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surrender demand would result in Truman being ‘crucified’ by the American public, weary of war but nevertheless determined to adhere to declared principle—and to avenge itself fully on the Japanese. Leahy, Forrestal, and most emphatically Stimson disagreed, urging the acceptance of Japan’s offer as written. (Stimson later groused in his diary about ‘uninformed agitation against the Emperor in this country mostly by people who know no more about Japan than has been given them by Gilbert and Sullivan’s “Mikado” ’.) Here was a chance to end the war and thus save American lives, and to prevent the Soviets pushing deeper into Manchuria and elsewhere and thereby demanding a significant share of the occupation authority. Forrestal found a way out of the impasse: accept Japanese terms, but in the acceptance honor what he called ‘the intents and purposes of the Potsdam Declaration’. Truman approved this ploy and assigned Byrnes to put it in writing.

The result was a reply that left much to interpretation. The Byrnes Note, as it came formally to be called, initially stated: ‘From the moment of surrender the authority of the emperor and the Japanese Government to rule shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers.’ Notice here that the continued existence of the Emperor was assumed, and that ‘Commander’ was a singular noun, ‘in order’, as Stimson put it, ‘to exclude any condominium such as we have in Poland’. (Forrestal, more accurately, said ‘Germany’.) Further on, the Byrnes Note allowed as ‘the ultimate form of government of Japan shall ...be established by the freely expressed will of the Japanese people’. This was largely a restatement of a provision of the Potsdam Declaration, though that document had omitted the word ‘ultimate’, the introduction of which now might suggest a phasing in period during which the Emperor might retain his perquisites. Byrnes won approval for his language at a cabinet meeting that afternoon. As the secretary read out the proposal, according to Vice President Henry Wallace, he ‘stopped’ and ‘laid special emphasis on the top dog commander over Hirohito being an American.’ Truman noted that Britain’s foreign minister, Ernest Bevin, had already approved the draft, and that it would also be circulated to the Chinese and Russians—though the President thought it unlikely that he would hear from Moscow. He also told the group that he had ordered a halt to the atomic bombing: ‘the thought of wiping out another 100,000 was too horrible.’ He ended by saying that, when peace rumors had been floated the previous day, the White House had received 170 telegrams in response. All but seventeen ‘were for hard terms—unconditional surrender’. With a slight subsequent modification by the British, acceptance by the Chinese, and grudging acquiescence by the Soviets, who had wanted at least a say in choosing the Supreme Commander, the Byrnes Note went to Tokyo, where it was received at 2.00 a.m. on 12 August.48

Now the wounds that the Emperor’s decision had closed with gossamer thread burst open once again. Togo was shaken by the unmistakable lack of explicit concession in the Byrnes Note; several of his subordinates in the foreign ministry hastily and deliberately mistranslated the note, moderating its language and hoping—fruitlessly, as it turned out—that the Japanese military would ask no questions or try a translation of its own. Yonai remained committed to surrender, but Prime Minister Suzuki wavered until Kido summoned him that night to put some backbone into him. Anami, Umezu, and Toyoda were angry at the American response and inclined to stiffen their position: Japan must fight on. A group of junior officers went further, making hasty plans to stage a coup against their disgracefully craven government and to take control of the Imperial Palace. Apprised of the plot, Anami remained silent. Along with Togo, and for reasons of his own, only Hirohito, guided by Kido, stayed steadfastly devoted to ending the war. Byrnes’s Note was not all that might have been hoped for, but even if properly translated