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A comparison to a Roman siege is absurd. It wouldn’t have been the siege of an army it would have been the siege of an entire nation. In the meantime, as their population died from mass starvation and rampant disease, they would have continued work on their own atomic bomb.

Siege of a blockaded island nation.

They were farming, their rice paddies were not bombed.

Just think if civilian cities were not bombed, civilians could go on with life normal except for rationing. Without the massive air attacks on civilian centers, there would be no particular reason for a rise in disease. They would have had no way to leave port, had no airplanes as the last of the kamakazis crashed. Every airfield runway bombed. The areas around the airfields could be swept clear of equipment by air power. Any reconstruction activity at airfields, bomb it.

Airplanes need runways to take off from.

Strafing and bombing their air forces on the ground.

Instead of thousands of bombers, build thousands more fighters and small ground attack bombers. With over 20 Essex class carriers, we could have kept whole fleets surrounding Japan, nothing in, nothing out. Gradually sweep the nation clear of all anti-aircraft arms. Could take 20 years, but would cost very few lives.

To take the small islands, you put all your forces to the task of one island, massive overwhelming force.

Which, of course, is our present doctrine.

Common sense, why risk lives on your own side when you can present massive overwhelming force at one key point. You just move from key point to key point, annihilating organized military operations and command and control.

Once the civilians realize their military is gone, they happily surrender.

This is how our last few operations have been conducted; we did not play cat and mouse and drag out the whole thing. The drag out nowadays is accomplished by a 10-year occupation of the country after the war proper is long over.

The civilian population simply needs time to think in a case where leaders won't surrender but the war is lost. Waiting is necessary. As months go by and they contemplate their next move and realize they don't have one; they realize they can't inflict any harm on the besieging forces, the siege will never end, they will simply be a neutered, cut off country until they surrender. It may take 20 years of that, but sometimes, waiting is what is needed. I think the Japanese nation would at some point have had a moment of satori, had we taken that somewhat eastern tactic of "waiting" and denied them the brave suicidal death of a final struggle for their soldiers, while also avoiding mass civilian casualties.

The concept of "total war" is a very 20th century, new world order, concept, and it's main purpose is to influence the public mindset by having the threat of total war hanging over the heads of the population.

I gave up magical thinking like that before I was ten years old.

"The concept of "total war" is a very 20th century, new world order, concept..."

General W.T. Sherman sends his regards.

The term “Total War” was invented by Josef Goebbels, he asked for it, he got it.