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Necessity and justification are two different concepts. Few believe it was necessary - the United States' overwhelming industrial capacity was bound to prevail

Necessity and justification are two different concepts. Few believe it was necessary - the United States' overwhelming industrial capacity was bound to prevail over Japan. The state of the two countries warmaking capacity was totally lopsided by 1945. Thus it was not necessary to achieve victory. That is brought an end to the war with fewer casualties, both American and Japanese even moreso, is not a difficult claim to support. Japan planned to fight a defensive war against an amphibious invasion in order to negotiate more favorable surrender terms. The Japanese estimated that this would incur 20 million Japanese casualties, and this plan was approved. Even if we assume that Japan's war machine would collapse before this figure of lives lost was reached, it is almost certain that the death toll would be in the millions. Germany, without the advantage of being a mountainous island nation and having a lower population than Japan, fought on its own soil in 1945 to the effect of several million dead. Thus, it's almost certain that the atomic bombings resulted in an order of magnitude fewer Japanese lives lost than an conventional invasion.

hutzlibu 6y ago
Yes, but maybe the bombs would have had the same effect, if dropped on actual military targets (or even unhabitated land, but close enough to demonstrate the power) instead of an civilian city. (a city with military production, sure sure, but they were choosen not because of military value, but because they were relatively undamaged, so the effect of the bombs could be studied. Concern for loss of japan civilian live was never an issue)
- manfredo 6y ago
  Remember, it took not one, but two atomic bombs dropped on cities for Japan to surrender. And even after that, there was an attempted coup to continue fighting the war: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident There only existed two bombs at the time. Had the bombs been dropped as a show of force, it is very likely the US and Japan would have to suffer through a costly invasion anyway.
  - dboreham 6y ago
    Hmm. I think the US had at least one more core for a fat man type weapon.
    - hpcjoe 6y ago
      Specifically, the demon core[1]. It was the core-in-waiting for a third bomb if needed, and I believe that the uranium and plutonium production lines were ramping up by that time[2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_core https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_core [2] https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/timeline https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/timeline search for 1945 July 23 entry.
    - Gibbon1 6y ago
      40 years ago I wrote a paper on nuclear weapons. My memory isn't perfect and the sources are 40-50 years out of date. But here goes. The US built a massive manufacturing pipeline to make nuclear weapons. Little boy was a once off. Fat man was basically a functional prototype. And the manufacturing pipeline was running and kept running after the war. How much weapons grade plutonium they had left over after they bombed Nagasaki is kind of a quibble.
  - garmaine 6y ago
    The production line was already delivering about 1 bomb per 10 days at that point. The military wanted to keep bombing until surrender was achieved.
- ThrowawayR2 6y ago
  Given that the Japanese military wanted to continue the war even after both Hiroshima and Nagasaki, your conjecture is demonstrably untrue. Remember, the military was the primary power in the Japanese government, second only to the emperor, and were the driving force behind starting the war as well. Also remember that the firebombing campaign across all of the other major cities had already inflicted combined casualties far greater than Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined; immense deaths of their own civilians was seen as an unavoidable necessity to defend their homeland.
- dreamcompiler 6y ago
  Minor elaboration: Nagasaki was not an undamaged city. It had been bombed multiple times by conventional American bombs. But then Nagasaki was just a backup target anyway. Kokura was the primary target for the second bomb but it was obscured by clouds and smoke during the bombing run on August 9 so the plane went to Nagasaki instead. By the time they got there it too was socked in by clouds which is why the Nagasaki bomb fell so far off target.
- Keyframe 6y ago
  It was discussed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Proposed_demonstration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_a...
  - hutzlibu 6y ago
    Those arguments do not seem convincing at all. Why would a demonstration need to be told the japanese in advance? And a dud could have also happened to the one used on hiroshima. A shock effect could have been achieved by a bomb detonated close to Tokyo. And with papers dropped, saying, this will happen to all your cities, soon.
rbecker 6y ago
You misunderstand - the belief is not that the US could have won the war even without the bombs, but that "bombs vs. invasion" was a false dichotomy, and that Japan would have unconditionally surrendered around the same time without the bombs, or perhaps even sooner had the conditional surrender they were already seeking been on the table.
- manfredo 6y ago
  Japan had actually repeatedly offered conditional surrenders. Specifically, surrenders on the condition that it keep some of its colonies (Korea and Taiwan), that the Japanese military government remain intact, and that nobody be charged for war crimes. This is as if Germany offered a surrender on the condition that it keep western Poland and Czechoslovakia, that the Nazi party remain in power, and that nobody be tried for war crimes. This is not remotely close to an acceptable surrender. And the US ultimately did accept a surrender on the condition that the imperial family not be tried for war crimes (a particularly contentious point for China, since a royal family member was the commanding officer in charge of the forces that perpetrated the crimes at Nanking).
- valuearb 6y ago
  The Japanese offered to surrender if they could continue to control their captured territories, essentially continuing to rape China. That’s a hell of a condition to allow them.
  - rbecker 6y ago
    I'm curious where you found this information, because the best I could find was that negotiations regarding those conditions were never finished: To this end, Stalin and Molotov strung out the negotiations with the Japanese, giving them false hope of a Soviet-mediated peace. [..] The Japanese would have to surrender unconditionally to all the Allies. To prolong the war, the Soviets opposed any attempt to weaken this requirement.[56] This would give the Soviets time to complete the transfer of their troops from the Western Front to the Far East, and conquer Manchuria, Inner Mongolia, northern Korea, South Sakhalin, the Kuriles, and possibly Hokkaidō - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan#Soviet_intentions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan#Soviet_inte... However, the Japanese presented no formal terms, because details were to be worked out by negotiation. - https://www.quora.com/When-Japan-offered-conditional-surrender-during-WW2-but-was-refused-because-of-its-unacceptable-terms-what-were-these-terms https://www.quora.com/When-Japan-offered-conditional-surrend... Edit as reply due to rate limit: The article you linked doesn't support the claims you made about Japan's conditional surrender. The closest it comes is "Anami wanted retention of the emperor, self-disarmament, no foreign occupation, and trial of any Japanese war criminals by Japan itself". But that is what Anami wanted, not what was written down in some final, take-it-or-leave-it offer. And that's from before the Soviet declaration of war. In fact the article basically contradicts your claim about the necessity of the bombs: > The bomb played a part in Japan’s surrender, but it may not have been necessary, he said. Had the U.S. drawn Stalin into publicly supporting the Potsdam Declaration’s unconditional surrender demand, Japan might not have held out hope for a Soviet-brokered deal. Had it guaranteed the emperor’s position, Japan might have surrendered earlier, Hasegawa said, though this is yet another point that draws endless historical debate. > “Other alternatives were available, but they were not explored,” Hasegawa said. Choosing the bombs over merely exploring other options is rather damning, don't you think?
Cocktail 6y ago
There is something you seem to forget, that lost Japanese lives counted for anything in American eyes. 4 years of war, reports of war crimes and propaganda effectively demonized them and thus their value as humans deteriorated to wholly expendable in American war plans. The reason there was no invasion, was to save American lives as much as possible.

