During WWII, we engaged in all-out war against Japan and Germany, and devastated both countries to the limit of our technical ability. Had the Japanese governme

During WWII, we engaged in all-out war against Japan and Germany, and devastated both countries to the limit of our technical ability. Had the Japanese government not surrendered after the atomic bombs, we would have continued dropping them until there was no one left. We were already fire-bombing cities at that point, despite the huge number of civilian casualties. After the war, Japan still had a functioning government which the US had a stranglehold on for years during reconstruction. Germany's government was wiped out and replaced with two puppet states for a long time as well. We were truly imperialistic then, having invaded and taken control of those countries until they were stable enough to run themselves. (Or couldn't be held anymore, in the case of East Germany.) We didn't do it that way in Iraq and Afghanistan. Years of bad outcomes with cold-war-era puppet governments got us away from that approach, and instead we tried to set up locally-run governments that were allies but not subservient. But that didn't work so well either. Maybe we let them go too soon, or maybe the population wasn't beaten down enough by the war, the way Germany and Japan were, to just accept any government so long as it stops the devastation.