Hell to Pay: Operation Downfall and the Invasion of Japan, 1945-1947

by D.M. Giangreco

Hell To Operation Downfall and the Invasion of Japan, 1945-1947 is the most comprehensive examination of the myriad complex issues that comprised the strategic plans for the American invasion of Japan. U.S. planning for the invasion and military occupation of Imperial Japan was begun in 1943, two years before the dropping of atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In final form, Operation Downfall called for a massive Allied invasion--on a scale dwarfing "D-Day"-- to be carried out in two stages. In the first stage, Operation Olympic, after the dropping of multiple atom bombs the U.S. Sixth Army would lead the southern-most assault on the Home Island of Kyushu to secure airfields and anchorages to support the second stage, Operation Coronet, a decisive invasion of the industrial heartland of Japan through the Tokyo Plain, 500 miles to the north, led by the First and Eighth armies. These facts are well known and have been recounted-- with varying degrees of accuracy-- in a variety of books and articles. A common theme in these works is their reliance on a relatively few declassified high-level planning documents. An attempt to fully understand how both the U.S. and Japan planned to conduct the massive battles subsequent to the initial landings was not dealt with in these books beyond the skeletal U.S. outlines formulated nine months before the initial land battles were to commence, and more than a year before the anticipated climactic series of battles near Tokyo. On the Japanese side, plans for Operation Ketsu-go, the "decisive battle" in the Home Islands, have been unexamined below the strategic level and seldom consisted of more than a rehash of U.S. intelligence estimates of Kamikaze aircraft available for the defense of Kyushu. Hell To Pay examines the invasion of Japan in light of substantial new sources, unearthed in both familiar and obscure archives, and brings the political and military ramifications of the enormous casualties and loss of material projected by trying to bring the Pacific War to a conclusion by a military invasion of the island. This ground breaking history counters the revisionist interpretations questioning the rationale for the use of the atom bomb and shows that the U.S. decision was based on very real estimates of the truly horrific cost of a conventional invasion of Japan.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World War II, Military History, Military Fiction, War, Japan

416 pages, Hardcover

First published April 7, 2009

About the author

D. M. Giangreco served at the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, for more than 20 years as an editor at Military Review, followed by work in the Foreign Military Studies Office. An award-winning author of thirteen books on military and sociopolitical subjects, he has also written extensively for numerous national and international publications and news agencies.

Reviews

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book puts to the rest the revisionist theory that dropping the 2 atomic bombs on Japan were unnecessary. The author utilizes previously classified documents to show that this was the right decision. The invasion of Kyushu alone would have cost 1 million casualties(Japanese and US).
The myth that they were ready for peace is dispelled by the Japanese cabinet vote to continue the fight "until death" after the 2nd atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki. It was only because the Emperor overrode the cabinet, that Japan surrendered.
If the US didn't drop those bombs, the USSR would have occupied the northern third of Japan and there would have been a very harsh occupation.
A personal note: Thirty years ago, I read that Republicans wanted to put ex President Reagan on the $20 bill, even though he was still alive. I wrote a letter to my local newspaper, suggesting that President Truman be put on the $20 bill, pointing out that he desegregated the US military, started NATO, the Marshall Plan, and so much more. The day after the Buffalo News published my letter, I received a phone call from a WWII vet. He said that Truman saved his life by dropping the A bombs on Japan. He was scheduled to be transferred along with his unit from Germany to the Pacific to be a part of the invasion of Japan.

