USSR which is the only reason that Stalin haulted hostilities without taking more real estate.
well the Japanese generals came the realization , IT WAS ONE BOMB .. THEN TWO .. the risk was to great to chance it , since every error , costed another 100,000 dead . in a blinding flash ..
I think the estimation of just 20,000 US casualties to take the Japanese islands is very very much underestimated since it cost 5000 USMC to take Iwo Jima alone.
But military casualties and civilian casualties are not the same. 10 dead fully armed soldiers who die in a battle are not the same as 10 children dying in a school in there hometown.
Try 24,000, including over 7,000 dead.
Yeah. Nobody in the US military expected that. There's a reason they minted like half a million Purple Heart medals, so many, that they are still using them.
@@supportgap7748 You do realize that the Tokyo firebombing raid alone killed more civilians than the nukes, yeah? Bombing civilian city centers was par for the course throughout the war, on all sides, in an attempt to break the home-front morale. The only reason the US did not suffer from this, is that neither the Germans nor the Japanese had the means to reach the US mainland with bombers. The nukes are in no way special in this regard. If anything, they hastened the end of the war way more, for way less casualties than the fire bombing campaign.
50.000
I’ve read several memoirs of marines and soldiers who fought on Okinawa and were told to prepare for the invasion of Japan itself that they could expect well over a million casualties and that they were expected to kill every man, woman, and child and that it was either the whole Japanese civilization would perish or they would eventually surrender. Not one marine or soldier wanted to do that and they saw the bombs as saving not only them but Japan as a whole
My dad was about five years too young to enlist. So he lived through the war and the bombing. His view was exactly this. Very sad at the loss of life but given Japan's resolve to fight, it was the least bad of all the options.
Except noone has that level of resolve... this comes from the inhuman way the japanese were viewed as mindless killing machines for the emperor and is laughably silly and childish way to view a rival culture.
@@Ancient_Entity the soldiers and marines hated the Japanese soldiers not the citizens why kill the populous when they could surrender
So then why wasn't this enacted during the allied invasion of Germany? This is a justification for the bombing but it isn't exactly true. More likely was that the Marines would have to lose many soldiers in order to complete the full invasion of Japan which was not something they wanted.
@@Ancient_Entitythey earned their reputation.
I think mainly because Japan knew they had a much better chance of keeping their emperor under an American occupation than a Soviet occupation.
None of these videos ever discuss how Japan is today and what kind of country Japan would be in those other scenarios. As terrible as the tragedy of the atomic bombs were, many more civilians were killed by conventional bombs. Japan ended up becoming one of the most economically dominant free democracies in the '90s and would have kept going except for their country's lack of natural resources and aging population.
@@fanily4072plaza accord left the chat
@@fanily4072it’s been said, if you want a better future, lose a war against the US…look at Japan and Germany! Only US helps its enemies after winning wars against them.
And now Japan is a proxy country of America and extremely docile and whimsical as a whole.
Revisionist history.. BS The US was the deciding factor NOT the USSR. The USSR defeated a bunch of Japanese in Manchuria when the US already completely destroyed the merchant Japanese fleet.. they didn't have enough supplies.. That was thanks to the US NOT the USSR. In 1945 the US was a 13 million man military. Japan also removed their elite troops in Manchuria much earlier to help the war effort in the Pacific.
i dont know who came up with the 20,000 casualty figure but its laughable. more than 2.5 times that were suffered during the okinawa invasion alone.
the us procured so many purple heart medals in expectation of the invasion of japan, that they were still being issued during the war on terror 70 years later.
Agree - it's ludicrous to think an invasion of Kyushu or Honshu would be nearly unopposed as implied by that 20K figure. That's an absurd estimate and damages the credibility of this video.
Perhaps a typo? 8:10
@@erminos8628 that's the only thing I can think of. 20k is 7k less casualties than Iwo Jima, which was a pebble in size compared to mainland Japan, with no civilians on it.
Yes. Watch some history on the battle for the island. The carnage was horrific. Those high death estimates for an invasion of Japan from the US military were not crazy. Plus, the US entered the war late. The Brits and other allies were completely exhausted. The US would have had to go it alone.
When you kill people to save soldiers you lose in the worse possible way.
A Japanese friend of mine was telling me all about Japanese history one day. He kept telling me about how the Emperor at the time had big plans for gaining new land and conquering neighboring countries and stuff. Really grow and become a massive empire, resolve their own cultural issues and become a global superpower.
When he told me about these big plans I kept asking "what happened next?" and he kept answering "Hiroshima"
They didn't surrender after Hiroshima though did they?? So that view is wrong. Use common sense.
@@deodrasshelios7957 A week after Nagasaki, which was 3 days after. There was also a threat to use more. That showed the USA had more than one. They might well have surrendered in the face of conventional attack but they did surrender due to the nuclear attacks. You're comment about common sense is rude, childish and you're clearly wrong.
Did he mention any of the Japanese atrocities committed while doing this? Probably not
@@Yamulo He did, actually. The atrocities didn't come up often but when it did, he didn't try to shy away from it or excuse or justify anything, he just told it like it was, as he understood it. He's proud to be Japanese but he's not so proud that it compromises his own moral compass. "It's not ok but that's how it happened" was basically how he felt.
@@deodrasshelios7957 They might not have immediately surrendered but having two entire cities blown to bits in the blink of an eye is not the best way to keep your plans on track. I obviously oversimplified the specifics of that conversation in my comment but whenever he said "they planned this" or "they were about to do that", Hiroshima was usually the reason it didn't end up happening that way.
Also, my comment never said "Hiroshima happened so they immediately surrendered that day", cuz that's obviously not how history works. He just meant that it was a catalyst in Japanese history and that things would've turned out very differently if it weren't for that. Didn't think I had to spell that out but here we are.
The only person who could answer your question is the Emperor of Japan.
This is such an easy question to answer. I've had to write many papers about this. The 100% undeniable proof can be found in the logs of the Imperial Cabinet Meetings (the big 6) during the last months of the war up until the end of the war.
Those meetings were all recorded and recorded before the droppings of the atomic bombs and are then not influenced by what the Japanese thought after the US occupied them. In those meetings months before the atomic bombs are dropped the Japanese are doing everything they can to move as many troops and supplies out out China/mainland Asia back to Japan to defend the home islands. This was because the Japanese knew under no peace terms would they be allowed to keep their empire. Their whole goal was to make an invasion of the Japanese mainland so painful that the US and allies would ease off the unconditional surrender terms.
During those meetings where they are moving troops from China back to Japan they say how that makes them weak to an invasion by the USSR and the Big 6 don't care. This is again because they knew that land was already lost to them. Once the first nuke then hit Japan the Big 6 had a meeting and were told by the Japanese Nuclear scientists that the US atomic bomb was just a one time weapon and that there was no way the US could have made more then one of them based on their knowledge of how an atomic weapon could be built.
It wasn't then until the second bomb that the Big 6 voted in a 3 to 3 split to surrender with the Emperor needed to break the tie. During that meeting they didn't once talk about the USSR having invaded China. They just talked about how the US having their new bomb completely destroyed their strategy of trying to defend the home islands to the point that the allies gave them better terms. The Emperor and the 3 members of the Big 6 who voted for surrender did so because the knew if the US could just keep atomic bombing them every week that the US would never have to invade them and they could do that until the whole Japanese population was destroyed if they wanted to. Thus they agreed to surrender because of the atomic bombs and not at all to do with the USSR invasion of China (which again they already knew was lost to them). It is so simple and easy to understand. It blows my mind that people still think otherwise.
