The Fall of Japan: The Final Weeks of World War II in the Pacific by William J. Craig
Like many readers of WWII history, I was more familiar with the war in North Africa, the Mediterranean, and Northwest Europe than the Asia-Pacific theatre, which is often treated as a bit of an aside. So I followed on from Antony Deevor's WWII Epic with this book, which focuses only on the last few weeks of the War against Japan. It's a beauty.
The blurb sets the scene nicely.
New York Times A “virtually faultless” account of the last weeks of WWII in the Pacific from both Japanese and American perspectives (The New York Times Book Review). By midsummer 1945, Japan had long since lost the war in the Pacific. The people were not told the truth, and neither was the emperor. Japanese generals, admirals, and statesmen knew, but only a handful of leaders were willing to accept defeat. Most were bent on fighting the Allies until the last Japanese soldier died and the last city burned to the ground. Exhaustively researched and vividly told, The Fall of Japan masterfully chronicles the dramatic events that brought an end to the Pacific War and forced a once-mighty military nation to surrender unconditionally. From the ferocious fighting on Okinawa to the all-but-impossible mission to drop the 2nd atom bomb, and from Franklin D. Roosevelt’s White House to the Tokyo bunker where tearful Japanese leaders first told the emperor the truth, William Craig captures the pivotal events of the war with spellbinding authority. The Fall of Japan brings to life both celebrated and lesser-known historical figures, including Admiral Takijiro Onishi, the brash commander who drew up the Yamamoto plan for the attack on Pearl Harbor and inspired the death cult of kamikaze pilots., This astonishing account ranks alongside Cornelius Ryan’s The Longest Day and John Toland’s The Rising Sun as a masterpiece of World War II history.
Published in 1967, it is a comprehensive effort to fully discuss the last weeks of WWII in the Pacific from both Japanese and American perspectives. Wisely, Craig starts with a discussion of Japan’s internal political conflicts during the 1930s, which eventually led to their decision to enter the war with an attack on Pearl Harbour.
It was realised right from the start by some of the Japanese military leaders that they could not defeat America but they went into war anyway. Fast forward to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which forced Emperor Hirohito to agree that surrender was the only choice. Yet, this decision was not meekly accepted - The Supreme War Ruling Council, or “The Big Six,” was evenly divided between surrender advocates and hardline “bitter enders.” The book gives considerable attention to their motivations, dismantling the myth that Japan would have capitulated without invasion or nuclear intervention.
The part I found most interesting was the shaky period between Emperor Hirohito’s acceptance of the Potsdam treaty and the arrival of Americans a month later. The unknowns for both sides are described very well. Now so many years after the decision was made, it is difficult to realize the lengths that some Japanese were willing to go to preserve their honour. The threat of rebellion by some of the younger officers resulted in murder and terror before being quashed. Fortunately, sanity prevailed and the view prevailed that they 'would have to endure the unendurable' or their nation might cease to exist. Once the surrender became known, a litany of suicides became the norm as those who played a great part in the war tried to expiate their shame.
The Allies certainly seemed to realize what was at stake if they let their own armies get out of hand, as it would have been so easy to do so after the atrocities became known. In going from war to peace, the victors had to find a way to balance the need to punish, and find a way to heal a world gone mad. That they did so is to their credit.
The book devotes considerable time to the US's attempts to use both Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalist Army and Mao Zedong's Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to exert pressure from within China on the occupying Japanese forces. The intrigues between the two Chinese leaders and their forces made this a fraught and frustrating experience as each party was just as intent on destroying the base of the other as it was in ending Japan's rule. This was a fascinating part of the story that was new to me.
Definitely a must-read for any war buff.