hutzlibu 6y ago

Yes, but maybe the bombs would have had the same effect, if dropped on actual military targets (or even unhabitated land, but close enough to demonstrate the power) instead of an civilian city. (a city with military production, sure sure, but they were choosen not because of military value, but because they were relatively undamaged, so the effect of the bombs could be studied. Concern for loss of japan civilian live was never an issue)

manfredo 6y ago
Remember, it took not one, but two atomic bombs dropped on cities for Japan to surrender. And even after that, there was an attempted coup to continue fighting the war: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ky%C5%ABj%C5%8D_incident There only existed two bombs at the time. Had the bombs been dropped as a show of force, it is very likely the US and Japan would have to suffer through a costly invasion anyway.
- dboreham 6y ago
  Hmm. I think the US had at least one more core for a fat man type weapon.
  - hpcjoe 6y ago
    Specifically, the demon core[1]. It was the core-in-waiting for a third bomb if needed, and I believe that the uranium and plutonium production lines were ramping up by that time[2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_core https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demon_core [2] https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/timeline https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/timeline search for 1945 July 23 entry.
  - Gibbon1 6y ago
    40 years ago I wrote a paper on nuclear weapons. My memory isn't perfect and the sources are 40-50 years out of date. But here goes. The US built a massive manufacturing pipeline to make nuclear weapons. Little boy was a once off. Fat man was basically a functional prototype. And the manufacturing pipeline was running and kept running after the war. How much weapons grade plutonium they had left over after they bombed Nagasaki is kind of a quibble.
- garmaine 6y ago
  The production line was already delivering about 1 bomb per 10 days at that point. The military wanted to keep bombing until surrender was achieved.
ThrowawayR2 6y ago
Given that the Japanese military wanted to continue the war even after both Hiroshima and Nagasaki, your conjecture is demonstrably untrue. Remember, the military was the primary power in the Japanese government, second only to the emperor, and were the driving force behind starting the war as well. Also remember that the firebombing campaign across all of the other major cities had already inflicted combined casualties far greater than Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined; immense deaths of their own civilians was seen as an unavoidable necessity to defend their homeland.
dreamcompiler 6y ago
Minor elaboration: Nagasaki was not an undamaged city. It had been bombed multiple times by conventional American bombs. But then Nagasaki was just a backup target anyway. Kokura was the primary target for the second bomb but it was obscured by clouds and smoke during the bombing run on August 9 so the plane went to Nagasaki instead. By the time they got there it too was socked in by clouds which is why the Nagasaki bomb fell so far off target.
Keyframe 6y ago
It was discussed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Proposed_demonstration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_a...
- hutzlibu 6y ago
  Those arguments do not seem convincing at all. Why would a demonstration need to be told the japanese in advance? And a dud could have also happened to the one used on hiroshima. A shock effect could have been achieved by a bomb detonated close to Tokyo. And with papers dropped, saying, this will happen to all your cities, soon.