[Steven Hull · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is an on-going, seven decade old debate about whether the Japanese Empire would have surrendered absent the dropping of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs. The simple answer is “yes”. Japan was the lone surviving member of the Axis Alliance. Surrounded by the combined forces of history’s greatest military alliance, Japan’s fate was sealed. But, capitulation at what cost, and how long would it take? Answers to these questions are the heart of this on-gong debate, with those opposed to the dropping of the bombs believing an encircled and starving Japan was about to collapse, and those grateful for the fruits of the Manhattan Project claiming the sudden and violent end to the war was a lifesaving blessing. In Hell to Pay, D.M. Giangreco weighs in on the debate employing information from new Japanese and American sources. He relies heavily on data and concludes that on balance Truman’s use of the atomic bombs was the best alternative for ending the war.
Giangreco avoids using a litany of post-war biases to strong-arm readers into backing his conclusions. Instead, he combines data with an understanding of the perspectives of the wartime American and Japanese military and political leaders and reconstructs their views of the war, prospects for success, the price already paid in blood and treasure, and their respective cultural viewpoints towards continuing what had become vicious, and at times pointless combat. The debate has neglected this 1945 context. Later scholars and pundits, understandably, would enter the debate with different contexts and biases. They would persuasively support their views, both for and against the use of the bombs, which served to further illuminate American and Japanese actions and reinforced the war’s wasteful misery. Nevertheless, the author believes the core of the debate ought to remain centered on the mid-1945 conditions in Japan and United States. Using this approach, Giangreco takes the reader back to 1945, as an observer of the unfolding events in what unknowingly were to be the waning days of the war.
By early 1945 war weariness gripped the United States. The manpower pool for armed forces was nearly exhausted. Since the June 1944 Normandy invasion the nation has been suffering an average of 65,000 casualties a month, by far the most costly of the war. The successful Pacific Ocean island-hopping campaign had been unrelenting. Americans’ growing familiarity with the heretofore obscure geography of the vast Pacific Ocean was centered on a successive list of remote islands, each associated with brutal combat and increasingly larger casualty lists—Tarawa, Tinian, Saipan, Leyte, Luzon, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. More importantly, the Japanese (mostly killed because they fought to the death) to American casualty ratio, 5:1 in the Philippines, had shrunk to 1.25:1 on Okinawa. In the air war, by July 1945 the Army Air Force’s strategic bombing campaign had run out of civilian targets, despite ravaging almost every Japanese city with a population of 40,000 or more, killing 178,000 Japanese and leaving another 8,000,000 homeless. Japan, nevertheless, remained a ferocious foe in spite of these losses and the destruction of the Imperial Japanese Navy. Through June, Kamikazes off Okinawa fought their way into 400 American ships, sinking 32, damaging 40 beyond repair, and killing and wounding over 10,000 American sailors, by far the greatest casualties and damage ever inflicted upon the U.S. Navy.
One of Giangreco’s contributions to the on-going debate is his clarification of projected American and Japanese casualties resulting from an American invasion of Japan’s home islands. He notes that post-war critics of the bombs point out that the 1945 estimate of American casualties was quite low, but he also shows that their numbers were only for the first 60 days of combat for the first of two massive amphibious landings. Estimates for the entire campaign were much higher. General George C. Marshall said there would be at least 500,000 American casualties. The New York Times printed this figure in the summer of 1945 and it was the number briefed to members of the armed forces. Hidden from public view were well-informed and larger estimates. Former President Herbert Hoover, working with a group of Army colonels, told President Truman that his research showed there would be 500,000-1,000,000 casualties. Dr. William Shockley, later famous for the invention of the transistor, estimated 1.7-4,000,000 American casualties and 5-10 million Japanese casualties.
Operation Downfall, the code name for the invasion and defeat of Japan, was a two-stage behemoth dwarfing Normandy’s D-Day in scope, size, logistical complexity, and tactical difficulty. The first stage, Operation Olympic, scheduled for November 1945, was the invasion of the southern Japanese island of Kyushu. Using Kyushu as a major forward base, stage two of Downfall, Operation Cornet (spring of 1946), was to be the invasion of Honshu and the eventual capture of Tokyo. Together, both operations would involve 5,000,000 men, over 4,000 ships, 20,000 aircraft and 42 divisions. The terrain at both invasion sites was rugged, easy to defend and a nightmare to attack.
In the meantime, the Japanese boldly prepared their defenses. While the Americans were fully engaged on Okinawa, the Japanese redeployed 24 army divisions from China and Korea back to the home islands. Twelve tankers full of aviation gasoline eluded American submarines and aircraft and brought home over a million gallons of high quality fuel. While American intelligence estimated the Japanese had 5,000 aircraft remaining for Kamikaze attacks, there were actually almost 13,000, with 18,000 moderately well trained pilots to fly them. Many of the aircraft were constructed of wood and fabric, making them invisible to American early warning radars. This construction also reduced the effectiveness of the American’s variable time (VT) fused anti-aircraft shells, the foundation of effective long-range air defense. Kamikaze submarines and over 2,400 explosively laden small craft rounded out a Japanese arsenal focused on destroying American troop transports. Finally, the Japanese civilian population was drafted en mass to strengthen the country’s defenses. All males between the ages of 15 and 60 and females between 17 and 40 were conscripted into the home defense forces.
With the allies insisting on unconditional surrender and the Japanese unwilling to accept this humiliating demand, the Empire of Japan prepared for the inevitable invasion. For the United States, since the invasion of Tarawa in November 1943, all indications were the fight to subdue Japan would be a fight to the death. Despite overwhelming American superiority in firepower and resources, the April-June 1945 Okinawa campaign had been unprecedentedly costly. Once the Americans met the Japanese main line of resistance, every inch of ground was contested. The battle’s casualties set a new record for the Pacific War—100-150,000 civilians, 110,000 Japanese soldiers and 82,000 members of the American armed forces. Operation Downfall appeared destined to repeat this slaughter on a much larger scale. As the Empire abruptly receded and resources dwindled, the tenacity and savagery of the Japanese remained undiminished.
It is true that the percentage of Japanese soldiers surrendering on Okinawa surpassed those of previous battles, but they remained an insignificant minority. Japanese military culture required absolute allegiance to the Emperor and transformed dying for the Chrysanthemum Throne into a spiritual honor of the highest order. Beyond this intangible force, the Japanese now had unique advantages. They were defending the core of their homeland. Despite being surrounded, they possessed interior lines of communication and supply, while their foes were fighting thousands of miles from home. Japanese defensive strategy and tactics had radically evolved during the Pacific War. Initially, the Japanese had contested the invaders on the beaches (Tarawa) and fought to the death. At Iwo Jima, the Japanese allowed the Americans to land uncontested, later seeking to destroy them in artillery, mortar, and machine gun kill zones on the crowded landing beaches. They also went underground, fighting from positions carved into every defensible terrain feature. The Marines at Iwo complained they rarely saw the enemy that was killing them. At Okinawa, the Japanese further refined the strategy and tactics used on Iwo Jima. They allowed the Americans to land and only contested the most defensible, and for the Americans the most costly geography.
How did the Japanese apply the experience of successive defeats to the defense of the home islands? After the war the Americans learned that Japanese predictions of the likely invasion sites, time frames, and the size of the invasion forces were uncannily accurate. The Japanese planned to aggressively contest the landings using air and seaborne Kamikazes against the troop transports. Furthermore, they intended to defend every inch of ground by exploiting the defensive-friendly geography. On Kyushu (Olympic) and Honshu (Coronet), that geography began on the landing beaches. Once inland off the beaches the terrain remained unfriendly to the invader, the antithesis of France’s rolling hills and good roads that General George Patton’s 3rd Army found so accommodating once the breakout from Normandy occurred. In contrast, Downfall’s inland invasion routes featured, hills, mountains, terraced rice paddies, soggy plains unfriendly to vehicles of any sort, and pre-set kill zones whose lethality rivaled any the Americans had previously encountered.
The frame of mind of a war-weary America in mid-summer 1945 must also be considered. 80% of the country’s World War II casualties occurred during the last fourteen months of the war following the invasion of Normandy. The manpower pool was depleted. Domestic pressure forced the release of some European theater veterans to civilian life at the same time the Army, Marine Corps and Navy were concerned they would not be able to muster enough replacements to maintain momentum once Olympic and Cornet were executed. The inhumane destructiveness of the Pacific War and what likely lay ahead in the Downfall’s fighting was demoralizing. But for a select few Americans, a rapid end to the war, with minimal casualties, was a pipe dream of the crazed until the morning of August 6, 1945. The end of the Pacific War was not in sight. G.I. humor targeted end dates based on wishful thinking with sayings like “the Golden Gate in ‘48” and “the Bread Line in ‘49”, but the only certainty was the light of peace remained at the end of a very long and unpredictable tunnel. The Enola Gay’s incineration of Hiroshima on August 6th and Bockscar’s leveling of Nagasaki three days later instantaneously turned the world upside down. Later generations have no idea what it felt like to be locked in a marathon death dance with Japan one day, and then the next suddenly accepting the surrender of an enemy still capable of inflicting and enduring unspeakable casualties. Today we tend to assume the surrender of Japan on August 15, 1945 was unremarkable and expected, when in fact it was an extraordinary miracle.
Following the war, distaste for the use of the atomic bombs grew over time, but not among those who were doing the fighting. Wounded combat infantryman and later prolific anti-war intellectual and historian Paul Fussell wrote, “…the degree to which Americans register shock and extraordinary shame about the Hiroshima bomb correlates closely with the lack of information about the war.” Famous novelist and Pacific War veteran James Michener wrote how he and his comrades felt after the bombs were dropped and Japan surrendered:
How did we react? With a gigantic sigh of relief, not exultation because of our victory, but a deep gut-wrenching sigh of deliverance. We had stared into the mouth of Armageddon and suddenly the confrontation was no longer necessary.
From my experience on Saipan and Okinawa, when I saw how violently the Japanese soldiers defended their caves to the death, I am satisfied that they would have done the same on Kyushu.

