soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Cubdriver wrote:
: On Wed, 09 Apr 2008 11:07:40 -0400, Robert Warinner
: wrote:

:>Hasegawa's points to the lack of contemporary evidence that the atomic
:>bombings motivated Japan's surrender.

: Apart from the Emperor's Rescript, that would be!

There were more than one Imperial rescript on the surrender. Consider the
Imperial rescript issued August 17 to the Japanese troops:

TO THE OFFICERS AND MEN OF THE IMPERIAL FORCES:

Three years and eight months have elapsed since we declared war on the
United States and Britain. During this time our beloved men of the army and
navy, sacrificing their lives, have fought valiantly on disease-stricken and
barren lands and on tempestuous waters in the blazing sun, and of this we
are deeply grateful.

Now that the Soviet Union has entered the war against us, to continue the
war under the present internal and external conditions would be only to
increase needlessly the ravages of war finally to the point of endangering
the very foundation of the Empire's existence.

There is no mention of the atomic bombs in the rescript. Can we conclude from
this rescript it was really the Soviet Union which forced Japan to surrender?

: Does he think the emperor was lying, or speaking for effect, or
: covering his fundament?

The rescripts are public documents with a variety of political goals in mind,
persuading Japan's military to accept surrender foremost among them and with a
healthy dash of concern for his own position as well. If the Emperor could
make a surrender stick, perhaps the Allies would be more favorably inclined to
keeping him around. The rescripts are not Hirohito's diary or an explanation
of his motivations and reasoning. So, yes, speaking for effect and covering of
fundament are there.

: What's not to understand about "a most cruel new weapon"?

I'd say that as much as we'd like to sort out the events of August 1945, we
will still be left with a lot of loose ends and differing interpretations.

For the Japanese leaders, a lot of strategic chickens came home to roost in a
very short period of time. They didn't have time to parse all the consequences
and implications of them. They didn't even have a reasonably coherent decision
making process to deal with them. History can't impose reason and order after
the fact. So we may not be able to say it was the nuclear chicken or the
Soviet chicken that did the trick.

I agree with Hasegawa on this: to see the events of August 1945 as a search
for justification of Hiroshima and Nagaski is distorting. Unfortunately
Hasegawa has his own biases which carry other distortions.


Andrew Warinner
warinner@xnet.com
http://home.xnet.com/~warinner