From: andrew@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (Andrew Sung Hyun Kim)
Subject: Re: questions of the Korean War
Organization: Northwestern University, Evanston Illinois.
Date: Sun, 22 Nov 1992 22:28:40 GMT

In article <1992Nov22.214349.27377@tc.cornell.edu> jfe@alchemy.tn.cornell.edu (Brian Chung) writes:
>In article <1992Nov22.205411.3685@news.acns.nwu.edu> andrew@casbah.acns.nwu.edu (Andrew Sung Hyun Kim) writes:
>>Please add following information to your analysis:
>>    [From "Modern Times", Paul Johnson ... pg 425]
>>
>>  On 6 June (1945) the Japanese Supreme Council approved a document,
>>  'Fundamental Policy to be Followed henceforth in the Conduct of
>>   the War', which assertd 'we shall ... prosecute the war to the
>>  bitter end'.  THe final plan for the defense of Japan itself,
>>  'Operation Decision', provided for 10,000 suicide plane (most
>>  converted trainers), fifty-three infantry troops would fight on the
>>  beaches, backed by 4 million army and navy civil employees and a 
>>  civiliAan militia of 28 million.  They were to have weapons which 
>>  included bamboo spears and bows and arrows.  Special legislation
>>  was passed by the Diet to form this army.  The allied commanders
>>  assumed that their own forces must expect up to a million casulties
>>  if an invasion of Japan became necessary.  How many Japanese lives
>>  would be lost?  Assuming comparable ratios to these already
>>  experienced, it would be in the range of 10-20 million.
>
>	However, this was in June.  In August, the Soviets declared war.
>"The Russians, meanwhile, declared war on August 8 and the Red Army moved
>forward in Manchuria and southern Sakhalin.  The Japanese Manchurian Army
>surrendered."  (Rise to Globalism by Stephen Ambrose.)  I gave more
>weight to the argument that said that the Japan may be ready to die by
>inflicting a terrible damage to the United States, but she wasn't ready
>to fight both the US and the Russians at the same time and from two
>different directions.
>>
>PS-Welcome back, Andrew.  Long time, no type.  :)

After the drop of the first atomic bomb the reactions by the
Japanese governments lend credance to their willingness to fight
even after the devastation of Hiroshima.  See excerpts below:

  Publicly, the Japanese government reaction was to send a protest
  to the world through the Swiss embassy...
  Privately, they summoned Nishina [more about him later], head
  of their atomic program, to Tokyo to demand whether the Hiroshima
  bomb was a genuine nuclear weapon and, if so, whether he could
  duplicate it within six months.
                       [from Modern Times... Paul Johnson]

This was AFTER the first A-bomb was dropped.

Nishina was an distinuished nuclear physicist.  By 1940 they had
first cyclotron, and by the time of the Russian invasion of North
Korea they had "huge nuclear installation in HungNam (North Korea),
later dismanteled by the Soviets..."  [from "Hirohito" by Edward Behr]

Same book also mention about possible nuclear explosion in HungNam
on August 10th, 1945 [by Japanese eyewitness].  There are many other
'evidences' that Japan was working on A-bomb [ibid] , and I am
sure that they would not have hesitated in using it.

>T. H. Brian Chung                 

Andrew Sung Hyun Kim        " 'All truth is simple',  is it not doubly a lie?"
andrew@eecs.nwu.edu         " The refinement of morality increase  with  the
andrew@casbah.acns.nwu.edu    refinement of fear "       Friedrich Nietzsche

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