# Why not just blockade Japan into surrender, WWII? Resolved...it was a bad idea. **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 22, 2018, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055 "2018-08-22T16:04:46Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2018, 7:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/41 "2018-08-28T19:01:21Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Sounds like plenty to back up an invading force using only fishing boats and aircraft for transport. That’s what Mao thought about Taiwan. Didn’t work out so well. > **[Battle of Guningtou](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Guningtou)** > > The Battle of Kuningtou or Battle of Guningtou (Chinese: 古寧頭之役; pinyin: Gǔníngtóu zhī yì; Wade–Giles: Ku3-ning2-t’ou2 chih1 i4), also known as the Battle of Kinmen (金門戰役; Jīnmén Zhànyì), was fought over Kinmen in the Taiwan Strait during the Chinese Civil War in 1949. The failure of the Communists to take the island left it in the hands of the Kuomintang (Nationalists) and crushed their chances of taking Taiwan to destroy the Nationalists completely in the war. > Following the establishment of ... ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Miskatonic](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mr.miskatonic/32/310_2.png) [@Mr.Miskatonic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Miskatonic)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2018, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/42 "2018-08-28T19:04:29Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Hadn’t the Czar as well as Communist Russia lost wars to the Japanese? I recall Nicholas II calling the Japanese “Little yellow monkeys”. Czar yes. Communists, no. The Soviets won some Mongolian border skirmishes against Japan in the 30’s. Nothing like the motive for revenge against Germany for their execution of Generalplan Ost. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2018, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/43 "2018-08-28T19:07:34Z")
> [@Urbanredneck](#): > > Sounds like plenty to back up an invading force using only fishing boats and aircraft for transport. If you think this then you must feel that the US was in overkill mode. Do you want to hazard a guess what our invasion force looked like? And we were predicting over a million casualties…and this with a battle hardened force experienced in years of amphibious operations, which the Soviets didn’t have. There is approximately zero chance the Soviets would have invaded the home islands without the other allies, primarily the US going in. They would have rightfully felt we were wanting them to soak up even more casualties and expense to weaken them further. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2018, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/44 "2018-08-29T04:10:42Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > And of course there was Vidkun Quisling. Quisling contributed next to nothing to the invasion. He arrived with the Germans and tried to issue orders but no Norwegians listened to him. When the Germans realized how little influence he had, they basically dropped whatever support they had been giving him. Quisling had to travel back to Berlin and ask for another chance. The Germans decided to give him one and installed him in power. But the reason they were able to do this was because they had already taken over Norway without any help from Quisling. > [@DrDeth](#): > > However the Imperial Japanese forces were well prepared and experienced at defending against naval invasions. How many troops and equipment do you think were deployed in Hokkaido in 1945? ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2018, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/45 "2018-08-29T04:17:09Z")
If you have a serious interest in this question, I recommend Gar Alperovitz’s book _The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb._ He makes a meticulous, well-documented case that Japan would have surrendered, and fairly soon, without use of the bomb. Clarification of surrender terms to include retention of the Emperor, and/or the shock of Russian entry into the war, would almost certainly have been sufficient. No Allied military leader, with the possible exception of Marshall, thought use of the bomb was a military necessity. Perhaps most eye-opening to me was Alperovitz’s research on how those who had made the decision—notably Secretary of State James Byrnes—almost immediately began covering their tracks as the Cold War opened up, going so far as revising their diary entries and hiding official memoranda. If you really want to get deep into this debate, and other historians’ responses to Alperovitz, scholarly musings from the early days of the Internet [are collected here.](http://www.doug-long.com/debate.htm) ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2018, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/46 "2018-08-29T04:58:24Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > How many troops and equipment do you think were deployed in Hokkaido in 1945? About 7 divisions, why? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2018, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/47 "2018-08-29T05:02:40Z")