Americans knew that an invasion of the Japanese home islands and the destruction of that country’s war-making capacity were necessary to fulfill Allied war aims. The evidence Giangreco presents shows that the Japanese intended to inflict unprecedented casualties among the invaders and had the ability to do so. Post-war debate over the dropping of the bombs rarely accounts for the mindset of the Japanese and the Americans during the mid-summer days of 1945, particularly those Americans who were doing the fighting and those who were ordering them into battle. These individuals were grateful for the end result of the bombings—Japan’s surrender—but did not rejoice over the deaths and destruction. Their focus was on themselves and their friends, for they were now going to live. “All I know is that we said prayers of deliverance and kept our mouths shut when arguments began as to whether the bombs needed to be dropped or not. And I have maintained that silence to this moment (1995)…”, said Michener. While much of the on-going debate has been academic for non-participants, for those whose lives were on the line, the bombs were salvation.
On a personal note, my father fought in the Central Pacific from March 1944 to March 1945 as a member of Navy Patrol Bombing Squadron 150 (VPB-150), which first flew out of Tarawa and later Tinian. After 55 combat missions and a few close calls the squadron returned home to Alameda, California in April 1945 and was disbanded. Following a month’s leave, my father reported to a new training squadron preparing crews for the invasion of Japan. They were being equipped with the new Lockheed PV-2 Harpoon, a redesigned version of VPB-150’s PV-1 Ventura. The Harpoon was slower, more stable, easier to fly at low altitudes and slower speeds, and specifically armed for low altitude ground attack.
By this time my father had come to hate flying. Perhaps it was the several close calls he had experienced, including a belly landing, a close encounter with a mountain one night, and the memory of he, the pilot, and the co-pilot pulling back on the plane’s yokes with all their might during a dive bombing attack to keep the plane from hitting the ground at 250 miles per hour—and succeeding with but 200 feet to spare. The moment the Japanese surrendered he decided to turn in his wings and end his flying days. He was diverted from this mission when most of the squadron’s personnel were grounded as unneeded excess. He was soon ordered to Camp Shoemaker, California to begin discharge processing.
My father was a gentle, thoughtful individual. Though he fought against the Japanese Empire, he never spoke disparagingly about Japan or the Japanese. He never used the term “Jap”. In fact, he rarely spoke of the war, and not because he had horrible experiences, but because it was a difficult, sometimes dangerous, and often fearful time when he didn’t think too much about the future because he might not have one. He did hate one thing, however—war. He had volunteered to serve his country less than 60 days after Pearl Harbor, but he avoided Korea. He took an early mid-1960s stand against the Vietnam War. In his final years he never wavered in his opposition to President George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq and the costly aftermath.
When the topic of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs was broached he spoke plainly—he supported President Truman’s decision. For him the atomic bombs had suddenly and unexpectedly terminated the Pacific War, his impending second combat tour, and his participation in Olympic and Coronet. He never presumptively imposed this viewpoint on anyone, but unhesitatingly put if forth when the impact of the bombs on ending the war was minimized or dismissed. I know he would have smiled and understandingly nodded in agreement at James Michener’s 1995 comment:
… I stood there on the lip of the pulsating volcano, and I know that I was terrified at what might happen and damned relieved when the invasion became unnecessary. I accept the military estimates that at least 1 million lives were saved, and mine could have been one of them.
Perhaps, as Giangreco notes, it is time for the post-World War II debaters of Truman’s decision to give full weight to the views of those who had tickets to the Pacific War’s final act to be played out on the beaches of Kyushu and the Tokyo Plain. This acknowledgement would not undermine the horror of nuclear war. Instead it would reinforce the notion that all war is brutal and the way death is dealt or experienced matters little to those doing the killing and dying.

[Ken · Rating 4 out of 5]

Puts the lie to recent revisionist histories of the decision to drop the atomic bomb with well-researched facts taken from both American and Japanese sources. Every decision involving war involves re-distributing death. No matter what is done or not done, people will die as a result. The only questions are who, how, and how many. Giangreco's analysis, well supported by primary sources, demonstrates that Truman's decision to drop the atomic bomb saved the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans and millions of Japanese. The invasion of the home islands would have been a bloodbath of proportions that can only barely be comprehended and would have made Okinawa and Iwo Jima look like sideshows. No book that says otherwise while ignoring the evidence presented here can be taken seriously as a scholarly work.

[Cav · Rating 2 out of 5]

I put this one down ~half way through. Something I rarely do.
I am very interested in almost all things WW2. In this case, I was looking forward to hearing the different perspectives on the later stages of war between Japan and the US.
This book, however, left much to be desired for me. It reads like an instruction manual or academic textbook. It is extremely dry and arduous. I don't do well with books written in this fashion.
The intro and first portion of the book were very well-written. It is actually a summary of the thesis of the entire book.
The thesis of the book, one which I whole-heartedly agree with, is that dropping the two atomic bombs on Japan in 1945 was the best course of action; not only for ensuring a speedy US victory, but also in preventing many hundreds of thousands, if not millions of Japanese lives lost. The author lays out a very convincing case for these assertions.
I soon realized that each subsequent chapter was the author expanding these points; long-form, and heavily supported by large data-sets.

If you are a meticulous data-collector, who appreciates notations on every person who was recruited, moved, fought, and possibly died - then this is the book for you. The book is a virtual barrage of numerical factoids.
If you are interested in a good story of the opposing sides near the end of the war, then give this one a pass.
I'm sure that there are many people who will appreciate the author's extreme attention to specific numbers, which are all annotated, but I am not one of those, unfortunately...
There is a great story to be told here, but you won't find it in the pages of this one.
2 stars.

[Urey Patrick]

This is a data rich account of the plans, resources, strategies and preparations on both Japanese and US sides for the inevitable, unavoidable invasions of Japan - Kyushu followed by the final invasion of the Tokyo plains on Honshu. Truman's decision to nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the war - unexpectedly. There is a lot of revisionist history critical of Truman's decision, and arguing that it was not necessary - revisionist and wrong. Monthly casualties in Japanese held territories alone were over 400,000 per month. The US expected to war to last throughout 1946, perhaps into 1947. The US suffered almost 1.4 million casualties in WWII - over one million of them between June 1944 and August 1945. Yet a partial demobilization was politically forced upon the US following the German surrender that reduced US troop strengths by nearly 50% even as troop requirements were increasing in the Pacific.

Based on intelligence estimates of Japanese resources and preparations on Kyushu it was estimated that US casualties would be on the order of 500,000 in the first 90 days... but that intelligence was wrong. Japan had two to three times the numbers of troops, suicide planes and boats, ammunition, fuel and defensive fortification - they intended to replay Okinawa on a grand scale, including millions of civilian suicide attackers. The Japanese had learned a great deal about American war doctrine and practice - and they prepared accordingly. The Honshu invasion was even bigger, more fully resourced - more desperately defended. Read this book and "Downfall" by Richard Franks - Truman's decision brought the war to an early, unexpected conclusion and saved millions of lives in the process. These two books make that simple fact unmistakably clear.

