Japan had no military. But didn’t surrender – Richard Rhodes

Richard Rhodes argues the Soviet invasion of Manchuria — not the atomic bombs — was the decisive factor that forced Japan’s surrender in 1945.

• Stalin moving up the Soviet invasion of Manchuria to August 8 (between the two bombings) broke Japan’s strategic calculus, not the bombs alone.
• Japan still had 1 million men in Western Manchuria and roughly a year’s worth of ammunition by mid-1945.
• Japanese civilian caloric intake had collapsed to ~1,000 calories/day from foraged weeds — yet Japan refused to surrender.
• Stalin initially believed atomic bomb intelligence was American disinformation designed to waste Soviet resources.
• Hiroshima and Nagasaki were preserved from conventional firebombing specifically so General Groves could study bomb damage effects on intact cities.
• The U.S. Air Force launched its largest firebombing raid on August 14 — during active surrender negotiations — partly to signal the Soviets to halt their advance into northern Japan.
• Paul Newman, trained as a Navy bomber for the Japan invasion, told Rhodes he was among the million soldiers who credited the bomb with saving their lives.
• Rhodes frames WWII as a turning point where civilian deaths exceeded military deaths — a structural shift in how wars are fought.

2024-05-01 · Watch on YouTube