Agreed, people just need to read the logs of the Imperial Cabinet Meetings to see that the USSR invasion of China had no effect on why Japan surrendered. The USSR just rushed up their invasion to get what they could out of of Japan which they knew would be surrendering shortly.
I find it so silly when people try to make the argument that Japan surrendered because the USSR invaded the territory they held in China. As the OP said, Japan already knew all of their Imperial holding were going to be gone in any peace deal they got.
They were just fighting on to try to get a better peace deal. The atomic bombs made that impossible because it broke the Japanese strategy of just trying to make any Allied invasion of Japan to costly. Since the invention of the atomic bomb made and invasion of Japan not needed. The Allies could just keep starving Japan out and dropping atomic bombs and regular bombs on it until it surrendered or the whole Japanese population was destroyed.
I agree too. Japanese didn't care about their own life they wanted to inflict pain as deep they can on allies. But their plan failed why? Cause atomic bombs. The Americans without a single casualty are killing hundred thousands of Japanese so how will you convince your population who have been brainwashed to fight allies till their last breath to remain calm as no allied soldier is dying due to bomb.
if i remember correctly the us first asked for an unconditional surrender. but then they allowed hirohito to stay at his position. this probably had a huge impact cause the japanese knew how the allies treated the germans and their high ranking party members.
@@dasurmel1424 Sorry, you don't remember correctly. The US and Allied terms were always unconditional surrender and that is what Japan and Germany agreed to. It was hinted to the Japanese that if they agreed to surrender through 3rd party nations that if they did surrender that the US maybe willing to allow the Emperor to stay in ceremonial power but that was it, no guarantee was ever made. That hint allowed the Japanese to start trying to clear the emperors name from documents related to the war as well. Or so the claim goes. The Japanese claim most if their records before 1943 were destroyed in US fire bomb raids.
8:50 The problem with this argument is that, as you said, the US didn't know any of that at the time of their decision. They couldn't time travel to find out that some random college professor from 2023 said that their estimates were wrong. At the time, they worked with the information they had, and that pointed to massive US casualties in an invasion of Japan.
I've never heard that argument before now. Ever. If anything I've heard the US had underestimated it's casualties.
Thank you DomesticOnion! I also don't accept modern judgements from Historians who are not limiting conclusions to facts known to Truman at the time.
Befor the bombs, the estimated casualties werent that high, after the bombs the estimated casualties get much much higher, so that dropping the bombs looked less unethical
Modern Professors=Apologize for Anything America 🇺🇸 has Done. Ask them, are they Veterans, the Children or grandchildren of Veterans of and you find out 👎 NO. Multi-Generational Professorship.... i.e. Never been outside of Academia.
Myself I actually got an A writing ✍️ a Paper on "Japan Deserved to Be Bombed"
@@wolf310ii In July of 1945, "before the bombs" as you put it, the US War department put the eatimate casualties of operation downfall at 2 to 4 million US service members and 5 to 8 million Japanese dead.
My Japanese grandma was saved because a bomb that fell on her house was a dud. She was running out of her house at the sound of air raid sirens, felt a thud on her roof and always told me she remembers the clacks and scraping of the metal bomb sliding down along her clay roof tiles. She was carrying my uncle who was a baby at the time on her back. If that bomb had gone off, I would not be here, my wife would be married to someone else, and my children would not have been born. Here’s to hoping we can minimize any future war to the bare minimum 🙏🙏
Too much religious nutcrack around for your hope.
Wow. Hopefully, we don't ever have another war like this!
And i would have never got a chance to read this comment
Who knows, maybe I would not be here either. I'm from Italy but causality moves and spreads pretty quick over time.
What your wife look like? Too bad
Thanks for the interesting and balanced video, very professional.
The HQ of the Second General Army (The army group responsible for the defence of the southern half of Japan) was located at Hiroshima castle. If you look at the pictures of 1945 Hiroshima, you can see the square moat in the top right. The destruction of the HQ was so complete that it was unable to even report on its own condition as it had lost all ability to communicate beyond bicycle messengers. Japan was governed by general officers, and I can't help but wonder what the effect was when they realised that a single American bomber dropping a single bomb could cut them off from any control they might have exerted upon the battle for the Japanese home islands for weeks at a time. This would be especially unsettling to them given that they had no idea how many nuclear bombs the Americans had. I don't think they would write it down, but I can't help but wonder if the leadership found domestic chaos a more frightening prospect than going down fighting.
It's funny that even after getting nuked the officers up the chain still saved face about what happened, which is comforting b/c officers the world over still do this.
I've read a theory that after the first bomb Japanese scientists assumed that the Americans could have only a tiny handful of such weapons as it was a uranium bomb and they knew how difficult uranium separation was. The second bomb was a plutonium bomb, which meant that the Americans had worked out how to build a breeder reactor and could therefore produce nuclear weapons in substantial numbers; it's now believed that the Americans would have been able to produce about three Nagasaki-sized bombs per month. In light of this, it became clear that a US invasion of Japan wasn't going to happen; Japanese alternatives were surrender or slow annihilation.
@@Michael75579 I've never heard this before, but I guess you have your sources. I am highly skeptical that Japanese scientists knew the precise construction materials of either bomb. We didn't advertise their specific makeup until later.
@@davidk7324 i think the prospect of nuclear weapons was kind of an open secret at this point. We already know that the Germans knew of the possibility of nuclear weapons even if they never had the capability to make in’s. In fact its this fact that kicked the Manhattan Project into high gear. We wanted it done before the Germans. So its not so far fetched to believe the Japanese knew either.
I watched a video where they talked about target selection, and Tokyo was on the original list. However, due to the fact it had already been fire bombed to h-ll and back, it was not considered an appropriate target to demonstrate the power of the bomb, since there would be few buildings to destroy. So on one hand, it is true they were not a target, but it was because by this time the city was pretty much leveled already. And the reason we know that tidbit is the reason we know it was at point considered a target.
So drop the bombs on civilian people got it
They had considered detonating it in Tokyo bay.
I’m pretty sure both cities were on a no bombing list to maximise the impacts of the nuclear bombs
bombing tokyo would be dumb, they need the governent to listen to them, america isn't gonna lead japan, what america wants is japan's government to follow them and not russia. If they destroyed the government it would mean america would have to rebuild the government themself which would be unescssarily costly and conflicting.
@@hydroking2969 buddy we leveled the city before we even thought of making the atom bomb, that’s why they never bombed it. They couldn’t anymore
Thank you it was a great information.
Great video. Thanks
One amazing fact about the canceled home island invasion is that the US has issued purple hearts meant for that operation into at least 2020.
We still are as of 2023.
There was supposed to be 3 bombs dropped, the third got jammed in the bomb bay after prematurely dropping from the carrier housing to the belly of the plane enroute.
@@robert9595 No. The third bomb was delivered to the Marianas but never loaded onto a plane. It was tentatively scheduled to be dropped on August 19th, proposed target was Tokyo. The ceasefire was the 16th.
@@user-gl5dq2dg1j prolonged ceasefire for another 3 more days and Japan would be DONE! dang, mindblown!
@@johnthegametologist Some officers in the army did try to arrest/kidnap Hirohito to prevent the surrender. Luckily their coup failed. Nimitz was worried enough that it could all be a trick or otherwise fall apart, he had Adm. Spruance offshore with the 5th fleet to resume the fighting.
My belief is that the Japanese either didn’t believe that America had more than 1 sun available to drop on them, or didn’t want to concede. After another sun was dropped on the Land of the Rising Sun (ironic), methinks that Hirohito thought Americans (and maybe the Soviets too) were just crazy enough to erase Japan off the map in irradiated fire.
You don’t have to believe that, we know it. He said so in his surrender speech:
“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.”