[Rod · Rating 5 out of 5]

Remember the brouhaha associated the Smithsonian's 50th anniversary exhibit on the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings? The exhibits implied that the bombings were unnecessary and amounted to war crimes. Veterans that suggested that the invasion of Japan would have lead to far more deaths (on both sides) were discounted by the professional historians.

Read this book for a thorough assessment of the planned invasions. In short, not only would the casualties on both sides sides been horrific and unprecedented, the success of the invasion was by no means a certainly.

Ironically, the nuclear weapons used in WWII may have saved many times more lives than they took.

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Exhaustively researched and detailed reconstruction of the US plans to invade Japan in late 1945 if the war had not ended after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The book is written by an unabashed proponent of the American choice to drop the atomic bomb on Japan, but it does lay out a highly convincing case that fewer lives were ultimately lost through the use of nuclear weapons to end the war. Fascinating but not stronger on documentation than narrative.

[Alan Carlson · Rating 4 out of 5]

TL;DR: The Enola Gay revisionists were wrong: invasions of Kyushu and Honshu would have been bloodbaths on both sides, yet necessary.

Well-documented and well-argued book on the necessity of invading Japan and the subsequent cost of ending WW2 if the atomic bombs were not used. Some of the writing is redundant from chapter to chapter, and some of the discussion is literally in the weeds, but overall a useful counter to arguments made against use of the atomic weapons.

[Peter Goodman · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Hell to Pay: Operation Downfall and the invasion of Japan, 1945-1947,” by D. M. Giangreco (Naval Institute Press, 2009). Well. Now I have everything I need if ever I get into a debate about whether we should have dropped the Bomb. The unequivocal answer: Yes! Chapter by chapter, page by page, footnote by footnote, Gianfranco examines every issue involved in the discussion. How about a blockade? Among other things, Japan had much more food available, and would have been able to grow a great deal. How long would it have taken? Would even that have induced an actual surrender? What about the straight-up invasion? Wasn’t Japan completely exhausted, its armies fatally weakened, its resources used up? No. In fact, morale among the troops was high. Even worse, the Japanese had figured out when Olympic, the invasion of Kyushu, would begin, and what beaches would be attacked. Starting in spring, 1945, they had begun moving masses of troops, including several of the veteran divisions of the Kwantung Army, into very carefully prepared positions on, around and behind the beaches and throughout southern Kyushu. They planned to resume the ferocious defense of the beaches that had been abandoned at Iwo Jima and Okinawa. And then they were completely prepared for a deadly defense once the American troops got inland, such as they demonstrated on the bloody hills of Okinawa. How about the American troops? Many divisions from Europe were already en route to the Pacific, though none of them had actually left the United States. At the same time, there was a partial demobilization going on. GIs with a certain number of points could go home; those points were precious and came only to those who had been in serious combat. Not many GIs from the European theater was happy to be sent to another war, after they had just finished one. How about the terrain on Honshu? The land itself was superb for defense and terrible for attack: narrow routes overlooked by hills and mountains at every point; the landing beaches themselves would have been subject to overwhelming artillery attack from the surround hills; the land, mountainous, cut through with canyons and defiles, covered with wet and easily flooded rice paddies and fields, was deadly for tanks, and far worse than the hedgerows of Normandy. But beyond the nature of the land, what of the invasion itself? Although in number of ships, aircraft, and men it would be far beyond the numbers involved in D-Day, the Japanese defenders would actually outnumber the attackers! The Japanese had learned how to fight the Americans: they built extensive underground fortifications, dug and fortified caves and tunnels built to be almost impervious to air and naval bombardment and extremely difficult for infantry attackers. The fight would have been a slog comparable to the trenches of World War I. The civilian population had been armed (sort of, even with spears and bamboo); it had been prepared for guerrilla war; the fighting would have been continuous, with nighttime infiltration---presaging the Vietnam War. What about the invading fleets, with battleships, dozens of aircraft carriers, hundreds of ships? The Japanese, unbeknown to the Americans, had hoarded more than 10,000 planes to be used as kamikazes. Many of them were obsolete and built of wood---meaning that they could not be detected by radar, and the deadly proximity fuse would not work on them. And even when they were shot up, they could still fly into the ships. And the targets: stationary, anchored, in enclosed areas, unable to maneuver, perfect, easy even for untrained pilots. The probability is that the kamikazes would have overwhelmed the defending aircraft and anti-aircraft weaponry. The fleet could not have handled them. And they would have sunk transports carrying tens of thousands of soldiers. We had never experienced such losses. Which comes to a couple of other points: the US was running out of men; the nation was getting very tired of the war, and the longer it went on the more tired it would become. The American manpower pool was being drained; month after month Selective Service fell short of its goals. And its goals were immense: 100,000 new troops every month or more. Turning to the Japanese, the military had no intention of giving up; the generals and admirals were willing to accept the death of 20 million of their people, or more; they even spoke of the annihilation of the entire race of 100 million. They were not going to be impressed by the demonstration of a single bomb. Not only did the Japanese soldier fight to the death in a way that the most courageous Germans never did, he was prepared to kill his own people to prevent them from surrendering. American troops saw Japanese soldiers throwing civilians off the cliff at Okinawa and elsewhere. Every Japanese soldier would have to be killed, one by one. In addition, the Americans were working on a tight timetable: the planned invasion of Kyushi and the capture of Tokyo, Operation Coronet, had to take place in March, 1946, before the rains came and turned the ground into impassable muck. So Olympic, the invasion of Honshu, had to take place no later than October. And October was the season of typhoons: the divine winds that destroyed the Korean invaders occurred in October. And during 1945 there were several tremendous storms that, even after the war, sank ships, damaged many more, destroyed facilities built ashore---they would have wreaked havoc on an invading fleet. What about the immediate effect of the bombs, and the near-simultaneous Soviet invasion of Manchuria? Even then the Japanese did not respond. There was no answer in the first few days. The Americans began to prepare, not just for the invasion, but to use WMDs---chemical weapons, mustard gas, the horrible munitions that traumatized even the armies that used them. We were prepared to engage in chemical warfare if the Japanese continued to resist. When finally the Japanese announced that they would accept the Allied terms, there was a coup attempt by hard-line militarists. It was beaten back, but it still happened. What about Japanese hints of peace negotiations through the Soviets? Nobody took them seriously; they were not coming from very high officials; there was no support for them in the government. They were not real. What about the casualty estimates? Did the Americans really expect millions of dead and wounded, and upward of a million dead? Yes. Those numbers were used again and again in discussions of the invasion. The lower estimates come from misunderstanding the nature of the figures used, and how the military counted casualties. There was another factor: Harry Truman’s World War I experience was not as thin as some make it; he was engaged in heavy fighting, and he saw what the war looked like. If he could avoid that, he would. This book is so full of figures and statistics that one’s eyes could glaze over---but Giangreco pounds them in over and over until their meaning cannot be ignored. Not to mention that the troops themselves were unbearably relieved. Nobody wanted to go into that hellfire.

https://www.usni.org/press/books/hell...

