Perhaps the BEST B1G Forum anywhere, here at College Football Fan Site, CFB51!!!

Everything you said about the military/strategic reasoning to drop the bombs is true, but that also doesn't mean that American racism didn't play a factor in more willingness to drop the bombs than if had been Europeans. And pointing out Japan's racism (which is true and I don't disagree) also doesn't mean that American racism didn't play a factor in more willingness to drop the bombs than if it had been Europeans.

Granted, I certainly haven't proven my assertion that it played a factor either. But I think there was more of a prevailing attitude to think of the Japanese as "other" in the 1940s in a way that wasn't true of the Germans or Italians, and probably as well of the Russians who had just been our ally.

If you were Truman, could you have faced Charlie's or Ralph's mom after they were killed and said "yeah, I could have prevented your son's death but I chose not to." 

I've got a few good books on Operation Downfall but I can't think of any titles off the top of my head.  I will, however, cover one thing here that is very important to understanding the end of WWII. 

When I was a kid my dad used to refer to what he called "the Ho Chi Minh, how to beat the Americans book".  The thing is, as I learned more about the Pacific War I learned that the book wasn't actually invented by Ho Chi Minh, it was invented by the Japanese and should probably be called the "Hirohito book of how to beat the Americans." 

If you are charged with defending an island against a numerically superior and much more well equipped force your only chance of successfully repelling the invasion is to defend the beach so as to prevent your superior enemy from getting a foothold.  If you fail at this your enemy will eventually conquer the island simply due to their superior numbers and supplies/equipment. 

Prior to Okinawa in most of the US invasions of Japanese held islands the Japanese attempted to repel the invasion by fighting desperately to defend the beach so as to prevent the US from getting a foothold and eventually taking the island.  The Battle of Okinawa represented a significant departure from the Japanese battle plans in the previous island invasions.  By the time the US got to Okinawa (April, 1945) the Japanese realized that they couldn't actually repel the invasion.  They were vastly outnumbered (roughly 5:1) and they had no hope of resupply while the Americans had all the equipment, fuel, ammunition, and supplies they could want.  Consequently, the Japanese adopted a strategy designed specifically to maximize American casualties.  Rather than trying to defend the beach where they would get pulverized by American pre-invasion naval bombardment and airstrikes, the Japanese instead built an incredibly elaborate network of tunnels and other defensive works and instructed their troops that they needed to take out 10 Americans each. 

The casualties on Okinawa were horrific.  The US lost around 12,500 killed or missing and suffered a total of around 50k casualties including wounded.  The Japanese lose around 110,00 killed with comparatively few wounded (they just kept fighting until killed) and a few (mostly unconscious) captured. 

The Japanese also applied the same principle to their Kamikaze strikes.  When they first employed Kamikaze's they tried to use them to destroy American Carriers, Battleships, and Cruisers on the theory that they needed to take those out first, THEN they would be able to sink the destroyers and transports.  Fortunately for the US, this meant that the Kamikaze attacks were not as deadly as you might think.  The Carriers were usually FAR out to sea so very few Kamikazes actually reached them.  Battleships were closer to conduct shore bombardment but Battleships are also sufficiently armored that the Kamikazes generally didn't do much damage to them.  If you go see the Missouri while you are in Hawaii there is a dent in the rail that was caused by a Japanese Kamikaze strike. 

IIRC, Okinawa was the first place where Kamikazes were used against amphibious ships.  These ships are much closer to shore than Carriers and much less armored than Battleships.  Additionally, they were LOADED with troops weighted down by all of their equipment.  The results were predictable. 

Okinawa was basically a final rehearsal for Japanese plans to defend their home islands.  Rather than seeing their Kamikaze's shot down attempting to get to carriers or bounce off of Battleships they planned to use them against vulnerable transports and amphibious assault ships.  Rather than being pulverized by pre-invasion bombardment while preparing to defend the beach they planned to use tunnels and other defensive works to maximize American casualties. 

If you think about it, this is ultimately how Ho Chi Minh managed to beat the Americans 20-30 years later.  Like the Japanese of 1945, Ho Chi Minh knew that he didn't have the necessary forces to actually meet the Americans on a battlefield and have any chance of winning but he figured out that if he dragged things out long enough and inflicted enough casualties the US would eventually decide that it simply wasn't worth it to fight him. 

