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2009-12-13 -Short Attention Span Theater-

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Posted by Anguper Hupomosing9418 2009-12-13 06:50|| || Front Page|| [11130 views ] Top

#1 The plans were being pursued for a landing but after experiencing Iwo Jima and Okinawa I'm not sure we would have followed through on them, at least not on the original schedule. I expect that absent the A-bombs we'd have continued the air (and shortly sea) bombardment and continued the sea blockade until not a handcart moved on the roads and not a sampan floated on the waters and not a city or town had adjacent buildings still standing such that when we finally did invade it would have seemed like walking into Dachau.

Posted by Glenmore 2009-12-13 09:03|| 2009-12-13 09:03|| Front Page Top

#2 I'm not sure we would have followed through on them,

I am. The invasion process had been tuned to assembly line processes. Organizations were already being alerted in Europe for transfer to the Pacific theater. The American diplomats were pressing Stalin to redeploy forces to the Far East and enter as soon as possible. Stalin wasn't in a hurry, till the bomb dropped which forced his hand. His spies had already kept him informed on the nature of the bomb. Needed to get his 'share' of the spoils. Japan would have been part of that, to include invading and occupying, portions of the northern islands for post war 'ownership'. They would have driven an American invasion to the south as ownership/occupation becomes 9/10th of the law.

IIRC, the author Alvin Coox found that the Japanese high command had finally been convinced after Okinawa to switch the targets of the Kamikazes from capital ships to troop and logistics vessels. Where as a capital ship could sustain several hits, one on a troop ship could take out a complete regiment. It would have been a butchers bill.

Posted by Procopius2k 2009-12-13 09:44|| 2009-12-13 09:44|| Front Page Top

#3 A good friend tells his children that they are here on this planet because he's here. He's here because his father is here. And his father is here because Harry Truman dropped the bomb.

His father was a gunner on a Navy Avenger, and in August 1945 was on a light carrier that was getting ready for the big invasion of Japan.

Posted by Steve White 2009-12-13 11:11|| 2009-12-13 11:11|| Front Page Top

#4 As a thought experiment, imagine that (God forbid) Stalin's spies had been more efficient and that the Soviet Union had dropped the bomb on Japan. How much bitching about that would we hear from "progressives" today?

Posted by Matt 2009-12-13 11:45|| 2009-12-13 11:45|| Front Page Top

#5 In his autobiography Akira Kurosawa the director talked about the nation expecting word from the Emperor for everyone to commit suicide. If that had happened our D Day would have been more psychologically damaging than physically. Of course Japan would have died and people would have blamed Truman for not nuking a city or two and saving the Japanese race.

Posted by rjschwarz 2009-12-13 12:02|| 2009-12-13 12:02|| Front Page Top

#6 According to the book Downfall by Richard Frank, the Americans plan was to start bombing the railroads between the rice fields and the cities, which would have caused mass starvation. The Japanese plan was to train everyone - women, children, old men - to resist with weapons, sticks, whatever was at hand.
Unless America had been willing to isolate the home islands and wait for the people to starve, or for the Japanese people to revolt against the emperor (unlikely), we would have had to invade.
I would probably still be here - my dad was a ground crewman for bombers. My uncles served in the infantry. I doubt they would have survived.
This book convinced me that in the end, it was a kindness to the Japanese to nuke Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Yes, thousands of civilians died. However, it is likely that millions of Japanese civilians would have died either from starvation or in the invasion. I realize that kindness was not the reason that Truman ordered the bombing.

Posted by Rambler in Virginia 2009-12-13 13:31|| 2009-12-13 13:31|| Front Page Top

#7 Operation Olympic, the invasion of Kyushu, would have been a bloodbath. The Japanese had thousands of cruise missiles (human-guided) to throw at the invasion fleet, more than any other operation. They would have fallen like rain while the American fighters reloaded. It would have been a horrific loss of life on both sides, and would have really made Americans think about what they were doing. The result would have probably been the total annihilation of Japanese culture.

Posted by gromky 2009-12-13 15:08|| 2009-12-13 15:08|| Front Page Top

#8 My father was scheduled for the 10 AM third wave in Yokohama harbor (where the 10th Mountain would have died).
They sent him home from Italy to make his last will and testament, visit his family and if he was Catholic (he wasn't) get Last Rites.
Sounds like a GO to me!
And yeah he would have never met mom.

Posted by 3dc 2009-12-13 17:01|| 2009-12-13 17:01|| Front Page Top

#9 Frank's book is excellent, as is his book about Guadalcanal, and to me decisive about the issue.

I've done a fair amount of reading of different opinions about Truman's decision, and the numbers break down like this:

100% of of liberal academics writing 50 years after the event condemn the decision.

100% of soldiers, Marines, sailors and fliers getting ready for the invasion not only support the decision, but think it was the best decision in the history of mankind, except that among soldiers and Marines in the first wave the number goes up to 500%.

