In April and May 1945, Japan made three attempts through neutral Sweden and Portugal to bring the war to a peaceful end. On April 7, acting Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu met with Swedish ambassador Widon Bagge in Tokyo, asking him "to ascertain what peace terms the United States and Britain had in mind." But he emphasized that unconditional surrender was unacceptable, and that "the Emperor must not be touched." Bagge relayed the message to the United States, but Secretary of State Stettinius told the US Ambassador in Sweden to "show no interest or take any initiative in pursuit of the matter." Similar Japanese peace signals through Portugal, on May 7, and again through Sweden, on the 10th, proved similarly fruitless.
By mid-June, six members of Japan's Supreme War Council had secretly charged Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo with the task of approaching Soviet Russia's leaders "with a view to terminating the war if possible by September." On June 22 the Emperor called a meeting of the Supreme War Council, which included the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister, and the leading military figures. "We have heard enough of this determination of yours to fight to the last soldiers," said Emperor Hirohito. "We wish that you, leaders of Japan, will strive now to study the ways and the means to conclude the war. In doing so, try not to be bound by the decisions you have made in the past."
By early July the US had intercepted messages from Togo to the Japanese ambassador in Moscow, Naotake Sato, showing that the Emperor himself was taking a personal hand in the peace effort, and had directed that the Soviet Union be asked to help end the war. US officials also knew that the key obstacle to ending the war was American insistence on "unconditional surrender," a demand that precluded any negotiations. The Japanese were willing to accept nearly everything, except turning over their semi-divine Emperor. Heir of a 2,600-year-old dynasty, Hirohito was regarded by his people as a "living god" who personified the nation. (Until the August 15 radio broadcast of his surrender announcement, the Japanese people had never heard his voice.) Japanese particularly feared that the Americans would humiliate the Emperor, and even execute him as a war criminal.
On July 12, Hirohito summoned Fumimaro Konoye, who had served as prime minister in 1940-41. Explaining that "it will be necessary to terminate the war without delay," the Emperor said that he wished Konoye to secure peace with the Americans and British through the Soviets. As Prince Konoye later recalled, the Emperor instructed him "to secure peace at any price, notwithstanding its severity."
The next day, July 13, Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo wired ambassador Naotake Sato in Moscow: "See [Soviet foreign minister] Molotov before his departure for Potsdam ... Convey His Majesty's strong desire to secure a termination of the war ... Unconditional surrender is the only obstacle to peace ..."
On July 17, another intercepted Japanese message revealed that although Japan's leaders felt that the unconditional surrender formula involved an unacceptable dishonor, they were convinced that "the demands of the times" made Soviet mediation to terminate the war absolutely essential. Further diplomatic messages indicated that the only condition asked by the Japanese was preservation of "our form of government." The only "difficult point," a July 25 message disclosed, "is the ... formality of unconditional surrender."
Summarizing the messages between Togo and Sato, US naval intelligence said that Japan's leaders, "though still balking at the term unconditional surrender," recognized that the war was lost, and had reached the point where they have "no objection to the restoration of peace on the basis of the [1941] Atlantic Charter." These messages, said Assistant Secretary of the Navy Lewis Strauss, "indeed stipulated only that the integrity of the Japanese Royal Family be preserved."
Navy Secretary James Forrestal termed the intercepted messages "real evidence of a Japanese desire to get out of the war." "With the interception of these messages," notes historian Alperovitz (p. 177), "there could no longer be any real doubt as to the Japanese intentions; the maneuvers were overt and explicit and, most of all, official acts. Koichi Kido, Japan's Lord Privy Seal and a close advisor to the Emperor, later affirmed: "Our decision to seek a way out of this war, was made in early June before any atomic bomb had been dropped and Russia had not entered the war. It was already our decision."
In spite of this, on July 26 the leaders of the United States and Britain issued the Potsdam declaration, which included this grim ultimatum: "We call upon the government of Japan to proclaim now the unconditional surrender of all Japanese armed forces and to provide proper and adequate assurance of good faith in such action. The alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction."
I agree, freedom makes everyone better..
