JAPAN’S SURRENDER, RECONSIDERED

JAPAN’S SURRENDER, RECONSIDERED

The story, as told 40 years ago

August 14, 2011

GARETH COOK’S Aug. 7 Ideas article, on the reasons for Japan’s acceptance of the Potsdam Conference’s demands for ending the Pacific war in 1945, is devoted to the claim by professor Tsuyoshi Hasegawa of the University of California, Santa Barbara, that it was the Soviet entry into the war, not the dropping of the atomic bomb, that forced Japan’s surrender.

After reading the article, I reread the 1970 book “Imperial Tragedy’’ by Thomas M. Coffey, which presents a summary of the day-by-day and even hour-by-hour discussions in Tokyo that led Japan to surrender.

Prime Minister Kantaro Suzuki and Foreign Minister Shigenori Togo had favored surrendering even before the Soviet Union’s invasion of Manchuria. However, the army members of the Supreme Council for the Direction of the War wanted to fight on till the death of every man, woman, and child in the country.

To break the deadlock, Suzuki managed the get the council to take the almost-unheard-of step of inviting Emperor Hirohito to attend a council meeting and hear the members’ views before they reached a decision. Hirohito, like British kings, had been brought up to understand that while the monarchy reigned, it did not rule. However, he broke with precedent and spoke in favor of surrender. The generals, who revered the emperor, then gave in.

Although the Soviet attack had caused consternation, I could find nothing to indicate it was the main reason for Japan’s surrender.

Robert Meister
Brookline