And there’s also this (wiki):_According to Thomas B. Allen and Norman Polmar, the Soviets had carefully drawn up detailed plans for the Far East invasions, except that the landing for Hokkaido “existed in detail” only in Stalin’s mind and that it was “unlikely that Stalin had interests in taking Manchuria and even taking on Hokkaido. Even if he wanted to grab as much territory in Asia as possible, he was too much focused on establishing a beachhead in Europe more so than Asia.” In other words, Stalin was more interested in creating military and political dominance in Central and Western Europe. [92]_ So Stalin had no real plans to invade Hokkaido. T ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2018, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/48 "2018-08-29T22:39:06Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > About 7 divisions, why? The portion of the Japanese Fifth Area Army on Hokkaido consisted as of August 15, 1945 of two infantry divisions (42nd and 7th) and an independent mixed\* brigade (101st), 115,000 men altogether. The portion of the 5th AA in the Kurils and South Sakhalin had around the same total manpower though more front line combat units (3 infantry divisions, 2 mixed brigades and a tank regiment), and was overrun by the Soviets in amphibious operations at similar or even greater distances from territory the Soviets already held than would have been necessary in crossing over to Hokkaido once the Soviets had the Kurils and South Sakhalin. On Soviet plans, Allen’s book is probably too early (1995) to have gained access to the relevant documents. Glantz in “The Soviet Strategic Offensive in Manchuria, 1945: ‘August Storm’” reproduces summary memo’s of the army, naval and tactical air forces (VVS) plans from Zolotarev’s “The Great Patriotic: The Soviet-Japanese War of 1945” written in 2000. To further summarize, the initial attack would have consisted of two divisions of the 87th Rifle Corps transported one at a time from Zolotoi Rog near Vladivostok to the port of Rumoi in Hokkaido under land based air cover of the Soviet Pacific Fleet Air Arm and 9th Air Army VVS. The third division of the corps would have crossed from the Kurils. The 5th AA had no major units at Rumoi, and some of the Kurils then (and now) under Russian control are close enough to support amphibious landings on Hokkaido with field artillery, let alone a/c. The Japanese air contingent on Hokkaido was even more minimal than the ground contingent. Preventing a Soviet foothold on Hokkaido would have required a major, rapid shift of air (special attack) units from Kyushu and Honshu and success of those units in defeating the Soviets at sea. It was too late for a major shift of ground forces, especially after US carrier raids sank most of the Honshu-Hokkaido ferries in July. Also B-29 mining by July/August had extended even to fairly northerly Honshu ports on the Sea of Japan though not as far north as Aomori. Getting aviation fuel to Hokkaido would also have been a problem. It would also have depended to what degree the Japanese believed a US invasion in more important places in Japan wasn’t going to immediately follow a Soviet one whether they’d even have tried a major shift in their defense. Stalin aborted the plan to invade Hokkaido in the real historical political situation where the Soviets fell behind schedule in the Kurils and Sakhalin and did not finish those operations until some days after Japan had nominally accepted an armistice on Aug 15. If the US-Japanese war had not been over, it would have been a different situation, in which the Soviets in fact had both the capabilities and a plan to gain a foothold on Hokkaido. \*originally infantry/horse cavalry formations that were usually just infantry by then. ---
**Author:** ![Sloe\_Moe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8797f3/32.png) [@Sloe\_Moe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sloe_Moe)\ **Post date:** [August 30, 2018, 7:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/49 "2018-08-30T07:58:06Z")
“(the war) be brought to a SWIFT and DECISIVE conclusion.” ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2018, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/50 "2018-09-01T19:07:21Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#): > > If you have a serious interest in this question, I recommend Gar Alperovitz’s book _The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb._ He makes a meticulous, well-documented case that Japan would have surrendered, and fairly soon, without use of the bomb. Clarification of surrender terms to include retention of the Emperor, and/or the shock of Russian entry into the war, would almost certainly have been sufficient. No Allied military leader, with the possible exception of Marshall, thought use of the bomb was a military necessity. > > Perhaps most eye-opening to me was Alperovitz’s research on how those who had made the decision—notably Secretary of State James Byrnes—almost immediately began covering their tracks as the Cold War opened up, going so far as revising their diary entries and hiding official memoranda. > > If you really want to get deep into this debate, and other historians’ responses to Alperovitz, scholarly musings from the early days of the Internet [are collected here.](http://www.doug-long.com/debate.htm) I’ve not read the book and am not prepared to argue with his conclusion. But, was Truman (or Byrnes) in any position to draw this conclusion? Or was it just a conclusion based on careful research into Japanese documents? They had a war to win, not a thesis to defend. Ever hear the phrase, “The fog of war”? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2018, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/51 "2018-09-01T19:25:08Z")
