They Japanese were not defeated and planning to surrender, they were seeking decisive battle thst would upset Americans enough to seek peace. People think Vietnam was bad.
Honestly it probably would have worked. If they’d killed million USA troops, we’d probably sought peace rather then continue fighting. But they got atom bombed and they failed to get continue peace with the soviets. They probably would have fought to th bitter end all the way to th streets of Tokyo, like the Nazis did.
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Japan was finished as a warmaking nation, in spite of its four million men still under arms. But...Japan was not going to quit. Despite the fact that she was militarily finished, Japan's leaders were going to fight right on. To not lose "face" was more important than hundreds and hundreds of thousands of lives. And the people concurred, in silence, without protest. To continue was no longer a question of Japanese military thinking, it was an aspect of Japanese culture and psychology.
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The intent of Ketsu-Go was to inflict tremendous casualties on the American forces, thereby undermining the American people's will to continue the fight for Japan's unconditional surrender. This intent is clear in a boastful comment made by an IGHQ army staff officer in July 1945:
We will prepare 10,000 planes to meet the landing of the enemy. We will mobilize every aircraft possible, both training and "special attack" planes. We will smash one third of the enemy's war potential with this air force at sea. Another third will also be smashed at sea by our warships, human torpedoes and other special weapons. Furthermore, when the enemy actually lands, if we are ready to sacrifice a million men we will be able to inflict an equal number of casualties upon them. If the enemy loses a million men, then the public opinion in America will become inclined towards peace, and Japan will be able to gain peace with comparatively advantageous conditions.
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Because Japanese geography did not provide many invasion beaches, the Japanese organized a strong defense, particularly at Kyushu. Over 10,000 aircraft of various types and sizes were prepared as kamikaze aircraft. Underground networks of bunkers and caves stored food, water, and thousands of tons of ammunition. 2,350,000 regular soldiers and 250,000 garrison troops were deployed, 900,000 of which were stationed in Kyushu by Aug 1945. 32,000,000 militia, in other words all males between the age of 15 and 60 and all females between 17 and 45, were given the task to supplement the regular military; their weapons include everything from antique bronze cannons to Arisaka rifles, from bamboo spears to Model 99 light machine guns. Perhaps the eeriest fact was that after the war the United States discovered even children were trained to become suicide bombers when necessarily, strapping explosives around their torsos and rolling under the treads of American tanks. "This was the enemy the Pentagon had learned to fear and hate", said Dan van der Vat, "a country of fanatics dedicated to hara-kiri, determined to slay as many invaders as possible as they went down fighting". Although there was a strong dovish movement in Tokyo to end the war by seeking a conditional surrender, Ketsu-Go (Operation "Decision") continued to move forth, aiming to cause as much casualty as possible in order to sway American popular opinion. If they could cause more casualties than what the American people could accept, they thought, Japan might have a chance at negotiating for an armistice.
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ww2dbaseNaturally, the American plan considered Japanese resistance. It noted the possibility that the invasion "will be opposed not only by the available organized military forces of the Empire, but also by a fanatically hostile population", which would result in high casualties. In a study done by the United States Joint Chiefs of Staff in Apr 1945, at least 456,000 casualties were to be expected for Operation Olympic alone. Some other evaluations were also done, and their casualty estimates ranged anywhere from 30,000 to 1,000,000. In preparation, the United States manufactured 500,000 Purple Heart medals to award to those injured in combat.
We still use those Purple Hearts today.
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The Allied operations envisioned would have ultimately involved 5,000,000 men and the largest concentrations of planes and ships yet used in a single operation. The bulk of the force would be American although the British Commonwealth would contribute three divisions of troops (one each from Britain, Canada, and Australia), the British Pacific Fleet, and a small number of air squadrons
https://fas.org/irp/eprint/arens/chap4.htmhttps://ww2db.com/battle_spec.php?battle_id=54
04 Feb 2018, 12:25 pm