What worked for Ho Chi Minh did NOT work for Hirohito because the US simply didn't give Hirohito enough time.  This strategy is ultimately dependent on the US not pouring in enough resources to win BEFORE US public support declines to problematic levels.  US leadership in 1945 understood this.  They planned the invasion for November, 1946 because that was as soon as they could do it and they KNEW that they were up against a clock. 

Two quick personal stories after something Truman said.  I'm sure if I spent some time googling I could find it but after the war Truman said something to the effect that he couldn't have faced the families of deceased American troops if he had been able to use the bomb and chosen not to.  Two of those potential causalities were friends of mine much later:
A guy named Ralph got me to volunteer for the American Legion Buckeye Boy's State.  You ( @847badgerfan ) will appreciate that the guy I work with now is from Wisconsin and attended Badger Boy's State years ago. Anyway, Ralph graduated from Medina High School on June 6, 1944.  That is D-Day, the date of the Normandy Invasion for anyone still reading who doesn't already know that.  Six months later he was in a repro-depot (replacement depot for green new troops ready to replace casualties) and got sent to the outskirts of the Battle of the Bulge as an artilleryman.  At the end of the war in Europe the US instituted a point system to determine who would get to go home first.  Guys got points for service time, time under fire, being married, having kids, etc.  My friend Ralph had been in combat for a few months but that was nothing compared to guys who had chased Rommel across North Africa, taken Sicily, landed at Anzio, landed at Normandy, then chased the Nazi's from Le Harve to the Rhine and beyond so he was not going home anytime soon.  He once told me that when the Japanese surrendered he was at a train station somewhere in Indiana when an "old" (probably younger than me now) guy drove by, saw his uniform, and said "Go home soldier, war's over".  Ralph was in Indiana because he had been shipped back to the US on the Queen Mary and ordered to report to some Army base in California for shipment to an undisclosed location in the Pacific.  He'd have been part of the invasion of Japan. 

Another guy I knew named Charlie was a year younger than Ralph.  He graduated from Medina High School in June, 1945.  By that time the Germans had already surrendered and, as a young and dumb guy, Charlie wanted to get into the war.  He joined the Navy because he figured they were the branch doing most of the fighting against Japan.  In later life Charlie said that he was a WWII veteran in name only because he was finishing up learning to be a tailgunner when Japan surrendered.  Charlie always said that the Bombs saved his life.  That was probably overly dramatic but it also was far from impossible.  Charlie ended up as a plankowner on the USS Midway.  In Naval parlance, "plankowners" are guys in the initial crew of a ship.  Midway was the first post-Essex class carrier and it was commissioned a few days after Japan surrendered. 

If Japan had not surrendered Ralph would have been hitting some beach on Kyushu and Charlie would have been flying over him in the back of a Torpedo Plane (Torpedo planes were used as level bombers when there were no more Japanese ships to use torpedos against).  If you were Truman, could you have faced Charlie's or Ralph's mom after they were killed and said "yeah, I could have prevented your son's death but I chose not to." 

Don't forget that to develop the bombs, entire cities were built in TN, NM, and WA.  Tens of thousands of people worked for years to just provide the infrastructure for the smart group of guys to bring them to a reality. 
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We didn't do all of that just to not use them.

Earlier in the war when Truman was still a Senator he started probing the Manhattan Project expenditures. Truman had a reputation as a cost cutting budget hawk and wanted to know where all this money (and it was a fantastic amount of money) was going. A general was dispatched from the White House to meet with Truman. He told the Senator"I can't tell you what it is, but if it works the war will be over."


NOTE for @betarhoalphadelta , this was when Germany was still the most dangerous foe and indicates an assumption of intentions to use the bomb against them.

The big bang — took and shook the world
Shot down the rising sun
The end was begun — it would hit everyone
When the chain reaction was done
The big shots — try to hold it back
Fools try to wish it away
The hopeful depend on a world without end
Whatever the hopeless may say

Really sad too because Chicago is one of America's truly great cities.

Was.

Last month was the final chance to turn things around, and they (voters) failed.

Miserably.