In 1967, director Kihachi Okamoto released the film ‘Japan’s Longest Day’, depicting the pivotal 24 hours the government debated if they would accept the Allies’ terms for surrender in 1945. For context, the movie summarizes Japan’s point of view: “for the first seven months of the war Japan was overwhelmingly dominant. In the blink of an eye, the Imperial Forces gained complete ascendancy in the Pacific, the Indian Ocean and projected their immense military might as far south as Australia. But in the Pacific Theatre, a crucial strategic battle was lost at Midway. From that day forward the power of the Imperial Forces gradually began to wane. It became impossible to maintain the strength of the front-line troops. Eventually, the island of Okinawa was lost to the Allies. B29’s flew from bases at Tinian and Saipan and dropped bombs on 92 cities, starting with Tokyo, reducing them to smoldering plains of rubble. Munitions factories were destroyed one after another. 3,600,000 soldiers had been killed or wounded in the war. 1,470,000 civilians had suffered death or injury at home. The victims of the war, on all sides, exceeded 10,000,000. Japan’s days as a conquering nation were numbered. Plans for the so-called “Operation Olympic” which called for deploying a million Allied troops on Japanese soil were well underway. And according to the Japanese Minister of Agriculture and Commerce Ishiguro, the forecast for Autumn 1945 was the worst harvest since 1931. Except for our farmers, most Japanese are on the brink of death from starvation. Japan has no strength to continue the fight! As a last resort, an Imperial Council was held in which they asked the Emperor himself to decide the matter. At the end of the meeting, the Emperor made the following judgment: “To continue the war any further would be to send the people of our nation to their deaths. I desire a swift end to the war.” At 6:00 a.m., August 10th a telegram was transmitted to the Allies via the neutral countries of Sweden and Switzerland. “With the understanding that the status of the Emperor will not in any way be affected, the terms of the Potsdam Declaration are acceptable.”
The World at War Episodes covered in this episode:
22 - “Japan (1941-1945)”- Japanese society during wartime and how life is transformed as the country suffers defeats including the Doolittle raid, Midway, the death of lsoroku Yamamoto, the Battle of Saipan, Okinawa and the relentless bombing of Japanese cities. Interviewees include Toshikazu Kase and Naoki Hoshino.
23 - “Pacific (February 1942- July 1945)” - Battles on tiny islands in the Pacific, aimed towards the Japanese heartland. Following the bombing of Darwin, the Japanese are turned back at Kokoda, Tarawa, Peleliu, the Philippines, Iwo Jia and finally Okinawa. Interviewees include Butch Voris and Frank Mansor.
24 - “The Bomb (February-September 1945)” - The atomic bomb, the ascendency of President Harry Truman, emerging splits in the Allies with Joseph Stalin, the atomic bombings of Hirohima and Nagasaki and the Soviet invasion of Manchuria, leading to the surrender of Japan. Interviewees include Toshikazu Kase, Yoshio Kodama, Marquis Koichi Kido, Major General Charles Sweeney, Brigadier General Paul Tibbets, Alger Hiss, W. Averel Harriman.
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-- References --
- The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936–1945, Toland (1971)
- War Without Mercy: Race & Power in the Pacific War, Dower (1986)
- The Thin Red Line, Malick (1998)
- The Pacific, McKenna (2010)
- The Pacific Crucible: War at Sea in the Pacific, 1941-1942, Toll (2011)
- The Conquering Tide: War in the Pacific Islands, 1942-1944, Toll (2015)
- Twilight of the Gods: War in the Western Pacific, 1944-1945, Toll (2020)
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