rbecker 6y ago

You misunderstand - the belief is not that the US could have won the war even without the bombs, but that "bombs vs. invasion" was a false dichotomy, and that Japan would have unconditionally surrendered around the same time without the bombs, or perhaps even sooner had the conditional surrender they were already seeking been on the table.

manfredo 6y ago
Japan had actually repeatedly offered conditional surrenders. Specifically, surrenders on the condition that it keep some of its colonies (Korea and Taiwan), that the Japanese military government remain intact, and that nobody be charged for war crimes. This is as if Germany offered a surrender on the condition that it keep western Poland and Czechoslovakia, that the Nazi party remain in power, and that nobody be tried for war crimes. This is not remotely close to an acceptable surrender. And the US ultimately did accept a surrender on the condition that the imperial family not be tried for war crimes (a particularly contentious point for China, since a royal family member was the commanding officer in charge of the forces that perpetrated the crimes at Nanking).
valuearb 6y ago
The Japanese offered to surrender if they could continue to control their captured territories, essentially continuing to rape China. That’s a hell of a condition to allow them.
- rbecker 6y ago
  I'm curious where you found this information, because the best I could find was that negotiations regarding those conditions were never finished: To this end, Stalin and Molotov strung out the negotiations with the Japanese, giving them false hope of a Soviet-mediated peace. [..] The Japanese would have to surrender unconditionally to all the Allies. To prolong the war, the Soviets opposed any attempt to weaken this requirement.[56] This would give the Soviets time to complete the transfer of their troops from the Western Front to the Far East, and conquer Manchuria, Inner Mongolia, northern Korea, South Sakhalin, the Kuriles, and possibly Hokkaidō - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan#Soviet_intentions https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surrender_of_Japan#Soviet_inte... However, the Japanese presented no formal terms, because details were to be worked out by negotiation. - https://www.quora.com/When-Japan-offered-conditional-surrender-during-WW2-but-was-refused-because-of-its-unacceptable-terms-what-were-these-terms https://www.quora.com/When-Japan-offered-conditional-surrend... Edit as reply due to rate limit: The article you linked doesn't support the claims you made about Japan's conditional surrender. The closest it comes is "Anami wanted retention of the emperor, self-disarmament, no foreign occupation, and trial of any Japanese war criminals by Japan itself". But that is what Anami wanted, not what was written down in some final, take-it-or-leave-it offer. And that's from before the Soviet declaration of war. In fact the article basically contradicts your claim about the necessity of the bombs: > The bomb played a part in Japan’s surrender, but it may not have been necessary, he said. Had the U.S. drawn Stalin into publicly supporting the Potsdam Declaration’s unconditional surrender demand, Japan might not have held out hope for a Soviet-brokered deal. Had it guaranteed the emperor’s position, Japan might have surrendered earlier, Hasegawa said, though this is yet another point that draws endless historical debate. > “Other alternatives were available, but they were not explored,” Hasegawa said. Choosing the bombs over merely exploring other options is rather damning, don't you think?

Cocktail 6y ago

There is something you seem to forget, that lost Japanese lives counted for anything in American eyes. 4 years of war, reports of war crimes and propaganda effectively demonized them and thus their value as humans deteriorated to wholly expendable in American war plans. The reason there was no invasion, was to save American lives as much as possible.