I'm not sure what those numbers mean.

Posted by Matt 2009-12-13 17:25|| 2009-12-13 17:25|| Front Page Top

#10 My dad was on Okinawa. After the fighting, we were amassing literally MILES of rows of equipment for the invasion of Japan, as part of Operation Olympic. There was a great amount of foreboding on that one. Dad felt that his fellow Marines were spared a death sentence when the atomic bombs fell on Japan.

In the awful accounting of war, the decision to drop the bombs saved lots of American lives, and Japanese lives, too. It is little consolation to those maimed in the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but it did demonstrate the ultimate carnage of total war. Dinnerjacket should think about it before he goes apesh*t with his nuke plans.

The possession of nuclear weapons by the US in many ways is more of a burden than an advantage. There is tremendous responsibility in owning those weapons. Contrary to the opinion of thugocracies, who think that they bring respect.

Posted by Alaska Paul 2009-12-13 18:05|| 2009-12-13 18:05|| Front Page Top

#11 My Father, an Army Engineer told me this story, and as far as I know nobody else has ever heard it;

He was assigned to the "Island Hoppers".
He said he was always the third thing to land.

First the Marine Air blew the island to hell and gone.

Second the Marines landed and killed everybody.

Third his ship landed, took off the marines and landed equipment, Himself, His division (Lieutenant) and, bulldozers, graders fuel, Quonset huts etc.

Then they built An airstrip to land, fuel, load repair and rearm the planes for blowing the shit out of the next island in the list, so he was always far from the actual fighting, (They got A Night Bomber, Harassment more than harmful, another story)

They were only a few Islands away from the Japanese home Island when suddenly they started getting EVERYTHING they requested, very unusual in wartime, things were scarce (He even got a Sky sweeper Radar Controlled anti-aircraft gun(Obsolete now look it up, a 5 inch naval rifle mounted on a semi-truck and autoloading) (RADAR was still a secret word then) which got their night Harassment bomber with 4 shots (Another story)
Asked for jackets, got Fleece filled down flight jackets (Expensive as hell then) and after a while he asked his boss (No Name) "What's up?.

His boss swore him to secrecy and showed him the invasion plans For "The Invasion of the Japanese home islands" he sat on his trunk, and shivered when he read them, it absolutely horrified him, there wasn't a chance in hell this could be done without Millions of deaths, about 60-40 was his best guess, and to boot which was 40 and which was 60 looked like we would be the 60 per-centers would be the USA.

After that he understood why they got anything requested, they were expected to be no survivors, so requests were treated as "Last Requests"
then three days later they got word that the USA had dropped the Atom Bombs (Not anywhere close to them) and they all loaded up again, but this time home, not the next island.

I and My two Brothers owe our lives to the Hiroshima and Nagasaki Bombs.

By the way, I recently had a raving anti war lunatic declare "The cities were wiped off the face of the earth".

I checked,

Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki are booming industrial cities today (2009) and show NO signs of being blasted "Off the face of the Earth" So I consider the bombs entirely justified when I look at the Arizona memorial.

Jim David, Montgomery Alabama USA USN (Retired)

Posted by Redneck Jim 2009-12-13 21:47|| 2009-12-13 21:47|| Front Page Top

#12 IIRC, during WW2 [1944-1945]Guam's Route 16 was the site of a famous mile-long US Mil shopping road where both sides consisted of nothing save crated but exposed-in-open-air mil supplies that seemingly reached to the sky. Paperwork aside, all an Army-Navy-Marine Supply Officer or Sergeant had to do was just point and select what was needed. I believe all of Guam's B-USAAC/USAAF airfields, includ Harmon Field = Depot Field, Guam, + new ones were slated for expansion or construx once a final decision to invade Japan was made.

* "60-40" > Many Perts accept that the a US army damaged by severe fighting in Japan would had been hard-pressed to stop the Lend-Lease rebuilt Soviet Red Army under Stalin from doing anything it wanted to in Asian mainland.

IOW, NO ATOMIC BOMBINGS = SOVIET EXPANSION = may had resulted in wholly SOVIET EURASIA. Methinks we all know what Uncle Joe Stalin's preferred method(s) would be to formally resolve the PAKISTAN-INDIAN andor SINO-INDIAN, ETC. RIVALRIES IN ASIA, now don't we?

D *** NG IT, PAK + INDJUH + SINA DON'T LIKE THEIR BORDERS, CLEARLY CAN EASILY TELL IT TO STALIN AS THEY GO ON THEIR COMRADELY TOURIST TOUR OF SIBERIA [or WORSE], NOT TO CHURCHILL OR TRUMAN???

Posted by JosephMendiola 2009-12-13 23:20|| na 2009-12-13 23:20|| Front Page Top

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