The Final Storm - Jeff Shaara [238]
There was never a moment’s discussion as to whether the atomic bomb should be used or not. To avert a vast, indefinite butchery, to bring the war to an end, to give peace to the world, to lay healing hands upon its tortured peoples by a manifestation of overwhelming power … seemed a miracle of deliverance.
—WINSTON CHURCHILL
The use of this barbaric weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons.
—ADMIRAL WILLIAM LEAHY, USN
You think of the lives which would have been lost in an invasion of Japan’s home islands—a staggering number of American lives but millions more of Japanese—and you thank God for the atomic bomb.
—WILLIAM MANCHESTER (USMC)
On August 10, 1945, after absorbing the impact of the second atomic bomb, Japan’s senior officials meet to debate what course to follow. They are almost evenly divided as to whether or not Japan should continue to fight the war. Led by Prime Minister Suzuki, the moderate faction pushes for surrender, but there are just as many, particularly from the army, who insist vehemently that the war be continued. To those highest-ranking commanders, including Field Marshal Hisaichi Terauchi and General Yasuji Okamura, surrender only betrays the army, those soldiers in the field who should still be allowed to end their lives with honor by fighting to the death. It is Emperor Hirohito himself who breaks the stalemate and orders his ministers to accept the terms of the Potsdam Declaration. Throughout the war, a fairly complacent Hirohito has allowed the Imperial High Command to operate mostly on its own terms. By stepping forcefully into the debate, he gives his ministers no alternative, and the Japanese government obeys their emperor. But radical elements of the army do not accept the emperor’s order gracefully, and a coup is launched, an attempt to assassinate the emperor. The coup fails, the conspirators brought down in part by those generals who are still vehemently opposed to surrender. Even the radicals come to understand that, no matter the humiliation of surrender, the nation’s outright suicide is not the most preferable course.
On Sunday, September 2, 1945, the Japanese formally surrender to the Allied forces on board the American battleship USS Missouri, at anchor in Tokyo Bay. The ceremony is stiff and somber, with signatures affixed to the documents by representatives of the United Nations, the United States, Great Britain, China, the Soviet Union, Australia, New Zealand, France, Canada, and the Netherlands. Signing for the Japanese are Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu, General Yoshijiro Umezu, and nine other officials. In one important gesture of concession, the American government does not require the document to be signed by Emperor Hirohito.
General Douglas MacArthur commands the ceremony, and signs the document on behalf of the United Nations. Immediately after the signatures are affixed, nearly two thousand American fighter planes and bombers roar overhead in mixed formations, a show of force that cannot be lost on the Japanese.
On the Missouri, a great many of the American generals and admirals are present, including Admiral Nimitz, who signs for the Americans. But no one’s presence is more poignant than that of General Jonathan Wainwright, who surrendered the American forces at Corregidor, and British general Sir Arthur Percival, who surrendered the British bastion at Singapore. Both men arrive at the ceremony just released from prisoner-of-war camps in Manchuria. Their skeletal appearance is an appropriate symbol of the suffering imposed on so many by their captors.
To honor his efforts as the Allied commander in chief, MacArthur is invited to meet with President Truman in Washington, a gesture of gratitude from Truman, as well as an event certain to please the newspapers. MacArthur refuses the invitation, and many subsequent ones,