I think that was even discussed by the Japanese war cabinet after the first bomb. Regardless, they found out the answer a few days later.
No landing operations or atomic bombs were required for the end of the war.
The CIA website has a PDF file which shows that the Government of Japan was asking the United States to talk the end of the war from the beginning of 1945.
And it was recorded that Japanese government admitted defeat and argued that retention of the Emperor was the only condition for surrender, because it was necessary to prevent Japan from becoming a communist nation.
The draft of the Potsdam Declaration was supervised by Joseph Grew, the former ambassador to Japan.
The draft included a sentence authorizing the guarantee of the emperor's retention.
Because Grew was known the above information, also knew well why Japan wanted the retention of the Emperor, and knew that Japan would surrender as soon as the Potsdam Declaration allowed the retention of the Emperor.
This Grew’s effort is proven by the Truman memoir.
It says:
"Grew arrived at the end of May and suggested to make a declaration urging Japan to surrender. The declaration provided Japan with a guarantee that the United States would allow the Emperor to remain head of state."
"I told him that I had already considered this issue and that (Grew's suggestion) seemed like a sound opinion."
However, when Truman annouced the Potsdam Declaration, the sentence that allowed the retention of the Emperor had removed from the declaration.
It was because the atomic bomb was completed shortly before the declaration.
And the guarantee of the Emperor's status would likely have done Japan's immediate surrender, which meant the loss of the opportunity and the place to test atomic bombs.
Therefore, it was clear that the US purpose of dropping the atomic bomb on Japan was not to end the war, and it was as follows.
1. Experiments on how the atomic bomb destroys and kills living cities and people
2. Experiments on contamination by radioactivity and its effects on the human body
3. Demonstration to the Soviet Union
In addition, it seems that it is not well known, but in fact, after the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, the US nuclear bomb development agency announced that it had "successfully conducted an atomic bomb drop experiment."
@@undercoverAlly you completely ignored the Japanese military. They did not want to surrender.
@@silencemeviolateme6076 @Silence me Violate me the bombs weren't dropped on the military were they?
Also, the military resided under the emperor and i did address that they were READY TO SURRENDER, Emperor and military.
Edit: at the time of potsdam declaration, Japan had already stopped occupying further territory and had started defending it's occupied territory. This was why they were willing to surrender through diplomacy.
I have lived in Japan for about 18 years and have had discussions with some of my Japanese friends over this-- they were more afraid of Japan being divided between the US and Russia more than the nuclear/atom bombs. Of course, the atom bombs were part of that decision, but not the main reason. When Russia entered the war and it became clear that they do not have the military capability to stop them and the US with atom bombs decimating their industrial military bases, surrender to the US seemed to be the best course.
Ok Commie bot. Soviet single handedly defeated japan and they handed over to US for occupation right?
@@totoitekelcha7628 Seriously? Read it again and again until you get what Im trying to say (and its not what you now think). Some people just dont know how to read...
@@swordofstmichael007 Some stupid peoples assume that talking with one or two private soldiers and take their opinion as the main cause. If you really wanted to know go and ask the emperor he is the one deciding the outcome. The emperor says because their enemy possess a devastating bomb thats why they need to surrender.
@@totoitekelcha7628 Again, you are showing that you do not know how to read. I did not say it as a matter of fact. I am saying that is the opinion of my Japanese friends. Try again.
@@swordofstmichael007 You take it as a fact
Very informative n interesting debate on what really caused Japan to ultimately surrender. We may never know but speculate. Kudos for the various points of views. Archival films n still pics were most effective in ur presentation. New subscriber because of this vid. Anticipating ur next one. Peace
I question modern historians and have a very hard time believing that estimated casualties of Downfall at the time were “greatly exaggerated”. There were still hundreds of thousands of Japanese troops in the home islands. Even with depleted munitions, I can’t see only 20,000 allied casualties being in any way realistic.
I also found that estimate extremely low. The United States had made so many purple hearts in preparation for the mainland invasion that we were still giving them out to our soldiers into 2020. So when I heard that estimate I laughed at how low it was.
Another conspirator …
20,000 per blade of grass captured, might be more accurate.
Whereas I have a hard time believing that a country that already knew it was defeated and had been trying to surrender was going to fight to the death. Japan went into the war knowing they were going to lose. The idea of an absolute massacre simply match primary documents.
@@ScooterinAByou knew nothing of Japanese nationalism then.
There is a slight (rare) mistake in this video. At 12:30, the caption reads "Nagasaki", when that is actually Hiroshima. The "T" bridge was one of the landmarks to be used as an aim point. Above the bridge, and to the right of the river, is the "Atomic Dome", a building partially crushed by the blast. This building stands today as a reminder of the event.
I think it was just representation of visual footage so people could see the end result, not trying to trick anyone that it was not the same city. Why do you think these channels use the same footage over and over and over....... it's a video reference only
@@rangerrick2246 He's not implying that anyone is deliberately playing tricks. He's just stating that it's an honest mistake. And it's not "a video reference only"; the label at the bottom clearly states "ruins of Nagasaki". It's a legit mistake.
The third minister for peace mentioned was an active duty military officer, Admiral Yonai Mitsumasa, Minister of the Navy.
Suzuki himself was also an retired Admiral.
Great documentary. Interesting note that the Bomb gave Japan an "excuse" to surrender. Never thought of that before, but totally possible. It seems pretty clear that the answer to all the questions at the end is "All of the Above." No doubt the Americans wanted to use the bomb to show the Soviets, and wantef to use it to end the war before the Soviets had much stake in the Japan war, but also there is no doubt that it was instrumental in bringing the war to a quick end under US auspices. The Soviet invasion alone would not have shortened a protracted war much more than the threat of a US invasion. Maybe in hindsight an Allied invasion would have crushed Japan in weeks, rather than months, but there was no reason to waste anymore Allied lives at all simply because the Japan government would not capitulate.
Was it necessary to drop them on two population centers?
@@timtom9503they didn't surrender after the first one
Apparently surviving vets of Okinawa, horrendous US fatalities, were outraged that the Bomb was available but not used earlier. Not much sympathy for Japan in Britain, US, NZ or Aus after what happened in Changi and other POW camps.
Yeah. In the Emperor's announcement of surrender, he specifically cited the atomic bomb, not the Soviet attacks.
I don't think the West fully understands just how important "saving face" is in Asian cultures. Also, to deny the impact of any of these factors presented (Soviet invation, already decimated cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki) is just an argument of which straw broke the camel's back. All of these were factors before the decision to surrender they were all instrumental in some way. I do favor the idea that Japan didn't want to be split like Germany between the US and the Soviets so it may have been a bigger straw...
The orthodox & revisionists mindset and viewpoints are not mutually exclusive. It is fair to say that the bombs were a large contributing factor to ending the war sooner than a traditional invasion in Japan and overall cost less lives, while also saying that the Soviets invasion was another factor in Japans surrender calculus. It’s also fair to say that this was in fact the last major act of the war to end it, and the first major act of the Cold War, though I would disagree with this because the Cold War had already begun by now.
I would say the orthodox mindset isn't mutually exclusive (IE there is room to say both were signifigant factors) but the revisionist mindset is, because revisionist historians want to portray the atomic bombings as a crime against humanity and vilify the US.
@Pax That really depends on the revisionists story. As far as I'm aware there are multiple and I think, that we can even create our own during a brainstorm session.
But, no one takes into account the KMT contribution, Japanese forces were also already being defeated by KMT forces.
@@pax6833 Vilify the US??? you gotta be dreaming.. USA vilified itself with every action is has made from Day one of freedom as UK colony to today, USA has done so much We have an abundance that there is no vilification.
