Article

2026-08-07 China-Japan-Koreas

'The Sun Fell to Earth.' Little-Known Facts About Hiroshima

Archived material is restricted to Rantburg regulars and members. If you need access email fred.pruitt=at=gmail.com with your nick to be added to the members list. There is no charge to join Rantburg as a member.

Posted by badanov 2026-08-07 00:00|| E-Mail|| Front Page|| [295 views ] Top

1 ...The alternative would have been far, far worse. If the Japanese still refused to surrender, Operation OLYMPIC, the invasion of Japan proper, was coming. And after that was CORONET, the attack on Tokyo.

Which would have been preceded by the dropping of six more bombs on the fortifications and troops outside the city, and followed by US and Allied troops marching through the hellscape the bombs would have created in one of the most densely populated places on Earth at that time.

Mike

Posted by MikeKozlowski 2026-08-07 06:32|| 2026-08-07 06:32|| Front Page Top

2 President Truman said he had no regrets.

Posted by Besoeker 2026-08-07 09:19|| 2026-08-07 09:19|| Front Page Top

3 President Truman said he had no regrets.

Posted by Besoeker 2026-08-07 09:19|| 2026-08-07 09:19|| Front Page Top

4 Final takeaway. If you're going to start a war, make damn sure you win it.

Posted by Mercutio 2026-08-07 09:21|| 2026-08-07 09:21|| Front Page Top

5 No wonder Zelenskyy won't give up.

Posted by DooDahMan 2026-08-07 10:41|| 2026-08-07 10:41|| Front Page Top

6 The strikes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not so much acts of intimidation against Japan as a show of force to the world.

I read in the book The Red Tsar how Stalin believed Truman dropped the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki to make sure he didn't get any ideas about moving the Red Army into Western Europe. So instead, he ordered Beria to develop a Soviet Manhattan Project.

Posted by Abu Uluque 2026-08-07 12:17|| 2026-08-07 12:17|| Front Page Top

7 The project people absolutely wanted to know the effect of the bombs and did a through job of the after effects. Around 70,000 did die in the first bomb. Tracked by rice ration allocations before and after. However, only under 5,000 were identified as having died of the after effects of radiation. The inflated 140,000 number is just counting in people who happen to be in or around the city at the time. It's sort of like counting everyone who was in Oklahoma City when the federal building was bombed and adding them to the count years afterwards.

Posted by Procopius2k 2026-08-07 12:38|| 2026-08-07 12:38|| Front Page Top

8 BTW its still well below the body count of Filipinos civilians who were butchered by Japanese forces in and around Manila in February of that year. Whether you die by bomb or bayonet and bullet, you are still dead.

Posted by Procopius2k 2026-08-07 12:42|| 2026-08-07 12:42|| Front Page Top

23:20 SteveS
22:14 trailing wife
22:11 James
21:39 chris
21:37 trailing wife
21:30 NoMoreBS
21:25 NoMoreBS
21:23 Angaique Mussolini9029
21:21 Blossom Elmolush6088
19:58 Frank G
18:58 hyper
16:57 Bobby
16:33 DarthVader
15:24 Procopius2k
14:54 Skidmark
14:39 Chantry
14:39 Skidmark
14:35 Grom the Reflective
14:33 Snirong Gray4069
14:28 Lord Garth
14:15 trailing wife
14:14 trailing wife
14:09 Chantry
14:08 trailing wife
Merry-Go-Blog