Not as a quote but the picture painted is extremely clear. They knew the war was unwinnable. The high command knew it and the emperor knew it.
I will say the idea that we weren’t saving a million lives by nuking them depends on hindsight. We had just gotten done with some of the most brutal fighting in the world’s history. We had no reason to suspect they would just lay down their arms.
Reading it over, I can see that scenario would have involved continued fire bombing campaigns, which had already killed over 300,000 people and left over 8 million homeless. It also suggests that many of Japan’s 2 million troops and thousands of planes would have been destroyed before surrender.
It says the vast majority of people surveyed in Japan at the time were willing to continue fighting the war, and the political structure made surrender particularly unlikely.
What do you think the US should have done in 1945?
Where is that in the document? I tried to find it but it’s long and I couldn’t spot it. Weren’t the bombs dropped in August '45?
it’s not in there
Not as a quote but the picture painted is extremely clear. They knew the war was unwinnable. The high command knew it and the emperor knew it.
I will say the idea that we weren’t saving a million lives by nuking them depends on hindsight. We had just gotten done with some of the most brutal fighting in the world’s history. We had no reason to suspect they would just lay down their arms.
Man, it would be a shame if you looked at page 107. You know you can just control f search PDF’s right?
Mine only goes up to page 94
I’m unsure why it would be getting cut off for you. I will provide a screenshot of the page.
Page 107. Not PDF page, document page.
Thank you.
Reading it over, I can see that scenario would have involved continued fire bombing campaigns, which had already killed over 300,000 people and left over 8 million homeless. It also suggests that many of Japan’s 2 million troops and thousands of planes would have been destroyed before surrender.
It says the vast majority of people surveyed in Japan at the time were willing to continue fighting the war, and the political structure made surrender particularly unlikely.
What do you think the US should have done in 1945?