@@wuhaninstituteofvirology5226 Chinese contribution to defeating Japan was negligible in military terms.
China kept a lot of Japanese soldiers tied down but numbers of Japanese soldiers would not have made a difference in the Pacific. That was where Japan was beaten and that was a naval war. Japan lacked the infrastructure to even move significantly more troops around the Pacific, let alone to supply them.
In Burma a bit of a difference was made but Japan was only in Burma because they were trying to cut China off from supplies. Chinese forces made a bit of a difference in the fighting in the very north of Burma but did nothing with Kohima and Imphal or the decisive counterattack campaign thereafter.
China was a place where the Japanese could kill a lot of people. That was basically the real Chinese contribution to the war. It's horrifying but it's reality.
My dude! Didn’t know you narrated any videos outside of The Great War. What a pleasant surprise. I’ve read a lot about the reasoning behind Japan’s surrender so I wasn’t sure I wanted to watch a long video about it but once I heard your voice, I was locked in.
Thanks!
On August 15, the emperor cited specifically the ‘new and most cruel bomb’ in his surrender speech, as well as a highly unfavorable military situation, but without mentioning the Soviets specifically.
True, there are no specific words about the USSR.
However, just before the sentence about the new weapon, there is a sentence that says, "The world situation is also working against us."
Since there was no new disadvantageous situation for Japan other than the invasion of the Soviet Union, it is thought that this refers to the invasion of the Soviet Union.
It was the Bomb. Japan had no clue how Big the Bombs could be. For all they knew, the US had a Bomb that would turn all of Japan into a crater
It was the Bomb. The USSR wasn't going to invade the Home Islands and end the Japanese government. Only the US could do that, and the Japanese knew it.
The emperor gave two speeches one for the home islands where he mentions the bomb and one for the military abroad where he only mentions the soviet invasion of Manchuria and says literally nothing about the bomb
@@LordDirus007the japanese had their own nuclear research they knew exactly what It was and that It was a really expensive and complex bomb to produce, also the home islands had been wrecked by firebombing in the months before they were literally used to it and not only they didnt react they were already set for the invasion even after the also warcriminal firebombings, moreover the military and navy outside the home islands expected the home islands to resist even after the bombings they tried to coup the japanese to keep fighting, army denied it was a nuclear hit saying It was too weak as It was the same size of a regular firebombing the Navy actually knew it was nuclear and went welp idefc
This guy grossly oversimplifies the coup on August 15 which was not organized by just " junior officers ". I suggest reading the great book " Japan's Longest Day" which details the day and the events leading up to it. My uncle , who was a fighter pilot in the Pacific theater, recommended it to me. It does however lend credence to the idea that there was definitely a fight to the death mindset among military leaders .
It's crazy how I had one grandfather on the eastern front in Europe, Army, and the other on the western front, Navy, both fought for the U.S. watching this reminds me of the story's they told me, I miss them both. 😢
I'm sure they were legends
grandson of the heroes
@johannlatiner. It’s crazy how I had…”. That you miss them both says they survived. I bet you wish you’d asked them lots of questions you didn’t think of when they are alive.
@@angusmckenzie9622 ofc
Germans and Japanese were enemies back then. They still are.
Complicating things further is that the Japanese government and military destroyed a lot of their secret papers and records. For example, there are no existing blueprints for the battleships of the Yamato class.
So I bought all that scrap metal for nothing?!
@@nemiw4429 Maybe you can find the plans for the Bismarck?
@@RogueDragon05get the plans . I will get the scraps
They also destroyed the economic report that led to Japan invading mainland Asia for resources. We don't know everything that was in that report, but we know that Japan knew they couldn't win even before the war took place.
A couple of years ago, a man by the name of Conrad Crane ( who was an expert on Curtis Lemay ) did a presentation in Tokyo.
At the end of it, one of the Japanese historians in atrendance stood up and said "At the end of the day, we Japanese must thank the U.S. fpr the firebombings and the use of the aromic weapons."
"They accomplished two very imprtant things. Firstly, it ended the war in August, which allowed General McArthur to immediately bring in humanitarian aid to Japan, otherwise millions more would have frozen and starved to death in the rapidly approaching Winter."
"The other thing it did was it allowed Japan to remain it's own nation. Otherwise the U.S. would have invaded, Russia would have invaded, and Japan would have ended up carved into warring factions just like Germany and Korea did."
I really appreciate the captions :) thank you!
Very well done. Also, probably "All of the Above" especially the one about "saving face". That is an inherently Japanese trait.
Great video. I actually did this topic as my final paper to graduate university and it was interesting to see how almost none of the people in the class thought it was a combination of both factors that led to the surrender when it did during the presentations we had to do throughout the semester.
Shows how uneducated and unthinking college graduates are.
That's nice ! What was your conclusion?
Always, when you have no absolute conclusion between two things, choose the middle one.
I wonder what is the background music at the end of this video. If you could remind me from what game or movie or other sources this music is i would be very thankful. Anyway nice video also, Thank You!
This is awesome history lesson, thank you🙏🏼😇🩶✨
I appreciate that you narrowed the focus of this video to the two largest prevailing schools of thought. To cover all of the various arguments would likely result in a video lasting a full day.
This was one of your best episodes. I find a fair discussion of these points of view more enlightening than just listening to one narrative.
such a great explanation and well organized content. thanks
Honestly, it's likely a mixture of both. The first bomb was likely met with incredulity, a sort "What sort of nonsense are you spouting? A single bomb wiped out a city? They probably just dropped a bunch of bombs like last time." But when met with the second bomb AND the active invasion by Russia, defeat was definitely inevitable. At that point, they just had to ask what level of disrespect they were willing to put up with.
The leadership in Tokyo were more than likely unaware of the scale of the Soviet invasion. The Soviet invasion would have put pressure on Chinese from leadership to surrender more than the bomb, but the bomb most definitely forced Tokyo leadership to surrender much more so than the Soviet invasion. You have to remember this was the 40s and imperial Japan. A very different time.
BS! The Imperial War Council was fully informed by their own A-Bomb Project scientists that the A-bombs could only be produced at a low rate (2-3 per month). And so the A-Bombs were not a factor.
Once we occupied Japan and debriefed their officers,we bacame clear on the role Saving Face has on their mindset. They would have fought to the last man were it not for Hirohito's command to stop. The A Bomb gave him a way out without loss of honor.
@@FUnzzies1 This is an underrated comment. Japanese did their best to hide and/or play down military losses. However, since the Atomic Bombings occurred on the mainland, they were much harder to cover up.
人家有满洲国，日本炸没了都无所谓
By summer 1945 the mining of Japan's coastal waters by the Allied forces meant that Japan couldn't easily supply and reinforce their troops. They were almost entirely unable to get sufficient aviation fuel to the remote airfields that might have been more effective in defending the skies over Japan's main islands. Many enemy vessels went to the bottom. Admiral Nimitz does not receive enough credit for this strategy.
Widespread mines deployed around the main islands of Japan had already been so effective that it was the conclusion of an assessment of its' efficacy that had Operation Hunger began months earlier the surrender could have come sooner.
Excellent professional video!! You've covered a difficult topic as well as could have been done. It's extremely difficult if not impossible to analyse a point in time because we know what happened after.
Read "A Torch to the Enemy!" and you will find that we firestormed Tokyo destroying 18 square miles and 300,000 died. We also had burned 78 others of Japan's major cities. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were generally smaller but were a few of the remaining cities.
For... both reasons?
I believe so as the emperor and government agreed to surrender due to nukes while the army who at the later stages of the war refused to surrender but were failing to hold the soviets back.
