Hey awesome TGA team! What were the Western allied plans if Japan didn’t surrender? Was the invasion of the home islands still envisioned? Or an atomic bombing campaign would have been the preferred option? If so, do we know how many more bombs did the US had or could create in the short term?
Thanks for all the amazing work!
Yes, the plans for Operation Downfall were in preparation, composed of two separate phases - first, Operation Olympic to take the home island of Kyūshū and then that island would be used as a massive air and logistical base for the second phase, Operation Coronet which was an invasion of the largest of the home islands, Honshu, on the Kantō Plain, near Tokyo. Olympic was intended to be launched mainly with forces already on-hand in the Pacific, while Coronet would need further reinforcements from both the allied home countries and a proportion of the forces that had occupied western Europe from the Nazis. Wes O’Donnell posted an informative article about this last week.
Japan was on the brink of a famine in August 1945 (see special episode ;Famine and revolution at the end of war) and the Soviet invasion was devastating for Japan. Without atomic bombs, Japan would have surrendered later, but before November 1945 (planned date invasion of Kyushu). The Soviet Union would have invaded Hokkaido after taking southern Sakhalin, if Japan refused to surrender.