There is so much nonsense at the ABC these days, it is very hard to watch or to listen. There is often a clear bias towards United States propaganda. One such example, this time directed at the veteran ABC Announcer, Geraldine Doogue, about her ignorance of world affairs and specifically as to why the United States dropped to the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And why did Japan surrender? – Ian Curr, 10 Dec 2023.
Tokyo War Crimes Trials, December 9
To: Geraldine Doogue Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC)
Your not knowing of the Soviet’s entry into the Pacific War on 1 August is why you don’t understand why the US Imperialists dropped the bombs or why the Japanese surrendered. The former had the twin purposes of showing the Soviets how much damage they could do with their new weapon. The Japanese decided that it was better to surrender to the imperialist power that had been attacking them since 1853 than to the Communists. They could then keep an emperor.
The excuse that a land invasion of the home island would be disastrous for the U.S. in terms of numbers killed was dreamed up in 1947.
In terms of the sweep of events, Tojo was right. He might also have pointed out that nothing his forces did was worse than what those under Macarthur’s father had inflicted on the Filipinos – or on Amerindians for hundreds of years.
Once the Meiji realised that in order not to be carved up like the Chinese Melon, they expanded north across the rest of Honshu and into Hokkaido; south to take over the Kingdom of the Ryukyus, and then, after a war with the Chinese, to hold Formosa for fifty years. In 1904-5m, they had naval victory over the Russians and a push towards Siberia. Next to fall was the Korean Peninsula till 1945.
The IJA joined the forces of intervention against the Bolsheviks and were not driven out until 1923. They made two attempts around the 1940s to push out of Manchukuo, but the Reds beat them back each time. The Army was aching to redeem its honour. Yamamoto convinced them that they would have trouble beating the Chinese after the US had cut off supplies of oil from Sumatra in 1937.
Hence, the thrust southwards from late 1941.
Earlier that year, the Soviet spy Richard Sorge had passed the Japanese strategic plans to Moscow. The IJA would not drive west. That allowed Stalin to shift Timoshenko’s tartars to wage war in winter, one of the reasons why Barbarossa stalled.
Apologies for taxing your Big Thinking head with context.
Daniel Rolands
Melbourne
9 December 2023