There were 24,053 casualties on Iwo Jima alone. So I think an estimate of 20,000 casualties on the mainland is an idiotic guess. And looking at information that's unearthed now doesn't take into account that information wasn't available to the Allies then.
8:11 I think you have a typo
@@erminos8628 I think you need to watch again
@@stevenobrien557 the video clearly states that the orthodox estimates of hundreds of thousands casualties were gross overestimations and that modern perspectives puts this as low as 20,000, which is how ranges work. In this mindset, it seemed unlikely that the Japanese could even stall long enough for the casualties to be so high since their military was in shambles.
@@richardsejour7731 buts it’s false.
@@richardsejour7731 also they studied Japanese defensive strategy during the occupation and they vastly underestimated the causality count.
Amazingly balanced video. Thanks for leaving the decision of opinion to us, your audience! You are getting a sub from me 😊
It was to show Russia, they knew Russia would be the next enemy
No need to show Russia. Truman told Stalin at Potsdam.
I was driving past the Hanford reactor site yesterday think that its crazy how a softball sized chunk of metal that was refined in the middle of nowhere in Washington State would completely destroy an entire city and snuff out thousands of lives in an instant.
Amazing work! 10/10 points.
I studied the topic for two decades now and my conclusion is simply inconclusive- we will never know.
However- just for the point that sources are problematic for August 45 - Japanese historians have released an amazingly detailed work on the days surrounding the surrender called Japan‘s longest day (unrelated to the crappy movie). It is absolutely unbiased and everyone should read it if they are interested into what was going on in the Japanese government.
It doesnt give a definitive answer of course but it does support the theory of multiple factors for sure.
Did you mean to say that it WAS biased? I am a bit confused😅
At one point in his book, Richard B. Frank contends that the one thing we can be certain of is that it was the *combined* simultaneous impact of the atomic bombs and the Soviet entry into the war that triggered the decision to surrender - because that is what actually happened. What's harder to make out is how to weight each factor (though Frank does lean harder on the bombs).
anybody care to ask the japanese about this?
I am under the belief that was never a question of if, but when the first nuke would be used in war. Makes you wonder which conflict it would have been used in. Had a ground invasion occurred both the US and Red Army might have been too exhausted and war weary to given play a game of Risk on the Korean Peninsula.
@@richardmalcolm1457 The decision to fight a war on two fronts to the bitter end gets humbled when cities can get wiped out in a blink. Plus while you're fighting to the death the side with that make bomb-go-blinky can build another one while they keep you penned up.
What a great video. #Quality.
superb video.
I appreciate the topic of this video and the question even being asked for one important reason and that is that this topic is never even remotely approached.
Yes. Hirohito clearly says it in his surrender. I think he knows why he surrendered.
Exactly.
The man himself was pretty clear spoken on the subject.
He clearly says that he's doing the world a favor by surrendering before the Americans potentially end the entirety of human existence. He was making his imperial army look like the victims so they could accept surrender without committing seppuku or throwing the high-command military hardliners under the bus. He also clearly says in a separate speech to his surviving troops that the Manchurian invasion was the cause for surrender, while not mentioning the nukes once
It's easier to blame a witch for your problems than the real source. Hirohito said a lot of things, but there are also a lot of things he didn't say.
@@ScooterinAB except this is a nuclear weapon, not a watch
Thanks!
What is missing from the argument is the fog of war. Even assuming that the Soviet Union entering the war caused Japan to surrender, no one knew that aside from the Japanese. There was zero indication that the Japanese were going to stop. It's very easy to know the answer to questions when you have perfect information. Regardless of if it actually mattered, it was required and justified due to everything Japan had shown up to that point.
I think it was well done on RTH to use Japanese sources. I notice that many revisionist historians avoid quoting Japanese sources to a suspicious degree, typically relying only on statements of US generals who concurred with their opinion (ignoring the ones who don't).
One thing I found strange was the claim that the US overestimated Japanese defenses in its casualty projections. I have never seen such a claim before and the evidence I have found on the topic suggests the opposite, that US intelligence badly underestimated the troop strength, equipment stockpiles of the IJA, and had assumed the imperial air force would be non-existent. The US would be going into Kyushu in much more unfavorable circumstances compared to Okinawa and an invasion would likely have been an American bloodbath.
Also, it should be noted that Japan was, before August, still seeking a white peace, not surrender, as some claim.
Yes, their goal was to make it so bloody they could get a negotiated peace vs. a surrender.
"I notice that many revisionist historians avoid quoting Japanese sources to a suspicious degree, typically relying only on statements of US generals who concurred with their opinion (ignoring the ones who don't)." I generally am skeptical of the revisionist school, but I think in fairness the lack of English translations (even today) for many Japanese primary sources for the war is probably partly at fault here.
The conservative historians dont quote the Japanese either…
And the lower estimates are based on the Kantogun in Manchuria disintegrating on impact when the Soviets attacked. More troops than the Americans faced so far and they simply were beaten with little effort in a week.
Also, many do not even assume that the US would ever have invaded Japan… i mean why would they? japan was close to starvation, running out if fuel and had bo fleet anymore. It was simply neutralized
@@bingobongo1615 "More troops than the Americans faced so far and they simply were beaten with little effort in a week." You might want to look at David Glantz's work on August Storm. It was anything but a cakewalk for the Soviet Army.
@@richardmalcolm1457 David Glanz is a very questionable historian. He primarily relies on non soviet sources and I heavily doubt he was deep into japanease sources eather. For his eastern front books he basically only used german sources including post war memoirs by german generals.....which I propably dont have to explain are more then questionable and unreliable
Truth is we dont know how hard August Storm was for the simple fact that the soviet/russians would tell us. The soviet archives are closed to historians and were only very briefly opened after the soviet union collpased.
I mean for example we know nowadays that the Battle of Kursk wasnt this heroic struggle, it was a one sided slaughter. The soviets lost redicilous ammounts of vehicles compared to the germans and the infamous tank battle at Prochorovka was no battle at all, it was a massacre. The soviet commisar in charge paniced and ordered a soviet guards tank army to counter attack near the village, far earlier then planned. They drove into their own defenses and were stuck before their own tank ditch resulting in the german tanks on the other side pcking them off on mass do to outranging them.
The famous battle of Prochorovka and the "tank ramming" bullshit was compleatly made up by this commisar because shortly after Stalin summoned him in person to Moscow to explain what happened (a death sentence) so he faked the documents and told a story of heroic fighting and destroying countless enemy forces to safe his own life.
Unless the russians reopen their soviet archives all we have is one sided guessing, especially as the japanease sources arent exactly trustworthy eather.
The only thing we know for sure is that the japanease army in Manchuria was destroyed
I’ve never understood why it’s believed that the reasons have to be one or the other. Realistically, Japan lost the war the moment they decided to go to war. Just as realistically, there were multiple reasons for Japan’s surrender, two of which being the bombs and the Soviet invasion. Though the Soviets didn’t really have the naval logistics to threaten the main islands.
Something that I think is insanely important that didn’t get mentioned at all is that the lives lost in the bombing, even if less than what would’ve been in a continued war, were mostly civilian, not military. And that’s wrong no matter which way you slice it.
Not to forget: The 'greater casualties' over a prolonged Conflict is only natural, but the fact that thousands of lives were litterally wiped out on an ATOMIC LEVEL in the blink of an eye. Now THAT is truely horrifying and a crime against humanity in my opinion.
That said the whole: 'It was to make them surrender to avoid greater loss of life' - argument is a slippery slope that would/could justify ALL SORTS of terrible acts.
@@MajorCoolDyeah no not when it comes to our soldiers lives. I pick our soldiers any day over foreigners lives.