[Noah · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5/5 as a fascinating premise with weak execution. Giangreco’s narrative was dry and prone to unfortunate instances of “author voice,” in which he often made sure to tell us that his work far exceeds any previous historians’ work on the subject. There were entire passages literally copy and pasted several times throughout the book, as well as pages and pages of nothing but figures and how figures were crunched. Bumping to 3 stars simply because of how interesting Operational Downfall itself is.

[Kristi · Rating 5 out of 5]

In the fall of 1967 as a sophomore at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota I was privileged to participate in the Term in Thailand with 25 other students. We studied at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok - Buddhism, Southeast Asian history, art, literature, and political science. On the way to Bangkok we visited Japan and Hong Kong. Coming home included stops in Penang, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Taiwan, the Philippines, and Guam. We were the only undergraduate study group in Southeast Asia - the closest program was in Japan. I have been an avid reader of World War II history and literature for more than 60 years. My father and most of my uncles served in the war in many roles - as a tank driver in Patton's army, a tail gunner who was killed over Germany, and a medic in the Pacific Theater. My reading, however, had largely been within the European Theater of operations. About 2 years ago I had a "DUH" moment. Why was I not reading about the Pacific War when I had visited so many important sites in that history?? I am trying to make up for my lack of knowledge. The following are the most significant books that I have read in that effort: "The Imperial Japanese Army: The Invincible Years 1941-42" Bill Yenn "Building the Death Railway: The Ordeal of American Pows in Burma, 1942-1945" Robert S. LaForte "Judgment at Tokyo: World War II on Trial and the Making of Modern Asia" Gary J. Bass "82 Days on Okinawa: One American's Unforgettable Firsthand Account of the Pacific War's Greatest Battle" Art Shaw "140 Days to Hiroshima: The Story of Japan's Last Chance to Avert Armageddon" David Dean Barrett "Twilight of the Gods: War in the Western Pacific, 1944-1945" Ian W.Toll "The Fleet at Flood Tide: America at Total War in the Pacific, 1944-1945" James D. Hornfischer "Thailand and Japan's Southern Advance, 1940-1945" E. Bruce Reynolds "Neptune's Inferno: The U.S. Navy at Guadalcanal" James D. Hornfischer "The Rising Sun: The Decline & Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-45" John Toland "Lightning Strike: The Secret Mission to Kill Admiral Yamamoto and Avenge Pearl Harbor" by Donald A. Davis. . I have visited two locations of horror and death at the hands of the Japanese. The first is the bridge over the river Kwai at Kanchanaburi, Thailand. With an enormous pool of captive labor at their disposal, the Japanese forced approximately 200,000 Asian conscripts and over 60,000 Allied POWs to construct the Burma Railway. Among the Allied POWs were some 30,000 British, 13,000 Australians, 18,000 Dutch, and 700 Americans. Of the US personnel forced to work on the railway, 133 died. (Their remains were expatriated. ) This included personnel from USS Houston and the 131st Field Artillery Regiment of the Texas Army National Guard. The Americans were called the Lost Battalion as their fate was unknown to the United States for years after their capture. Near the bridge is the Kanchanaburi War Cemetery, the main prisoner of war (POW) cemetery for victims of Japanese imprisonment while building the Burma Railway. . The cemetery contains 6,982 graves of British, Australian and Dutch prisoners of war, of whom 6,858 have been identified. I have walked through that cemetery and always remember the peace and beauty of the bougainvillea, and the graves and graves and graves. After contemplating the devastating loss of life in WWII, we were standing on the railroad bridge over the River Kwai when 3 American jets made a low pass - coming from or heading toVietnam. Remember this was the fall of 1967. The Tet Offensive would be in the spring of 1968. I could not help but think of the new waste of lives and the fact that we never learn. I still recommend the 1957 movie, "The Bridge on the River Kwai", starring William Holden and Alec Guinness . Although it is not completely factual, it does capture the hardship of the slave labor to build the railway. Ironically upon awakening on our first day in Tokyo my roommate and I heard the "Colonel Bogey March" which was the theme song from the movie. We looked down upon a lower roof and saw Japanese workers doing morning exercises to the music. We wondered if they had any idea that the music was associated with Japanese atrocities for us.. I have walked through Fort Santiago, the last building in old Manila liberated by the Americans during the recapture of the Philippines. It had been used as a prison/ torture chamber / death house and was found with literally hundreds if not thousands of dead bodies inside. The main entrance when I was there was broken and enlarged to permit American tanks to enter the fort. One of the most difficult books that I have read so far in my Pacific Theater education is "Rampage: MacArthur, Yamashita, and the Battle of Manila" by James M. Scott. Yamashita, the "Tiger of Malaya" had ordered his army to retreat into the jungle highlands because he believed he could not defeat the Americans in Manila. Rear Admiral Iwabuchi Sanji defied Yamashita’s orders to withdraw from the city and utilized his 18,000 men to massacre thousands of Filipino civilians. This book isvery painful as it has many first-person accounts of the murders and rapes. I have also had the privilege or having known a survivor of the Bataan Death March as a friend. He did not wish to speak in great detail, but the one thing that I have never forgotten was the role of other soldiers to protect their comrades. He explained that they always tried to walk in 3's with the weakest man in the middle supported by two stronger men on each side.. I fell in love with Kyoto and Nara. The beautiful gardens and shrines... The city largely escaped the fire-bombing toward the end of the war. In my reading I was grateful to learn that though Kyoto had been at the top of the list for the atomic bomb, Secretary of War Stimson removed it because he had also fallen in love with this the city. One evening as a couple of friends and I were walking, we were stopped by 3 Japanese university students who offered us drinks in return for an opportunity to practice their English. 57 years later I remember one of the young men asking why the U.S. did not drop atomic bombs on North Vietnam. I could not believe that a citizen of the only country to experience such devastation would think it a good idea to use such a weapon... Finally I believe that anyone who seriously studies the Pacific War has anobligation to form an opinion about whether the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the best option to end the war. There are several factors that have led me to believe that this was the right decision. We were fire-bombing cities all over Japan - led by Curtis LeMay. Thousands of civilians were dying. Our knowledge of the effects of the atomic bombs was so limited that one proposal for the invasion of Japan involved dropping a bomb on an area and invading 24 hours later. We had no idea that we would be killing the American soldiers involved. Some theorists state that the fact that Russia had invaded Manchukuo meant that the Japanese would have surrendered soon. The Japanese were not that concerned about Russia. They also were not surprised. One has to remember that the Soviet Union had never conducted an amphibious landing during WWII, if ever. They had not trained troops for such an endeavor nor did they have any ships or transports for invasion. In Europe and especially the Pacific, the Americans had conducted dozens of water invasions and would have had to supply all the training and the equipment. Finally, even after the first bomb and even after Nagasaki there were still strong forces who did not want to surrender. A particularly militant faction attempted to seize the emperor and keep the war going. The death toll among the armed citizenry and both militaries would have been HUGE. I wish the atomic bombs had not been necessary, but I believe they were more humane than fire bombing, blockading and starving the country and the massive Allied and Japanese loss of life in an invasion. ****************If I had any lingering doubts about the necessity of the atomic bombs, all were removed by this book. Allied forces conducted air raids (later with napalm fire bombing )on Japan from 1942 to 1945, causing extensive destruction to the country's cities and killing between 241,000 and 900,000 people. No one will ever know. The vast majority of Japanese cities had wooden contruction. Think of the firestorm created in Dresden ( a "modern" European city with brick, mortar and steel structures. Despite the devastation and death toll the Japanese refused to surrender. The fact that one bomb could obliterate a city finally moved the Emperor to end the war. This book points out the many factors about Japan's military capabilites that had been underestimated by the Allies. We thought that there were about 5,000 fighters left. There were in fact 10,000. If we had blockaded ports to starve Japan into surrender, our ships would have been sitting ducks for Kamakazi attacks. The Japanese were also retooling old wooden planes that would escape radar detection and preparing suicide boats to detonate on impact were also being prepared. Although we will never know the probable death toll for armed Japanese citizenry and Allied invasion forces, 1,000,000 Allied losses were a distinct possibility. Finally I usually recommend listening to books as this is such a pleasure to me. In this case, however, I would suggest reading the book as the statistics are sometime difficult to comprehend when only heard. EXCELLENT BOOK!!!! Kristi & Abby Tabby

