Decision ‘08

Hiroshima: The Critics Are Wrong

Yesterday, I highlighted a piece by Max Hastings examining the pros and cons of the decision to drop the atomic bomb. Today (with the hat tip to RealClearPolitics) I want to bring a long, well-reasoned piece by Richard Frank, writing in the Weekly Standard, to your attention. Using communications intercepts to examine the situation from the viewpoint of what we can surmise of the prevailing knowledge at the time, Frank argues that the three main premises that the critics of Truman rest their case on are all flawed:

The critics share three fundamental premises. The first is that Japan’s situation in 1945 was catastrophically hopeless. The second is that Japan’s leaders recognized that fact and were seeking to surrender in the summer of 1945. The third is that thanks to decoded Japanese diplomatic messages, American leaders knew that Japan was about to surrender when they unleashed needless nuclear devastation…

…It is clear that all three of the critics’ central premises are wrong. The Japanese did not see their situation as catastrophically hopeless. They were not seeking to surrender, but pursuing a negotiated end to the war that preserved the old order in Japan, not just a figurehead emperor. Finally, thanks to radio intelligence, American leaders, far from knowing that peace was at hand, understood–as one analytical piece in the “Magic” Far East Summary stated in July 1945, after a review of both the military and diplomatic intercepts–that “until the Japanese leaders realize that an invasion can not be repelled, there is little likelihood that they will accept any peace terms satisfactory to the Allies.” This cannot be improved upon as a succinct and accurate summary of the military and diplomatic realities of the summer of 1945.

No doubt we’ll be hearing much more on this issue as this 60th anniversary week progresses…

9 Responses to “Hiroshima: The Critics Are Wrong”

1 algiga Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 2:05 am
The Japanese aren’t and weren’t stupid. At that stage of history they didn’t know of the power of these new weapons. So the question is not whether the bomb should have been dropped, but whether it should have fallen on a large city. If the Japanese had been told, “look at this boys, the next time it’s on your head” and the bomb dropped somewhere away from major civilian centres, they would have been convinced of the folly of persevering with the war. Having said that, the logical arguments aginst the dropping of the bombs ignores the emotional aspect of the war. I’d imagine that after years of such a bloody conflict and the millions of casualties, the idea of inflicting pain on the enemy must have been very strong, even as the war was coming to an end.
2 Mark Coffey Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 2:43 am
algiga, in reference to your point about dropping the bomb away from a population center, it was considered…I can’t remember (it’s been a while since I read up on it) the exact arguments against that, but one of them was that there were only two bombs. Fat Man and Little Boy were our entire stockpile at the time, so it was deemed too risky to have a demonstration that might backfire…
3 Fred Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 5:08 am
Yes, and how would the Japanese leadership respond to something along the lines of “we just dropped a very large bomb off your coast that did no damage. So now surrender.”

Remember this was all happening in the middle of a fire-bombing campaign that killed hundreds of thousands of Japanese without an observable effect on their determination to fight on.
4 fatman Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 6:38 am
algiga:

Correct me if I’m wrong (boy, I’m using that phrase a lot tonight) but wasn’t there an attempt by some Japanese officers to hold the Emperor as a virtual prisoner in his palace while they seized the recorded copies of his speech ordering the nation to surrender, without ever actually using the word surrender? A different speech–by an army officer–was to have been substituted, exhorting the Japanese people to fight to the bitter end. The plot failed in no small part because the plotters couldn’t find either copy of the Emperor’s speech. Which may be why the Japanese Eastern District Army refused to support the plot.
5 fatman Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 6:42 am
My point, which I didn’t make clear in my last comment, was that even after Nagasaki there was a hardcore group of fanatics in the upper echelons of the Japanese military who considered death, even obliteration, to be preferable to surrender. A demonstration bombing would have had no effect on these people.
6 Mark Coffey Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 12:33 pm
Exactly so…many Japanese generals, knowing full well they had no chance to win, thought that surrender was too shameful to even ponder…
7 Clint Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 3:37 pm
Perhaps there’s some overlap here — aren’t those saying that the Japanese would have been reasonable the same ones who think we can deal with Al Quaida by negotiating a few reasonable compromises?

Dealing with a fanatical enemy is frightening — it’s not surprising that some people will deal with it by imagining a more reasonable enemy. (Like the Stockholm Syndrome in which hostages come to see their kidnappers as kind and good people who wouldn’t hurt a fly — it’s something they have to tell themselves to quiet their own reasonable fears.)
8 Mark Coffey Says:
August 1st, 2005 at 4:20 pm
Yes, the Stockholm Syndrome is an apt analogy…
9 Andy Says:
August 2nd, 2005 at 11:11 pm
fatman, IIRC, the History Channel had a 2 hour documentary on that.

A coup attempt to kidnap the emperor and seize the recording. It failed due to the emperor’s butler who refused to divulge the hiding place with his life and the radio station manager who refused to broadcast the coup, 1st on a technicality, then sabotage of some sort.

The attempt was conducted by a Major at night with “support” contingent on plausible deniability and capture of the emperor. By morning it fell apart and the Major comitted hari-kari. Like I said, IIRC from about 2 years ago. The documentary is bound to run again.