@@davidpowers9178 Calling people killed on their home soil foreigners... Just say you value US nationals over those other nationals.
Easy for you to say.....you are not in the areas occupied by the Japanese. You did not suffer in the Bataan death March...or the terror and death the civilians suffered in Manila. A sudden death by a bomb is better than a prolonged torture by the Japanese
Army.
Not sure about this. Invading the Japanese main islands would put US soldiers in direct conflict with Japanese civilians. And the reality is, said civilians were deeply indoctrinated into either opposing the invaders with any weapon they had, or taking their own lives, and the lives of their children, to prevent falling into the hands of the "brutal and bestial" Americans. I'd argue that a full on military invasion of the main islands combined with a continued fire bombing campaign, would have had way, WAY more civilian casualties on the Japanese side that what the two bombs left behind.
This is amazing reporting/history. Bravo. Thank you.
The revisionists sound like Soviet admirers.
The final stand was on the Island of Kyushu which had been reinforced to create as many casualties to the allied forces as possible. The A bomb showed that the US could just turned the island into a cinder and casualties would be limited. Gen G. Marshall had the same idea with persistent poison gas as a add on to isolate the allied landing beaches. Admiral Nimitz wanted to isolate and wait until they starved to death, which except for th intervention of McArthur they would have in 45-46.
And while the last Japanese troops were grinding down the invading Americans, the Red Army would be waltzing down Hokkaido and half of Honshu because they had nobody defending in that direction. It's not like they could quickly reposition their defenses, what with the infrastructure being completely wrecked, thanks to American bombing.
You call hundreds of thousands of lives limited? In what world are you living in? More than half of those were civilians. They could've dropped it on military bases and called it a day, instead they dropped it on civilians. There were no bases there.
@@MyLife-og2kr I believe that was the point
@@MyLife-og2kr so what Japanese didn't care about civilians. do you know how many civilians Japanese dropped bombs on etc.
Japan started that war and are to blame for every death and if stayed in their own country no one would of died.
Add up every civilian killed throughout Asia Pacific and even on Australian soil because of Japanese.'Japanese even fired torpedoes in to Sydney Harbour Australia at civilians.'
Japan bombed Darwin Australia even more then Pearl Harbour
POWs added urgency
“The debates are just as heated and explosive as ever”. I see what you did there.
Any estimate of 20 000 American casualties from an invasion of the Japanese mainland, is a supreme example of wishful thinking. The Japanese were ideologically opposed to surrender and hated Americans, with this in mind, one feels the 1mil casualty estimate for such an invasion would also have been on the low side.
Japanese propaganda about what the US troops would do to captured Japanese women and children, some of it true, incredibly effective, made most evident by the horrible self-inflicted Japanese civilian casualties (suicides) on Okinawa.
Though some civilians would fight, many more would engage in subterfuge, though the majority, especially women, would flee and/or kill themselves and their children.
It isn't to say you're incorrect. You aren't. Japanese culture, including a dictate from the Emperor, would thrust many into battle.
After the 2nd nuke, there was a 3rd bombing of 126 B-29s targeting factories in Northern Japan and on the way home with no loss of planes those air crews heard of the surrender over the radio. That had to of had some impact or urgency on the surrender decision.
Interestingly Japan had also twice approached Australia with a peace offering that if Australia declared neutrality that it would guarantee not to attack.
Wow, love the analysis presentation of both arguments. Subscribed because of your non partisan, non political Facts presented. 👏
The Japanese themselves even mentioned the new use of "cruel weapons" (referring to the bomb) in the surrender. The pending Soviet invasion must have had a major impact as well but I still think the bomb was the most significant. The Japanese probably figured the Soviet's wouldn't want to invade the mainland and might be satiated by taking the Manchurian mainland and taking some historically contested areas like the Kuril islands and still possibly come to a negotiated peace.
Not that they could have invaded the mainland. The USSR at that point did not have much of a Navy, and the majority of their vessels were in the Mediterranean, Baltic, and black sea, as I'm sure you know they had almost zero focus on the eastern front, and those naval vessels would have had to go all the way around Africa since going around Asia could have been frozen over at some points and damaged the vessels.
USA won't use on Germany but willing to drop A bomb on Japan because recial bias.
And yet they tested their own nuke, just before. ... 😶
Japanese didn't care that much about the Russian invasion their records even state that they sent their most elite soldiers to where Australia and Americans would land for a invasion since it was the Australian and Americans who beat them from Papua New Guinea to Japan mainland.
Russia and Japan had signed a peace pact and even up to the day Russia invaded Russia said they were sticking to that pact.
Japan had a incling it might happen but believed it might not also.
Once wthe Japanese were able to assess the situation after the second bomb was confirmed dropped, it didn't take them long to realise "There is no way to defend against this." It might have taken 6 months for the US to ready another bomb, and it wouldve been a stream of them at that point, but regardless, six months later the US wouldve been able to drop 20 of them, one after another, until Japan surrendered or was utterly annihliated.
I heard the Emperor had recorded Japan's surrender days before the bombing, but his General's delayed its delivery, because they didn't want to surrender
That appears to be correct. The failed coup on the Emperor's seems to have been to destroy that recording and the seize the Privy Seal.
@@campbellpaul I think the second bomb was dropped to show Russia that we have the bombs in quantity, and to not push further in Europe.
Hirohito specifically mentioned the atomic bombs in his surrender broadcast
@@s.henrlllpoklookout5069 yes true, but the documentary I watched, said the first one was done days before, which was intercepted by high command, so it wouldn't be delivered. Not sure how accurate it is, but had compelling evidence offered
source: trust me bro
In 1943, the URSS and Japan signed a pact of no agression, After the atomic bombs were exploded with the destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Stalin decided to invade Japan and the reason of this treacherous attack is to keep strategic parts of land such Manchuria where Vladivostok is located, Korea, South of Sajalin y the Kuriles. Then Japan surrender to the Americans
There are 3 other factors that were very important in the US decision to drop the bombs: 1. The American public was shocked by the casualty rate at Iwo Jima and Okinawa and sickened by the kamikaze carnage. 2. Vast swathes of China and SE Asia were still in Japanese hands and the people there subject to horrific cruelty every day. And 3, during the liberation of the Philippines it became known that Japan planned to murder Allied POWs before allowing their liberation. Thousands of Americans, Brits, Aussies and others were interned by the Japanese in horrific conditions dying every day. Time was of the essence. The sooner we forced Japan to surrender, the sooner that suffering would end.
The Japanese were about to surrender, and the US hurried up the atomic strike before they could do so. Period.
Thank you! That point was not brought up in this video.
and that justifies dropping nuclear bombs into civillians ? i wouldve understood that if they were dropped in Ports or military complexes.
@@semiramisubw4864 Yes. It ended the damn war. Japan brought this on herself. I have no sympathy. Remember the Nanking Massacre, to say nothing of numerous other atrocities that we do not discuss anymore, for political reasons. Today, we are brainwashed by political correctness.
Not to mention the Rape of Nanjing
The Japanese thought they could hold out and get a conditional surrender mediated by the Soviets. When the Soviets invaded Manchuria, that was off the table. I think its as simple as that.
Japanese were too full of themselves. They mistreated Western POWs and civilians and now wanted to be treated civilly. They got off very easy. It's not deniable though that the A bombs were immoral acts of murder as Anscombe said but it's not to say the Japanese culture at the time was evil. Sadly they wiped out Nagasaki which was a Christian town, and those people had faced immense persecution from pagan Japan.
