any land invasion of japan would cost a s*** ton of lives and it would drag on for years. japan has that warrior culture, and with there government being somewhat fanatics at the time, imagine the lives lost if soldiers tried to fight against the japanese military AND the civilians who would take up arms and fight back also. cant win that fight.

nah

much of the politicians, as well as the emperor, supported the end of the war. following the loss of okinawa the emperor's feelings were pretty much set in stone. but the military, who were in ultimate control of the war effort, wasn't going along with that. they actually believed there was still a way to win.

the big six, AKA the war council (which was japan's supreme council) held a vote just before the bombing of hiroshima. they voted 5-1 to keep the war going.

even after nagasaki got bombed, there was still much hesitation to end the war. there was a 3-3 split from the war council and hirohito actually had to come out and demand the war end the day after the 2nd nuke.

even after getting nuked twice and having surrendered, the military still wanted to fight so they staged a coup.

literally just wait lol. Invasion was unnecessary anyway. The US and Australia had already taken back Japan’s foreign holdings, Russia was preparing to declare war on Japan, and Japan was already trying to seek peace

Any other narrative is just retroactive justification by numbskull Americans who like big bombs

Also worth noting Japan was planning a bio attack on civilians in San Diego on September 22nd which 100% would have prompted a US invasion / Nuke if they hadn't done it in august
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Cherry_Blossoms_at_Night

Thread got me wanting to play Civ

you got me wanting to play civ

I remember reading about this in depth in high school, I still hold the same sentiment today in that, it was the best option we had. Japanese soldiers were literally instructed and trained to fight until there was no one left to fight. No surrendering

Left

You think the US should have just left the war?

At that point? Sure. The US had far greater naval and air superiority. They had targeted their infrastructure heavily to the point where they were just bombing population centers by the end. Kamikazes did what they did because they could not contend with the US armament in conventional combat.

They bombed pearl harbor to bring us into it. The US literally could not leave without an unconditional surrender. What possibly would the upside of pulling out all our troops have been.

Pearl Habor targeted combatants. The US firebombed cities full of people for months before committing one of the most unnecessary war crimes ever. Imperial Japan's military capabilities by that point were wholly inadequate to threaten the US. They would have untrained pilots sharing a single plane in some instances. Planes that barely worked were sent on suicide runs. It was not competitive.

They could have detonated a nuke 10 miles off shore and probably gotten the same surrender btw.

Was this thread inspired by my comment in that other thread

Probably

They didnt have to use the nuke, they had already won the war in russia,

Once Reza Shah flipped it was a done deal. Look up the Stalin Roosevelt and Churchill meeting in Tehran.

USA did that s*** to pretend they saved the world.

Germans built the rail roads in Iran... just connect the dots

What were the NAZIs hoping to achieve and who allowed them to build the rail roads in Iran and in return promised allegiance?

to an extent

The Dark Green were Allied Powers already involved in the war.
The Light Green were Allied Powers who joined after Pearl Harbor.
The Blue were Axis Powers.

Gee, I wonder what could've been done to stop Japan once Italy and Germany surrendered and gave up the countries they were in control of without using nukes...

As usual, the nuclear weapons were never truly needed to stop Japan. They were nothing more than a glorified flex to show the rest of the world America's power going into a post-WWII era.

We f***ing vaporized thousands of civilians and gave cancer to the survivors. There was absolutely an alternative.

Nothing?? They had already won the war 2 years prior when reza shah flipped and germans couldnt use the railroads nazis had built in iran to get food and ammo to their troops in russia. Roosevelt stalin churchill and reza shah had a meeting in tehran in 1943 and panned it out. US did that to pretend they saved the word

Horrific acts that the US then pardoned them for

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_cover-up_of_Japanese_war_crimes#:~:text=The%20American%20cover%2Dup%20of,humanity%2C%20predominantly%20in%20mainland%20China.

and don't forget about the Nazi's

npr.org/2014/11/05/361427276/how-thousands-of-nazis-were-rewarded-with-life-in-the-u-s

Jesus what a sick sick country