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091116/ap_on_re_as/as_obama_china_internet;_ylt=AnC8h.qe.hgClSj94fdEJDP9xg8F;_ylu=X3oDMTJxdWE5amJxBGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMDkxMTE2L2FzX29iYW1hX2NoaW5hX2ludGVybmV0BGNwb3MDMQRwb3MDMQRzZWMDeW5fdG9wX3N0b3JpZXMEc2xrA2NoaW5lc2VjZW5zbw--
"Obama may have been hoping to set a personal example for China's leaders when he said he believes that free discussion, including criticism that may be annoying to him, makes him "a better leader because it forces me to hear opinions that I don't want to hear."
One prolific blogger who goes by the name of Hecaitou said that a transcript of the exchange posted on the portal Netease was taken down by censors after just 27 minutes. A full Chinese-language transcript of the event was later posted on the official Xinhua News Agency Web site but required four clicks to locate the relevant section."
when he was in Japan. Said he didn’t have enough time.
But that sure would have been one “free discussion, including criticism that may be annoying to him….” and I would have loved to hear him explain why it was necessary to bomb two civilian cities with no meaningful military threat and kill 140,000 in one and 80,000 in another.
Because Israel wasn't invented yet and wasn't around to do the job? LMAO!
Gaza! There's a military threat for you! The combined forces of the Wehrmacht and the Red Army in WWII couldn't crush THAT military colussus! Thank Allah Israel was around to hurl white posphorus, strafe hospitals, shoot up ambulances and attack frightened schoolchildren, or we'd all be living under the tyranical boot of the Gaza Caliphate.
We get it; you hate Israel. You're an anti-semite. But at least keep your rhetoric focused to relevant posts. Taking a post about Obama talking about freedom in China and twisting it into a rant about Israel is really excessive.
were firing rockets at American cities every day, just like the terrorists in Gaza did to Israel, so it made perfect sense to "nuke em."
Good pick up. I'd forgotten about that.
Every indication was that Japan was going to keep fighting. The 220,000 killed was a fraction of the number that could have died in we had to island hop to the Imperial Palace.
Japan has not appologized for Pearl Harbor. It has not appologized for The Rape of Nanking. Nor the Battan Death march. Nor a hundred other attrocities that had NO arguable excuse.
At least Hiroshima was arguably an act of war that save lives. The Rape of Naking was just pure kill 'em for the sport.
except when it is about health care reform in which case you are convinced the government has no idea what it is doing.
But back to our story - you left out that in fact Japan was already defeated both militarily and economically and more important that Japan had sought to end the war diplomatically before the H bombs were dropped. So the story that most believe -we had to drop the bombs bc they were going to fight till the end and we would have to invade Japan - was not true.
Why did we reject Japan's overtures to end the war? Bc we insisted on unconditional surrender, and were unyielding at the need to save face for the military government. Would a conditional surrender been so bad?
Was it worth 140,000 lives?
You confuse the times when the need for government effectiveness far exceeds any requirements for efficiency vs. those times when a proper balance between the two should be left to individual freedom.
I trust you are not suggesting that killing 140,000 can be justified because it was effective, even though not efficient and even though the same result - the end of the war - could have been achieved at low human cost to the US by blockade and diplomacy, although certainly not as quickly.
you have no way of knowing what the outcome of a conditional surrender would have been or what Japan would have looked like afterward. We had just experienced WWII because WWI had a "conditional" surrender.
Maybe Holder/Obama can keep a chair warm for Truman's corpse at the upcoming NYNY terror parade/charade and find a way to put him on trial as well. I'm sure it would make you happy and that is of course what that's all about.
on two cities, as did all of the players at the time.
Now balance the certainty of 140,000 deaths against YOUR speculation that, gee, maybe the conditional surrender would not have worked out so well.
But I do agree with you that if "effectiveness" is the goal, "nuke em" is always a good solution.
THere is no reason to assume they would have surrendered. NOTHING. There is not one shred of paper that indicated that they were not going to fight on, until the bombs were dropped.
NOTHING.
As such, you have to assume the war would have gone on.
You just assume they were on the verge of throwing in the towel, saying, “We are sorry,” and being nicey-nice.
In fact, the outcome of dropping the bomb is that there were no more island-hopping invasions like Iwo Jima where tens of thousands of Japanese and Americans were killed. There was no invasion of Japan, with a march to Tokyo with hundreds of thousands of Japanese and Americans killed. The outcome was a fascist, militaristic regime was replaced with a democratic nation.