Interesting how we are asked to doubt the honesty and integrity of those who were there, a generation with deep faith and integrity, by a generation who wasn't there and largely doesn't believe in anything and has shown very little integrity.
the whole "conventional bombing killed more, shock value wasn't that big" is ridiculous. Its not the death toll, its the fact that only 2 bombs were able to decimate that much land and that many people instantly. There was huge shock value, as there was definitely speculation about what would happen if many more bombs like that were used against their homeland. Like the quote from earlier in the video from a Japanese military person, it was beyond their wildest dreams.
The bomb was a shock to the population, who lived under a fascist military regime for a century. But the bomb was already known to the decision makers in the Imperial War Council.
There's no need for commenters to have "opinions" on why the Japanese surrendered. The Imperial War Council documented their meetings, and the answer is clear. The A-bombs were not a factor.
That's just one of the stupidest arguments supporting US propaganda. "Shock value" really? You think Imperial Japan were scared by shock tactics? The same people that approved of horrific abuses and unspeakable torture? Get a grip!
What's the difference between killing 200.000 in Tokyo in a 2 hours or 100.000 in Hiroshima in 15 minutes? Shock value? Seriously? 1000 heavy bombers over your head are not shocking enough? Now that's "ridiculous".
My, my, my. No one ever listens, it seems.
The question is "Did Japan surrender because of the atomic bomb?"
To get the answer, one need only ask the Imperial War Council, which made the actual decision to surrender at Hirohito's orders. (The power of the emperor was not as absolute as many think,)
After Hiroshima, the IWC inquired of their own atomic bomb program how many more could the US produce. The Japanese A bomb scientist advised the IWC that the Americans could deliver 2-3 more bombs each month.
The IWC knew that 60 cities were already destroyed by Curtis LeMay's napalm firebombing, and millions of refugees clogged the infrastructure. Two or three more cities per month just was not a factor.
Also, given their knowledge that the American invasion would occur in November, the IWC had no reason to change its deliberations.
The IWC were not shocked.
The IWC plan was to absorb the American invasion and make it last awhile. They knew that America would tire of taking casualties on the main island, and expected the US government would thus accede to better surrender terms.
To this end, they equipped the common people with crude weapons, barricaded streets, etc. They told the people to DIE with honor. They told the JN soldiers to NEVER surrender.
Yet, all along, since February 1945, the IWC had, in fact, secretly been planning surrender as ordered by the Emperor.
They were lying to the people. They were calling for suicide attacks, to fight to "extinction." but all along, intending to surrender!
9 August 1945: Now, the Japanese received a real SHOCK! At 4 am, the IWC learns that Stalin has betrayed them, and Soviet troops had taken Manchukuo with ease. Stalin had invaded first by taking Sakhalin Island. The Japanese main island was within sight.
The IWC knew the Soviets would be in Tokyo within days. The Japanese people would soon be exterminated or enslaved.
10 am. Hirohito ordered the IWC to speed up their deliberations. He told them the existence of the Japanese people was in peril.
11 am. News of the Nagasaki bombing reached the IWC.
Just read the historical documents, folks.
Also, the terrorific testimony of the people from Hiroshima, some days after the bombing, made Tokio realized what was at stake. They knew what happened during conventional bombings, they had systems for defense and interceptors. For the A-Bomb, they were completely defenseless.
This series covering popular internet topics is a tonic for all the "UA-cam University" hot takes out there.
The US planners wanted a ‘clean’ city to see the bomb’s effects. The problem was the AF had fire bombed almost everything. Given paper and wood houses, there was significant devastation.
Otherwise neither city really had any military significance.
The Japanese viewed America as being the better post-war agent.
So if you were the leader, how would you decide?
An excellent summation and overview of the various reasonings behind the surrender of Japan. I have tried to answer this question myself for 40 years and still can't say for certain.
It's both. That's why. Japan had so many reasons to surrender earlier even but due to their radical kamikaze culture it was inevitable to be a drawn out fight.
@@Vetionarian
There’s no way to know anything was “inevitable”. Dumb af. We can only know what did happen - not what would happen in other circumstances.
Comment with intelligence please. Think before typing.
My dad was there just after the war. He had a Japanese interpreter, a woman, who visited him around 2010 when he was 85. We went to Niagara Falls. She was working at NYC Met. Museum of Art. I have a tea cup she gave as a present. Her family owned Nakamura pottery company.
So what
@@119jle So there.
@@119jle so, shut up and respect others
Also, there were stories that Japanese scientists, upon examining the residue from Hiroshima, knew it was a Uranium bomb. The scientists told the military that they didn't believe the US had enough Uranium 235 to drop another bomb or two as they understood how hard it was to refine. Well, the Nagasaki bomb was determined to be a Plutonium bomb, and they knew Plutonium was easier to produce in larger quantities by reactor breeding.
"But now the war has lasted for nearly four years. Despite the best that has been done by everyone - the gallant fighting of the military and naval forces, the diligence and assiduity of our servants of the state, and the devoted service of our one hundred million people - the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantage, while the general trends of the world have all turned against her interest. 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 surrender broadcast
The Japanese invaded Korea , invaded Manchuria in 1931 , China in 1937 , Indonesia , Formosa , Hong Kong , the Philippines , Burma , Indonesia , Vietman and attacked the US and even Australia .
Hirohito was misleading people by stating it was 4 years .
.
Japan didn’t surrender because of the atomic bomb, Japan surrendered because of the atomic bombs.
Except it didn't. We've known this for nearly 100 years. Japan was already defeated. It already tried to surrender. And when the USSR's nonaggression pact ended, time ran out. Japan could keep lying to itself about the US, but it couldn't lie about a largely unexhausted Russian army entering the war. The war was over long before that happened. It's just the fighting that hadn't ended yet.
The point at 5:39 is extremely important to consider that between the Soviet Union declaring war on Japan and the dropping of the 2nd atomic bomb there was no real argument amongst ministers in the Japanese government as to wether or not Japan should surrender only what terms Japan would accept for surrender. Inversely after the us dropped the first bomb the Japanese government responded by reaching out to the Soviets 5:12. The invasion of Manchuria convinced the Japanese government that they couldn’t win the war and that they should surrender, the 2nd bombing convinced the Japanese government to surrender unconditionally.
It cannot be one or the other. Honestly think about the supply and merchant shipping situation. The US Navy sank so much imperial Japanese shipping that the home islands were starving and her industry ground to a halt in 1944. It may have taken a year for the emperor to discover that important piece of information. I believe that if the shipping situation continued throughout 1945 and the US decided to invade Japan in spring of 1946 the Japanese army couldn't have put up much of a resistance unless they had found a way to reroute all of their shipping over land from SE Asia across China to Manchuria for industrial use and get a grip on their food problem they would have starved before we could have bombed them into extinction.
Remember communication was totally trash back then especially with all the bombing going on. They could of not heard about it til a lot later.
@@williamwigley2240 Operation downfall was scheduled to begin in November 1945.
The fact much of the Japanese higher-ups stayed in power to some extent strongly suggests that there were understandings about the extent of War Crimes tribunals.
If we imposed harsh terms the Japanese could have surrendered to the Soviets and started shuttling Russian troops over. Neither us nor the Japanese wanted that, thus the motivation to sign a treaty.
I think many Americans dont really grasp the threat of the Soviets coming in and what that means to people in power.
Notice we never took down Krupp, Rheinmetall, Volkswagen, Mitsubishi, Kawasaki, Yokohama, Isuzu, Subaru (from Nakajima), Aichi, etc. They all continued to exist.
That DID NOT happen under the Soviets.