With the benefit of hindsight, had Russian taken part in the defeat of Japan, it would have wound up keeping part of it, as it did in Eastern Europe and Korea after the war. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2018, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/52 "2018-09-01T21:30:44Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > About 7 divisions, why? You’re misinformed. The Japanese officially had two infantry divisions stationed in Hokkaido; the 7th and the 77th. But they were divisions in name only. Both had been stripped of troops and equipment which had been sent to reinforce units in Kyushu and Honshu. ---
**Author:** ![spifflog](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@spifflog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spifflog)\ **Post date:** [September 1, 2018, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/53 "2018-09-01T23:01:15Z")
> [@Mr\_Downtown](#): > > If you have a serious interest in this question, I recommend Gar Alperovitz’s book _The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb._ He makes a meticulous, well-documented case that Japan would have surrendered, and fairly soon, without use of the bomb. Clarification of surrender terms to include retention of the Emperor, and/or the shock of Russian entry into the war, would almost certainly have been sufficient. No Allied military leader, with the possible exception of Marshall, thought use of the bomb was a military necessity. > > Perhaps most eye-opening to me was Alperovitz’s research on how those who had made the decision—notably Secretary of State James Byrnes—almost immediately began covering their tracks as the Cold War opened up, going so far as revising their diary entries and hiding official memoranda. > > If you really want to get deep into this debate, and other historians’ responses to Alperovitz, scholarly musings from the early days of the Internet [are collected here.](http://www.doug-long.com/debate.htm) I’d like to be on record that I disagree with your assessment of Alperovitz’s work. I found it to be amazingly one-sided and lacking in research. Of the books that I’ve read on this subject, his was the least compelling. ---
**Author:** ![Sloe\_Moe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/8797f3/32.png) [@Sloe\_Moe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sloe_Moe)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2018, 1:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/54 "2018-09-02T01:42:40Z")
> [@spifflog](#): > > As **septimus** alludes to above, I think the biggest positive unintended consequence of the dropping of the atomic bomb in WWII and then subsequently not using in in Korea or in Vietnam, is that it became not just another bigger bomb. It became something not to be use again. And if it hadn’t been used in WWII, it might have been used in Korea, and then who know how it’s viewed. Not really a decision based soley on that. The Rosenberg betreyal emboldened the communists to engage the US in various proxy wars. Who would even stand up to a country that holds a monopoly over nuclear weapins, and has demonstrated the political will to use them? ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2018, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/55 "2018-09-02T01:52:11Z")
> [@Sloe\_Moe](#): > > Not really a decision based soley on that. The Rosenberg betreyal emboldened the communists to engage the US in various proxy wars. Who would even stand up to a country that holds a monopoly over nuclear weapins, and has demonstrated the political will to use them? Indeed. [Operation Dropshot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Dropshot) was a plan to defeat the Soviet Union using the atomic bombs the USA had available. ---
**Author:** ![Mr\_Downtown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Mr\_Downtown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr_Downtown)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2018, 4:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/56 "2018-09-02T04:53:47Z")
> [@Hari\_Seldon](#): > > was Truman (or Byrnes) in any position to draw this conclusion? Alperovitz says they had the needed information; he’s not Monday-morning quarterbacking. That’s the meticulous part of the case he makes. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2018, 5:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055/57 "2018-09-02T05:14:40Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > With the benefit of hindsight, had Russian taken part in the defeat of Japan, it would have wound up keeping part of it, as it did in Eastern Europe and Korea after the war. They did, and they did. But not much for either. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-just-blockade-japan-into-surrender-wwii-resolved-it-was-a-bad-idea/820055.md?page=2)