[Tony · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Last Word

This book is the last word on Operation Downfall and the decision to try the atomic bomb beforehand as a means of shocking the Japanese leadership into surrender. Had Japan's militarists continued to hold sway after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the invasion of Japan would have begun, with devastating losses suffered by both sides.

Giangreco exposes many misconceptions about the state of Japan by the summer of 1945. He reveals that far from being out of aviation fuel for their fleets of kamikaze suicide attack squadrons, the Japanese had ample stocks of fuel stored away in preparation for use during the invasion. Giangreco also reveals that the apparent lack of Japanese air activity during this time was due to a deliberate husbanding of kamikzaes in preparation for attacks on the invasion fleets. Giangreco also reveals the difficult defenses and terrain features the two Allied landings--Operation Olympic, on Kyushu, and Operation Coronet, on Honshu--would have faced, plus the inevitable delays typhoons would have caused for the launching of Olympic and Coronet.

Giangreco derails the revisionist argument that predicted invasion casualties were postwar fabrications designed to justify use of the atomic bomb. He reveals that many casualty estimates generated during the buildup to the invasion were indeed in the 500,000 range, with some predicting even more losses. Only a scattered few projections over optimistically predicted lesser losses.

The book's only flaws were a scattering of typos and how some illustrations and their captions were not placed in the vicinity of the relevant parts of the chapters they appeared in. These are minor flaws, however, and do not detract from this tour de force of research and scholarship on WWII's biggest "what if?"

After I read Eugene Sledge's searing memoir "With The Old Breed At Peleliu and Okinawa," I shared Sledge's relief that no invasion of Japan proper ever happened. After reading "Hell to Pay," I am even more grateful the bloodbath to be that was Operation Downfall never had to be executed.

[DoctorM · Rating 3 out of 5]

An excellent account of the plans for Operation Downfall, the planned invasion of the Japanese Home Islands. Good presentation of the evolution of American plans and the countermeasures planned by the Japanese--- though the book is marred by egregiously bad proofreading. Giangreco makes it clear that the two-pronged American invasion would've been a hard-fought and difficult operation, and that the Japanese would've been a hard enemy to destroy, even in those last starving months of the war. He also makes it clear that, based on Okinawa and Luzon, the final battle on the Kanto plain envisioned by both American and Japanese planners would likely not have meant an end to fighting, that in the mountains of Honshu and Kyushu hold-out units might have fought on for months.

"Hell To Pay" is good military history, and worth reading. It is however designed not only to discuss Operation Downfall, but also to be part of the whole ongoing debate about the morality of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Giangreco makes it clear that he's writing about attitudes in 2010 as much as about events in 1945. I suppose that it's inevitable, though--- the end of the Pacific War has long since become a marker for attitudes to contemporary cultural and political issues.

[J.w. Larrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

An exhaustive analysis of the plans for Operation Downfall. Those who question what an invasion of the home islands of Japan would have cost in carnage of American lives should read this book. Maybe the most sobering of chapters was "Half a million Purple Hearts" in which was detailed the grim ordering and production of massive numbers of the medal in anticipation of invasion . The navy alone had an initial order of 135,000 of the medal. Quite a lesson in the enormous killing fields it would have wrought.

[Mike · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a great book. It is a detailed analysis of the planning that went into an invasion of the home islands and a realistic look at why the atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The revisionist history is to paint the Japanese as innocent victims of American aggression. The Japanese were far from innocent. There is no doubt but what civilian non-combatants were killed in the bombings, but there is also no doubt but what the slaughter was much lower that it would have been.

The most telling part of the book was the letter from James Michener telling a fellow soldier why he could not state his true feelings about the bombings. Basically, if he had spoken his mind, the Hollywood and academic elites would have blackballed him and ruined his career.

If you have any questions as to why the bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, this is the book to read.

[John Vandike · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting look back at US government plans around the invasion of Japan following the fall of Germany. A substantial portion of the book is devoted to investigating potential casualties, both among American servicemen as well as Japanese troops and civilians and contrasting those with the human toll exacted by the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. A fair amount of interesting statistical trivia with respect to the scale and sites of potential invasion beachheads. A fairly quick read, clocking in a little over 200 pages excluding appendices.

[Kenneth Flusche · Rating 3 out of 5]

A tough book to read, not sure if written by an accountant (Statistics) or politician (Repeats and goes in circles) But the fact remains as told me by my WWII veteran friends. Those two bombs saved from one to three million human lives......... May my friends rest in peace and may nobody explode a nuke in test or war again.

[Michael Werner · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have studied WW2 for 45 years, and this volume was filled with information I was completely unaware of. Presented with facts, figures, tables and maps, the author gives a compelling case for the 1 million + casualties/deaths that an invasion of mainland Japan would have brought to the American homeland.

