What if Japan hadn't surrendered?

[TokyoBayer]

@Qin_Shi_Huangdi

If anything, the imperial system should have been abolished or at least Emperor Hirohito should have been tried and hung for war crimes. The fact that perhaps Japan’s spirit and will was not wholly broken by an end to the supposed divine imperial system is why ultranationalism is much more common in Japan compared to the German Federal Republic.

I’ve written a rather extensive post about the difference between the two countries.

@TokyoBayer

The question is then why the Japanese didn’t develop the same sense of collective guilt which the Germans did after WWII. Many people point to this and try to make comparison, but there were large, material differences between the situations concerning the two Axis nations.

As far as the Emperor as a war criminal. Sure. In a perfect world he most certainly should have been tried and hanged for his role, but it was more important to obtain his cooperation.

Let’s imagine for a minute that it’s August 10, 1945. You are Truman, the leader of the free world and I’m General Anami, War Minister for Imperial Japan. You’ve just dropped two bombs on two of my cities.

If you are going to insist that Hirohito be tried as a war criminal, then you have to force a truly unconditional surrender.

Without assurances that the Emperor is going to be OK, Hirohito will not break the deadlock in the Supreme Council for the Direction of the War. Martial law is imposed, and in a time honored tradition, I (Gen. Anami) become the military dictator of Japan while keeping the emperor in a gilded cage.

I release an Imperial Rescript in the emperor’s name, commanding all of the military and civilians* fight to the death rather than surrender.

It’s going to be one bloody fight. The IJA had changed tactics toward the end of the war, leading to horrific numbers of casualties among US forces in Iwo Jima and Okinawa.

I’ve seen an estimate of the number of Japanese civilian deaths by starvation at 7 million if they didn’t surrender until spring, '46. How many more if the military kept retreating further and further into the mountains?

There were 5,400,000 Japanese soldiers and 1,800,000 Japanese sailors in uniform. Japan still occupied large chunks of China as well and Indochina, Malaysia, Singapore Hong Kong, DEI, etc., as well as Korea and Formosa.

Civilians in Japanese occupied lands were dying by the millions. Gray Ghost linked to the massacre in Manila, and it can only be assumed that the Japanese would react similarly in all of the occupied territories.

Famine and disease were killing between 500,000 to a million civilians per month in occupied countries.

The cost in civilian deaths could have been over 10 to 20 million had the Japanese not surrendered and choose to fight it out.

So, your call. As Truman, do you let one guy get off easier to save this slaughter, as well as reducing military casualties or do you make a stand on principle and revenge?
*Civilian attacks on Allied troops would not be expected to be effective. However it would mean that the Allies would not make many efforts to spare the civilians.