Need I go on.
Yes, it is speculation. We all do that.
In fact, I want a president who will act on the best available information. Lives will be lost either way. Go on what you have. That is the best info, and that is all there is or was.
Truman had to go on what he had on that day.
Again, and again, and again. Let's start having the rest of the world say how sorry they are for the suprresion of Eastern Europe, the oppression of the Moslem Republics of the Soviet Union, Tibet, Toltecs, Hopis, natives in the Belguim Congo, Algeria, Ireland, Turks v. Armenians.
Let the world go "mea culpa," and we will say we are sorry and bow down.
In April and May 1945, Japan made three attempts through neutral Sweden and Portugal to bring the war to a peaceful end. On April 7, acting Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu met with Swedish ambassador Widon Bagge in Tokyo, asking him "to ascertain what peace terms the United States and Britain had in mind." But he emphasized that unconditional surrender was unacceptable, and that "the Emperor must not be touched." Bagge relayed the message to the United States, but Secretary of State Stettinius told the US Ambassador in Sweden to "show no interest or take any initiative in pursuit of the matter." Similar Japanese peace signals through Portugal, on May 7, and again through Sweden, on the 10th, proved similarly fruitless.
By mid-June, six members of Japan's Supreme War Council had secretly charged Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo with the task of approaching Soviet Russia's leaders "with a view to terminating the war if possible by September." On June 22 the Emperor called a meeting of the Supreme War Council, which included the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister, and the leading military figures. "We have heard enough of this determination of yours to fight to the last soldiers," said Emperor Hirohito. "We wish that you, leaders of Japan, will strive now to study the ways and the means to conclude the war. In doing so, try not to be bound by the decisions you have made in the past."
By early July the US had intercepted messages from Togo to the Japanese ambassador in Moscow, Naotake Sato, showing that the Emperor himself was taking a personal hand in the peace effort, and had directed that the Soviet Union be asked to help end the war. US officials also knew that the key obstacle to ending the war was American insistence on "unconditional surrender," a demand that precluded any negotiations. The Japanese were willing to accept nearly everything, except turning over their semi-divine Emperor. Heir of a 2,600-year-old dynasty, Hirohito was regarded by his people as a "living god" who personified the nation. (Until the August 15 radio broadcast of his surrender announcement, the Japanese people had never heard his voice.) Japanese particularly feared that the Americans would humiliate the Emperor, and even execute him as a war criminal.
On July 12, Hirohito summoned Fumimaro Konoye, who had served as prime minister in 1940-41. Explaining that "it will be necessary to terminate the war without delay," the Emperor said that he wished Konoye to secure peace with the Americans and British through the Soviets. As Prince Konoye later recalled, the Emperor instructed him "to secure peace at any price, notwithstanding its severity."
The next day, July 13, Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo wired ambassador Naotake Sato in Moscow: "See [Soviet foreign minister] Molotov before his departure for Potsdam ... Convey His Majesty's strong desire to secure a termination of the war ... Unconditional surrender is the only obstacle to peace ..."
On July 17, another intercepted Japanese message revealed that although Japan's leaders felt that the unconditional surrender formula involved an unacceptable dishonor, they were convinced that "the demands of the times" made Soviet mediation to terminate the war absolutely essential. Further diplomatic messages indicated that the only condition asked by the Japanese was preservation of "our form of government." The only "difficult point," a July 25 message disclosed, "is the ... formality of unconditional surrender."
Summarizing the messages between Togo and Sato, US naval intelligence said that Japan's leaders, "though still balking at the term unconditional surrender," recognized that the war was lost, and had reached the point where they have "no objection to the restoration of peace on the basis of the [1941] Atlantic Charter." These messages, said Assistant Secretary of the Navy Lewis Strauss, "indeed stipulated only that the integrity of the Japanese Royal Family be preserved."
Navy Secretary James Forrestal termed the intercepted messages "real evidence of a Japanese desire to get out of the war." "With the interception of these messages," notes historian Alperovitz (p. 177), "there could no longer be any real doubt as to the Japanese intentions; the maneuvers were overt and explicit and, most of all, official acts. Koichi Kido, Japan's Lord Privy Seal and a close advisor to the Emperor, later affirmed: "Our decision to seek a way out of this war, was made in early June before any atomic bomb had been dropped and Russia had not entered the war. It was already our decision."