[Tachikoma22 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obscene, disgusting, horrifying, therefore accurate

Before engaging any confrontation about that cursed event that was the end of the pacific front of WW2, read this book.
You won't be able to stand the mindless football-cheering mentality that characterize the discussion even today.

[Georgiana · Rating 4 out of 5]

Makes me wonder if there was any way to end the Pacific war that wouldn't have been horrendous.

[Fresno Bob · Rating 5 out of 5]

totally justifies the dropping of the bomb

[Dane Swenson · Rating 3 out of 5]

An extremely thorough book. It was a bit dense and tough to process, however, it certainly didn’t leave out any nuance of this complicated decision of war and death

[James Clark · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always wondered about the allied plan to invade Japan in WWII. Most accounts of WWII leading up to the A-Bomb droppings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki but do not get into the detail of what would have happened IF we had to really invade Japan and take it by force. In years passed, there have been some loud voices against the dropping of these A-Bombs on Japan saying we could have taken Japan conventionally. This book is all about FACTS. I don't know another book that I have ever read about WWII in the Pacific that is so well thoroughly documented, so filled with data and information, so thoroughly vetted as this book is. Not only does this book contain the allied plan called Operation Downfall, consisting of Olympic and Coronet, that is, the successive allied plans to invade first Kyushu but also Honshu (main Island with Tokyo). Also included are the details which the Japanese Imperial Military were preparing for this invasion: their plans. This serious, thorough and highly detailed study revealed that the Japanese has us "figured out." They knew where we were going to land and what we probably would do afterwards..they had figured this out in minute detail and were prepared to counter us. The Japanese were committed to sacrificing 20 million Japanese lives (or more) in order to prevent the invasion...and the fact is that the Japanese had been working on defenses starting in 1943. As the allies progressed across the Central Pacific and into Saipan, Guam, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, the Japanese learned a great deal about allied tactics. The book discusses more than once, the fact that prior allied losses earlier in the war had been a ratio of 1 allied to 5 Japanese. By the time Okinawa happened, this ratio had been reduced to 1 allied to 1.2 Japanese. The Japanese held out for 100 days on Okinawa against overwhelmingly superior allied forces. The book reveals, that in Kamakazi attacks, three wooden Kamakazi planes managed to destroy THREE (3) U.S. Navy destroyers! The Japanese were prepared to defend "in-depth," while pursuing a murderous Kamakazi policy. The allies figured the Japanese had only about 7,000 planes, when in fact they had 15,000 hidden on the Japanese islands. The allies figured that the Japanese had just about run out of pilots to fly them, but the fact was that there were about 18,000 pilots that were available, meaning that IF - we had attacked in a conventional manner, the Japanese would have used up to 15,000 aircraft in a Kamakazi fashion- thinking about those 3 destroyers sunk to three puny wooden Kamikaze planes. The Japanese were prepared to fling their entire air capability at the allies. And in fact, the wooden structure of the airplanes was impervious to radar detection. As far as "in-depth" is concerned, this means multiple rings of successive heavily fortified defense points. The Japanese had stockpiled aviation gas, ammunition, weapons, medical supplies and food all over the Japanese Islands in hidden bunkers, tunnels and caves. What this all comes down to is that the 500,000 to 1,000,000 allied DEATHS projected to occur would also result in at least a multiple of this in injuries - probably on the order of 5 times as many allied injured as killed or roughly 2.5 MILLION or greater. This book is more than just convincing proof that President Truman made the right decision to drop the atomic bombs on Japan to force an end to the conflict. The allies were figuring a minimum force of 5 million allied required. The fact is, however, we did not know whether even dropping the A-Bombs on Japan would be enough to convince the fanatical Japanese militarists to finally give up...it was a gamble. I did learn in this book that we were actually contemplating dropping NINE (9) A-Bombs on the island of Kyushu alone in a V-shape...this was something I had never read before. There is so much historical fact and detail in this book, you have to read it for yourself, if you really want to know for SURE why what we did was the right thing to do! Yes, 200,000 Japanese died as a result of dropping the atomic bomb on them - BUT, it saved 20,000,000 projected Japanese lives, up to or more, 1,000,000 American lives and up to 2.5 or more million injured American combatants...and this does not even take into account the expenditures in warships, planes, tanks, ammunition and other weapons and materials needed to conquer Japan by conventional force. If anyone leaves this book still convinced we should not have used nuclear weapons on Japan, then they didn't learn a thing from reading the book. This is one OUTSTANDING BOOK! Exhaustive, totally vetted, thoroughly and compelling professional in its details - an absolute "must read" for any military historian.

[Josh Liller · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good recent book that delves in the many details of Operation Downfall (the invasion of Japan) and its two sub-operations: Olympic (Kyushu, fall 1945) and Coronet (Honshu, spring 1946).

I have read several books about the end of the war against Japan, but none of them go into the depth of this book. Both the American and Japanese sides are examined: their plans and concerns (even the details of medical planning like hospital beds and bloody supply), and factors that they didn't consider that would have likely affected the invasion. Even the role of the British Commonwealth forces is addressed. George Marshall's interest in using poison gas and tactical atom bombs is included. Extensive G2 analysis is included in the appendices. Giangreco is focused on the details, facts, and conclusions; he tries to stay away from the speculative.

A few things that did not seem to be mentioned:

-The story that the US Army ordered a half million purple hearts for Olympic (so many that they still have a huge surplus today) is referenced, but never seems to be explicitly confirmed nor denied.

-I've read past references to Nimitz proposing a "fake invasion" with landing craft loaded with AA guns instead of soldiers in an attempt to bait out kamikaze strikes, but I don't think this was addressed. It may have been the idea was not given serious consideration in planning to merit inclusion in this book.

-Alternative invasion plans to the Olympic-Coronet sequence are referenced as being blown off in the summer of 1945, but no analysis of alternative invasion points is really covered. The author probably felt that delved too much into speculation.

-Possibly also excluded for being too speculative were the impact (if any) of the new aircraft coming into service in late 1945: P-80 jet, F7F Tigercat, F8F Bearcat, and - on the Japanese side - the Kikka jet.

I mention those things more as points of interest than actual criticisms. My real criticism with the book is the organization. The writing is good, but sometimes the author repeats himself (sometimes verbatim). Also, the chapters aren't in a chronological progression. They are sort of jumbled, like a collection of essays; each chapter is tightly focused but the topics jump around too much.

Overall, I'd definitely recommend it to anyone interested in the end of the war because of the content. However, there is still definitely room for improvement and much more to be said about this topic.

