If we are to condemn the atomic bombing of these two towns, then we must also condemn the bombings of Hamburg, Dresden, and Tokyo (B-29 raid raid on Tokyo with incendiary bombs for paper houses).
The Doolittle raid on Tokyo (with little impact except for morale) resulted in over 200,000 Chinese being killed in retaliation for that raid by the Japanese in 1942.
There was an article I read last week that the US intended to use at least 9 atomic bombs as part of an invasion. Three bombs for each invasion area, with one bomb to "soften" the landing area, one bomb dropped behind the landing area, and a third bomb to nuke reinforcements.
Buchanan is flat wrong that Japan could not defend itself -- there were about 10,000 Kamikaze planes ready for the invasion, and Japan was constantly building more.
US Navy losses off Okinawa were horrific in World War II. The invasion of Japan would have made the losses to the US Navy at Okinawa pale by comparison
I guess if we only lost 5 battleship, 20 aircraft carriers, 30 cruisers, and a 100 destroyers in the invasion of Japan, then maybe Buchanan would see a different light. (These figures are extreme, but well within ball park figures of what could have happend.)
And in case you don't realize it, today we don't have 20 aircraft carriers to lose in a single battle.
The figures that the Truman administration estimated were 500,000 Allied soldiers killed and over 2 million Japanese soldiers if Japan was invaded. There was also fighting going on in the Philippines, and people dying in Japanese death camps.
Finally, even when the Japanese War Council met to discuss surrender after the atomic bombings, the War Council was deadlocked -- it was the Emperor's vote that broke the deadlock. In the next 24 hours, there were several military attempts on the Emperor's life. Japan's warlords were not that willing to surrender even after getting NUKED a couple of times.
So Buchanan is off in the weeds with some of his analysis and commentary.
There have been a number of comments over the years by military people who suggested that an invasion of Japan was absolutely unnecessary for the U.S. to win the war. As an island nation with few natural resources, the country could not possibly have sustained a major military force for very long.
I saw a fascinating show on the Discovery Channel last weekend, about the role the Emperor played in the planning and execution of the war. If not a direct planner, he signed off on everything, including the atrocities against the Chinese before the Japanese ever bombed Pearl Harbor, of which he was also aware.
Near the end of the war, when surrender of the armed forces was demanded by the Allies, there were some who wanted to do so, but the leader of the Army forces vehemently disagreed saying that he still had a million men who were ready to die for Japan and that they would kill all the Americans who landed on their shores.
That shows that they were willing to fight to the death of every soldier and civilian, if need be to repel and invasion. It would have resulted in the deaths of tens of thousands of American soldiers, obviously, as well. My late father-in-law was one who was slated to have been sent in that invasion in the Fall of 1945, so he was grateful that the bombs were dropped.