In spite of this, on July 26 the leaders of the United States and Britain issued the Potsdam declaration, which included this grim ultimatum: "We call upon the government of Japan to proclaim now the unconditional surrender of all Japanese armed forces and to provide proper and adequate assurance of good faith in such action. The alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction."
What? No mention that it was the Soviets entry into the war that “scared” the Emperor into surrendering much more so than the A-bombs? So many opinions.
There is no doubt that there was and is no shortage of the A-Bomb naysayers (concerning their role in ending the war). As long as we’re speculating, maybe the Hiroshima and Nagasaki demonstrations convinced the non-Japanese and rational rest of the world that those actual live uses of nuclear weapons were all we needed to not want to do it somewhere else.
I linked. I did not excerpt this discussion in the post since I was simply showing Phil that there is plenty of evidence to support my post.
Clearly scholars differ as to whether the atomic bombs caused the surrender or the Soviet entry into the war. But I'm not addressing that - my thesis is the coventional wisdom repeated by Phil that Japan would fight till the end unless we dropped the bombs is simply not true, as they were actively seeking peace but wanted to save the emperor from being executed as a war criminal.
To kill 140,000 Japanese bc we insisisted on an unconditional surrender is why I find reprehensible.
How we got to that point was secondary.
The characterization of Soviet involvment was quite different in the two articles.
Like I said. So many opinions, so few facts. And you cannot say with certainty (or even high probability) that your conclusions are the correct ones.
AND 140,000 lives would have been spared.
And I bet you don't even know, without looking it up, what happened to Hirohito, the guy who was the "condition" for which
Japan initially refused to surrender.
Yeah, that was "totally unacceptable." That was worth 140,000 lives.
"Japan has not appologized for Pearl Harbor."
Toward the end of the occupation, Hirohito let it be known to SCAP that he was prepared to apologize formally to U.S. Gen. MacArthur for Japan's actions during World War II – including an apology for the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.[49]
According to Patrick Lennox Tierney, on the day the Emperor came to offer this apology, MacArthur refused to admit him or acknowledge him. Tierney was an eye witness because his office was on the fifth floor of the Dai-Ichi Insurance Building in Tokyo, the same floor where MacArthur's suite was situated. Many years later, Tierney made an effort to explain his understanding of the significance of what he had personally witnessed: "Apology is a very important thing in Japan."[49] A pivotal moment passed. Issues which might have been addressed were allowed to remain open, with consequences which have unfolded across decades.[50]
figure out a way to sell you guys something. You are SO accepting of the party line.
Kudos indeed to POTUS Obama for saying what he said to the commie Celestials, but let's face it, they were just being polite to a guest and humoring him.
The liklihood of the Communist Party of the PRC ever heeding Obama's words is about the same as the Israelis ever admitting they were ever wrong in any word they uttered or deed they committed.
No wonder Israel and the PRC do such a great illegal trade in US weapons and US weapons technology : under the surface, the differences between those two pernicious polities is not even a thimble's worth of warm spit.
Very nice try for the POTUS though, but he's just not putting points up on the board.
-- Modified on 11/16/2009 7:35:59 PM
War and Politics don't mix, Our Special forces could have killed Osama,But Political correctness said send in Afgan troops to mess is up!, Though I don;t think we should have come into Iraq, again Political correctness, When those 100 terrorist were hiding in the Mosque and sniping at our soldiers, If we blew it up the 1st day , They would have know from then on not to hide or store weapons there! And Leaders would not let them stay there.... And by the way they blow up their own Mosque and kill other cleric, so they can't complain
WOW that's gotta be the longest link I've ever seen. (Ok, that sounds odd).
You just gotta love the irony here. A quote lauding free speech, cherished so strongly by Americans, lasted all of 27 minutes before the censors sliced it.
But remember boys and girls, China is a good trading partner though, so we love them. We hate those Cuban commie bastards though! No cigar for you!
You gotta love the Chinese they censored the speech that Obama had on censorship regarding the net 