[Charles Temm · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible read, the detail is almost mind numbing. The book spends an enormous amount of time outlining both Japanese and American preparations for both the Kyushu & Honshu (Opns Olympic & Coronet) invasions. Even a short perusal highlights the US belief in the strength of Japanese assets (air & land) were grossly under estimated, the Japanese knew where and almost exactly when we'd invade, and that the US was likely under counting expected losses (at least publicly).

Moreover Mr Giangreco spends a lot of time going over why the alternatives so favored POST War by the various nuclear use dissenters were all examined to various degree by POTUS & the War/Navy Depts and rejected. Some are the continual favorites of revisionists such as the starvation route and "letting" the Russians invade northern Japan but others include chemical weapons and defoliant use against crops. Unlike many times in US history, the senior leadership both military and civilian had experience first hand of war and they were quite sensitive about more losses after 1944's heavy body count.

There are other books on the subject but none spend so much time on the whys that propelled the final nor add have almost as many pages of footnotes/appendixes as the main part of the book.

A poignant epilogue comes from author James Michener on pg 291, written in 1995 but not released until his death. It was in regards to a move by some Hollywood/literary world revisionists about the use of the bomb 50 years earlier. Michener refused to sign the petition as urged by a friend, Martin Allday and sent his reasons why he, as a WW2 Pacific veteran would not damn the use of the bombs. However he knew the reaction he'd get if he went public why he wouldn't sign, Allday honored the request and didn't criticize Michener then or later....

[Mike Kershaw · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a detailed examination of the Japanese and American planning for the Invasion of Japan. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in the global challenges faced by the US Army in World War II, the decision to drop the Atomic Bombs or anyone who has read historical accounts of the last year of the War in the Pacific and desires more detail on the invasion plans. However, it is not well-written or well organized and therefore I would recommend Richard Frank's "Downfall" which is exceptionally well-written and more comprehensive. The value in this account lies in the details -- how, for instance, did the US Army plan to sustain the flow of whole blood to the theater; how did the various air forces plan on countering the kamikaze threat; what manpower challenges confronted the Army as the war extended into 1945. Many of these issues figure in other accounts but rarely are they discussed in the detail you see here. Additionally, Giangreco offers analysis on the Japanese perspective -- their adaptations, anticipation of the Allies plan and their strategy to attrit Allied forces in Kyushu (they correctly anticipated the initial allied landings here) and force a negotiated end to hostilities. In some accounts, these aren't given much credence -- here, details on mobilization, troop deployments, tactics, terrain and geography are woven together to present a Japanese plan that may have had a much greater chance of success than generally admitted and provide another reason for continued intransigence after dropping of the first atomic weapon, in particular. A very interesting book.

[Davina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Probably one of the least likely, or perhaps, least interesting subjects to delve in to concerning the Second World War. This books discusses contemporary perceptions, and the reality of the projected Invasion of Japan. That is important as it can frame the discussion of the US decision to use Atomic weapons against Japan. This has been dealt with in other sources, and from many perspectives. I find this a very well researched volume, using both American and Japanese sources. He may not have spent enough time discussing one of the more bizarre acts of the war, which was a partial demobilization following the defeat of Germany. He does cover the impact of that decision on the War against the Japanese quite well. This book is not speculative in nature, he looks at contemporary estimates, including how they were produced. He uses evidence from other battles against Japan (the Philippines, Saipan, Peleliu, Okinawa, etc.) to give perspective to the estimates, and context for the larger American and Japanese battle plans. Certainly, I walk away with even more respect for the Japanese, and I have a better idea of the size of the Japanese Armed Forces, at the time of the Invasion. This didn't change my mind on the use of Atomic weapons. It did remind me further of the naivete of the Americans regarding radiation given the tactical planning for the employment of further atomic weapons. I am glad that didn't happen, both for the Japanese, and for those American soldiers as well. A very interesting book. The appendix is quite dry, but still worth reading.

[Brian Miracle · Rating 3 out of 5]

While not an especially easy read, this book succeeded in showing the preparations by the Allies and Japan for Operation Downfall, the invasion of Japan scheduled for fall, 1945 and spring, 1946. The book shows that the Japanese knew where the Allied landing zones would be, and they were rapidly reinforcing those areas in the months prior to Japan's surrender.

The book gives details of the expected casualties (both Allied and Japanese) that were expected as a result of the invasion. The casualties in the last year of the war had skyrocketed, shocking the Allies. Japanese resistance intensified as the Allies marched closer and closer to Japan. The carnage on Iwo Jima (more than 6800 American dead and more than 17000 Japanese dead) and Okinawa (more than 20000 American dead, 77000-110000 Japanese military dead, and 40000-150000 Japanese civilian deaths) was just the opening act to much worse that would have resulted from invasion. Expected Allied deaths ranged from a low of over 100000 to more realistic estimates of 400000 to 800000. Since Japan was arming civilians to reinforce the military in the endgame, expected Japanese deaths were as high as 20 million.

The book shows that, at the end of a long and tragic war, American leaders, in dropping the atomic bombs, ended the war in the quickest and least bloody means. After the atomic bombs, the killing quickly stopped, rather than continuing for another 1 to 2 years.

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a turgid book to read. Commentators have said that the book reads like an operations order or an intelligence study by the military. Having said that, I am glad I read the book so as to flesh out my taking a look at the decision to drop the atom bomb. The author limits his study to "strategic tactics" by looking at the operations orders for both Japan and the US in the last year of WWII.

His conclusion that the Japanese had the will and capacity to resist for some length of time if invaded is well-founded. His studies of the possibilities of immense casualties on both sides are hard to read, not because they are false but read true.

I was surprised that he did not respond to a note on p. 30 of Richard Frank's book in which Mr. Frank takes Mr. Giangreco to task for overusing the Saipan ratio in an article written before Frank's book, Downfall. The Saipan ratio was used to try to determine casualties in the event of an invasion of Japan early on. It was replaced by other figures after Okinawa. It seems to me that both come to the conclusion that casualties would have been brutally high and that Pres. Truman knew of those figures.

Indeed, Mr. Giangreco does not mention Frank's book on pp. xviii-xix in which he mentions two others (Drea and Coox) who are the only ones who took up operational matters. I thought Frank had done so.

[Sean O'Hara · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book purports to be a study of what would've happened in the US had invaded Japan in late 1945, but in truth it is a thinly disguised defense of Truman's decision to use nuclear weapons. There is certainly a strong case to be made that Truman made the right decision, but Giangreco doesn't make. While he does score many points debunking the idea that Japan was a paper tiger ready to collapse, pointing out that the people making that argument are often misinterpreting facts, for instance taking the casualty estimates for the first 30 days of Olympic as the total expected casualties in Kyuushuu, his own arguments go too far the other way, often accepting the worst case estimates of the Americans and best case scenarios for the Japanese as the most likely course.

If you're really interested in an argument in favor of the atomic bombings, you're better off with Hasegawa's Racing the Enemy.