Two Fridays ago, I wrote about how and why the atom bombs dropped on Japan were not justified acts. The arguments I included in that post were moral ones. What follows are factual arguments against the conclusions that the bombs ended the war at all. Today I came across an article from the AP that reports on a new book detailing a tremendous Russian presence that seems to have had a far greater effect on Japan than the bombs, believe it or not:
Historians rethink key Soviet role in Japan defeat
By SLOBODAN LEKIC (AP)
As the United States dropped its atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August 1945, 1.6 million Soviet troops launched a surprise attack on the Japanese army occupying eastern Asia. Within days, Emperor Hirohito’s million-man army in the region had collapsed.
…
But following the German surrender on May 8, 1945, and having suffered a string of defeats in the Philippines, Okinawa and Iwo Jima, Japan turned to Moscow to mediate an end to the Pacific war.
However, Soviet leader Joseph Stalin had already secretly promised Washington and London that he would attack Japan within three months of Germany’s defeat. He thus ignored Tokyo’s plea, and mobilized more than a million troops along Manchuria’s border.
Operation August Storm was launched Aug. 9, 1945, as the Nagasaki bomb was dropped, and would claim the lives of 84,000 Japanese and 12,000 Soviet soldiers in two weeks of fighting. The Soviets ended up just 50 kilometers (30 miles) from Japan’s main northern island, Hokkaido.
I’ve never heard of Soviet troops being so numerous or so close to Japan. 30 miles is nothing—that’s practically a walk from my apartment in Washington Heights down to Wall Street and back. The NYC subway would let me make the journey in two hours.
So, that’s how close they were to invading Japan (yes, I know the A Train doesn’t travel between Gornozavodsk and Hokkaido, but you get the point).
On top of that, there’s the part where in May, 1945, Japan tried to talk peace with Russia. They were interested in an end to the fighting two months before and if Stalin had been more interested in peace, perhaps the end of the war would look very different to us now.
Regardless, this is proof that the atom bombs were not necessary to ending the war. Plain and simple.
