#69 - The Atomic Bomb

* Episode 69. * Ray’s favourite number. * Have you actually had one yet, Ray? * Sister in law? * Truman had given his final approval to the plan to invade Kyushu, the southern most island of Japan, just two weeks before leaving for Potsdam. * A Russian invasion of Manchuria and Korea figured prominently in the grand strategy that underlay that plan. * Second, even an invasion of the home islands did little to solve the problem of the estimated 1.8 million Japanese soldiers in mainland China. * But the Soviets could handle that problem as well. * In return, of course, for the new territories they wanted as a result. * Which were mostly old Russian territories lost during the Russo-Japanese war as we discussed in earlier episodes. * Getting Stalin into the Pacific War was Truman’s number one goal in Potsdam. * The Japanese knew of course that this was coming and had been trying to negotiate a way to keep their Neutrality pact in place with the Soviets. * They had offered the Soviets pretty much everything they wanted - southern Sakhalin Island, Port Arthur, and half of Manchuria in exchange for help in keeping the rest of Japan’s conquests in Asia. * The Russians had informed the Allies about these offers and their rebuttals of them. * But still the Americans didn’t trust the Soviets and thought they might cut a deal. * Of course, Truman need not have worried about Russian desires to join the war against Japan. * Stalin wanted Russia involved in the war as much as Truman did. * On June 28, 1945, even before he set out for Potsdam, Stalin told his commanders to begin preparations for a war with Japan “in the greatest secrecy.” * As later reported, “army commanders [were] to be given their orders in person and orally and without any written directives.” * Almost without debate, Stalin told Truman early on at Potsdam that Russian forces would invade Manchuria no later than mid-August. * Truman was as happy as a capitalist pig in shit. * How to end the war with Japan remained a question of intense debate. * The Allies had insisted on unconditional surrender for Germany, but several strategists argued that the same insistence for Japan might well prove counterproductive. * The geography of Japan complicated any attempts at invasion and military dominance. * Culturally, the Japanese people had an attachment to the emperor that argued against an insistence on his removal. * If the Americans, whose forces would have to bear the brunt of an invasion of the home islands, insisted on dethroning the quasi-divine emperor, it might force the Japanese to fight on for an abstract goal that had little real strategic or political importance. * The Americans should, Secretary of War Henry Stimson and others argued, allow Japan to keep its emperor in exchange for ending the war. * Most senior US military officials agreed, noting that only the emperor could sign or endorse a capitulation that the Japanese people would respect. * Removing him by force might create anarchy and an untenable situation for occupying forces. * British Foreign Minister Ernest Bevin drew a direct lesson from World War I, arguing that “it might have been better for all of us not to have destroyed the institution of the Kaiser after the last war; we might not have had this one if we hadn’t done so.” * Thus, he argued, the Allies should remain flexible about the emperor’s future. * Other officials recalled with bitterness Pearl Harbor and insisted that Japan must surrender unconditionally. * The still-influential former secretary of state Cordell Hull publicly blasted any concessions to the Japanese as “appeasement.” * His word choice mattered deeply, as it carried the historical implication of both American weakness and the beginning of another round of conflict. * He, Byr