@@user-gl5dq2dg1j thanks for that I'm not sure it would have mattered by September '45 with the Soviet entry and invasion of Manchuria they had no supplies or food it was a hopeless situation for the Empire of Japan. Even if the Soviets didn't invade Manchuria it would take at least a year to create some sort of improvement for shipping over land. In that timeframe much if not all of operation downfall would likely be different including the schedule. To add insult to injury the US and Soviets were already thinking of the post war and the cold war was already being formed. Without Soviet intervention it's possible the US could have decided to keep the war going just to have an outlet to test weapons and tactics on the world stage and justify it all.
The Emperor’s broadcast to his subjects explicitly mentioned use of a “most cruel weapon.” No question that dropping nukes on Japan triggered their surrender.
I was taught that if Operation Downfall (amphibious assault of Japan) proceeded, the US fleet would have taken heavy casualties from a typhoon. I had never heard that Russia figured into the surrender. Thank you for the information.
Intriguing.
Why not a combination of both factors; the Atomic bombs AND the Soviet invasion, plus a host of other factors as well?
That's likely closer to the reality.
I would add the blockade caused by mines and the U.S submarine force. Cutting off nearly all imports to Japan.
The Russian argument (here called revionist) proposes that this was the MAIN reason, and everything else was secondary.
The 'revionists' argue that for Japan's leadership 'The Russians have beaten up a handful of Korean forced-conscripts in a wasteland far away but will be confined to the continent since Russians have no navy' was more of a shock to them than everything else that had happened to Japan.
Things like Japanese losing more to strategic bombing in 6 months, than Germany did in 5 years.
Because USSR had very limited naval power in the Pacific, and they have no experience with any amphibious landing during their war with Germany. So tell me how would the USSR ever invade Japan's mainland?
It was multiple factors, the atomic bomb, the inevitable loss of all of their Chinese and Korean territory to the Soviets as well as the looming famine and economic collapse.
And after that it's Korean that paid the price.
Korea get divided while they are the victim.
It should be Japan that split into pieces.
To me "the bomb vs Soviet declaration of war" isn't the most pertinent question. The real question is whether it was necessary to use the bomb on a civilian population, or would a test demonstration in front of the military leaders of Japan have been just as effective in achieving the aims that it supposedly did.
The key word is 'civilian' - only part of which it was but also a huge military manufacturing hub. Hiroshima was the headquarters of the 2nd General Army of Imperial Japan, responsible for the defence of the impending invasion of Japan. It also had heavy shipbuilding and aircraft manufacturing facilities, untouched by war until that point. Even today, Hiroshima is still Japan's most important manufacturing prefecture.
No. Ya gotta have death, plenty of death, before people will sit up straight, pay attention and take notice. Otherwise they'll continue to try to figure out a way.
Well they killed too much Chinese civilians, just karma.
Some extra context. The firebombing campaigns against japan was 29 times as destructive as the 2 attomic bombs. Japan had been nearly completely bombed into submission. The only cities still standing at the time was Kyoto (emperors city), Natgasaki and Hiroshima. The latter two was obliterated. So it follows that this shock would have some effect on their descision making
This is very inaccurate. Japan had not been nearly completely bombed into submission before the atomic bombings. Kyoto, Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not the only cities still standing. Nagasaki wasn’t even the primary target on the day it was bombed - Kokura was. Part of the selection criteria for the first two atomic bombing targets was that cities on the target list could not have been heavily bombed previously, allowing the effects of the atomic bombs to be accurately assessed. After that, there was still a long list of potential atomic bombing targets, a third bomb was already being assembled on Tinian island and could have been used as soon as August 19, and there was planning for use of as many as 12 more bombs as they became available over the next several months.
In addition to my previous comment, while the military leaders might have been shocked more so by the Soviets than the bombs (although unclear how much so or if at all), the personal decision by Hirohito almost certainly makes me believe the bombs had an emotional affect on him in a way the invasion of Manchuria couldn’t. It’s clear from his quotes that he felt the gravity of the situation, and that he also knew that there was a strong possibility of Soviet invasion given their allegiance with the US and UK.
I think a way to look at it would be; How much does the outcome change if one happened but not the other? I agree with your previous post the they are not mutually exclusive. But if you look at it with the question I posted I think it is pretty clear that the Soviet invasion was the greater factor.
I'd also say that the bombs were used more as a message to the Soviets than as a weapon with practical purposes. We did after all more thoroughly destroy Japanese cities with incendiaries than we did with the bomb. The threat of a Soviet Hokkaido, even if the Russian amphibious capabilities in the Pacific were absolutely pathetic, gave the bombs a political use. Just one small group of soldiers on Hokkaido would've created North Japan and South Japan.
Not saying that justifies their use; I think the whole, "It will save American lives in a invasion" as a reason is pretty much just a line to make their use more acceptable to the American public.
@@jona.scholt4362 the thing about the message argument is that Truman had already hinted to Stalin (and Stalin already knew anyhow) about the bomb. I don’t deny that could have been flowing through Truman’s head when he made the ultimate decision, but I believe he made the decision to end the war over sending a message to the Soviets.
@@jona.scholt4362 Before the war was over Stalin proposed landing on Hokkaido and Zhukov stated it was simply not even possible to do it. So that was never really going to happen.
@@jona.scholt4362 You have to look at things from an ahistoric perspective to think many Americans in 1945 would have found using the atomic bomb against Japan unacceptable. Indeed, I'd be willing to say that if anything, more were disappointed that rather than Tokyo or Kyoto, two relatively unimportant cities got nuked. It was more a case of "build it and they will come" than anything else that led to their use.
I think the nuke sobered Japanese leadership to he fact that they are indeed not immortal and could lose the war; this sober mindset now looked to Manchuria and realized how screwed they really were.
I find it absolutely amazing, that anyone believes that the party which was the initial aggressor, and guilty of so many atrocities, should, at the moment of surrender, be the one to dictate the terms of surrender.
You haven't studied much history, if you can point to one side as the initial aggressor.
It always depends how far back you choose to go.
Was an oil embargo an act of aggression? Was Commodore Perry's gunboat diplomacy an act of aggression?
Japan was far from innocent, but it didn't just decide to bomb pearl harbour for no reason.
Solely due to how the Japanese treated people who were not Japanese during the second world war is why I have no issues with Japan being nuked twice at that time. The Japanese are really cool now tho.
@@Johnny-ew4dg imagine thinking that the death of many innocent people is justified because of their government’s decisions. You’re disgusting.
@@michaelebbage9166
I wonder how much you have studied when you seem to be confusing economic sanctions with an act of war.
@@DougieFrank the Pacific fleet moved to Pearl Harbor in direct response to Japan - otherwise they wouldn't have been there to attack.
At the time, 80% of Japan's oil imports came from the US. The US, even today, will happily bomb a country to protect 5% of its oil supply....
Hirohito said it was because of the bomb in his nationwide broadcast ordering the people to surrender. Disputing this is the largest longest running fishing expedition in modern history
19:50 "Some even think that an invasion of the island of Hokkaido would have put an immediate stop to the war."Stalin was told in July 1945 that they had no way of invading Hokkaido.
Everyone always says it was Japan, but technically the United States was the first country to have an atomic bomb dropped on it
In reality, the Trinity test bomb was not dropped. It was placed in the top of a tower. Yes, it was the first exploded in the world.
@@mikus4242 it was not used in anger. Both us and ussr tested a thousand nukes in atmosphere. Not counted as bombing as not used in anger, but for threat or research.
Most people say the atomic bombs dropped on Japan were the first and only nuclear *"attacks"* ever used in a war. What happened in Los Alamos in 1945 and the subsequent thousands of nuclear tests were just experiments.
I wrote a long paper on college on this very topic... you are damn near point for point on my thoughts.
Yes