I don't see a whole lot of point to discussing what we think Japan would have done, given the information that we have now. I have seen some of the research sug

I don't see a whole lot of point to discussing what we think Japan would have done, given the information that we have now. I have seen some of the research suggesting that Japan was more concerned about Russia's declaration of war than the atomic bombings, and might have surrendered based on that alone. But that research is based on a bunch of historians with unlimited access to Japanese records of high-level meetings and conversations, and all the time in the world to research, correlate, and discuss things. They may well be right, but American Military officers making decisions couldn't possibly know any of that. All they can know is what the Japanese government has said and done, and anything that their intelligence sources can pick up, which may or may not be believable. Everything they would have seen up to that point says that Japan is ruthless and determined to not surrender, and they can only be convinced otherwise if it's clear that they face total destruction otherwise. I can't see how any information available to them points to any other conclusion than that the bomb should be dropped as soon as it's ready to bring an end to the war as quickly as possible.