Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire [Paperback]

Richard B. Frank (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 1, 2001

In a riveting narrative that includes information from newly declassified documents, acclaimed historian Richard B. Frank gives a scrupulously detailed explanation of the critical months leading up to the dropping of the atomic bomb. Frank explains how American leaders learned in the summer of 1945 that their alternate strategy to end the war by invasion had been shattered by the massive Japanese buildup on Kyushu, and that intercepted diplomatic documents also revealed the dismal prospects of negotiation. Here also, for the first time, is a comprehensive account of how Japan's leaders were willing to risk complete annihilation to preserve the nation's existing order. Frank's comprehensive account demolishes long-standing myths with the stark realities of this great historical controversy.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire is an impeccably written analysis of the last months of the Pacific War and the unfolding of the American air campaign over Japan. The story opens with a searing description of the fire-bombing of Tokyo in March 1945, which caused more deaths than the atom bomb in Hiroshima. Within five months, Japan's economy was collapsing and the country faced catastrophic starvation. Richard B. Frank coolly analyzes different scenarios for ending the war (Russia waited in the wings). Frank concludes that the emperor and the Japanese military were far from ready to surrender, and that the decision to use the atom bomb probably saved millions of lives, not only Allied but Japanese and other Asian lives, also--perhaps a hundred thousand Chinese were dying each month under Japanese occupation. The effects of the bomb worked on many levels, even lending faces to the Japanese militarists, who could convince themselves that they were defeated not by a lack of spiritual power but by superior science. Densely documented, intelligently argued, Downfall recreates the end of the war from the viewpoints of the principals, giving the book an unusual immediacy. A highly valuable insight into the disintegration of the Japanese Empire, one of the most dramatic episodes of World War II. --John Stevenson --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

The premise behind this excellent history of the concluding stages of WWII in the Pacific is that the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki has cast a light so bright that it has blinded historians to many of the political, diplomatic and military realities that existed before August 6, 1945. In his comprehensive study of the last months of WWII, Frank (Guadalcanal) aims to present events "as they were perceived and recorded by American and Japanese participants in 1945Anot years or decades thereafter." In 1945, American strategists developed their plan, "Operation Downfall," for forcing the unconditional surrender of Japan. Japanese leaders, meanwhile, mobilized all available military and civilian resources for a final defense of the homeland. Though they knew the war was lost, Japanese military strategists believed their preparations were sufficient to compel the Allies to offer more generous terms on which the war might end. Frank immerses his readers in the flow of intelligence estimates, battle experience and shifting strategy on both sides. The centerpiece of the book is an exacting and dispassionate examination both of the American decision to use the atomic bomb and of whether Japan would have surrendered absent the bomb. Frank marshals an impressive and complex array of evidence to support his contention that surrender by Japan was by no means imminent in August 1945, and that alternatives to the bomb, such as incendiary bombing, carried no certainty of causing less suffering and fewer deaths than the atomic bomb. In his balanced use of sources and in his tough-minded sensitivity to moral issues, Frank has enriched the debate about the war's conclusion. Agent, Robert Gottlieb of William Morris.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 496 pages
• Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics) (May 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0141001461
• ISBN-13: 978-0141001463
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (52 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #79,415 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #11 in Books > History > Military > Weapons & Warfare > Biological & Chemical
  • #51 in Books > History > Military > Weapons & Warfare > Conventional
  • #74 in Books > History > Asia > Japan

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

134 of 141 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Definite Account, October 19, 1999

By 

Steven Zoraster (Austin, Texas USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire (Hardcover)

This book will become the standard against which all future study of the use of atomic bombs against Japan is judged. The author describes in detail the continuous flow of new information to both the military and government bureaucracies of Japan and the United States. That information, mixed with prevailing ideology on both sides, helped determine the course of the World War II in the Pacific during the summer of 1945. Among pieces of the whole picture which I was not aware of before reading this book are:

1. While the United States was intercepting diplomatic messages sent from Japan to the USSR attempting to achieve a negotiated peace through Russian intervention, it was also intercepting many more messages planning for the last ditch battle against the expected American invasion of Japan. An invasion that the Japanese - including the Emperor - expected to end in a Japanese victory followed by a relatively favorable peace for Japan. (In fact, by August of 1945, Admirals Nimitz and King of the United States Navy worried that the planned invasion would end in a Japanese victory!)

2. The fire-bombing of Japanese cities was just as horrendous as the use of the atomic bomb, causing more deaths when done "correctly," and causing many more deaths in total than were caused by the use of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Plus, if General LeMay hadn't figured out how to "do it" right using B-29s and "conventional" weapons, he would have almost certainly been replaced by someone else, almost as fast as he replaced his predecessor. (His predecessor having failed to get much obvious destruction in Japan out of the B-29s at his command.)

3. About 100,000 civilians in Japanese occupied territory, including the Dutch East Indies, Malaya, China, French Indochina, and the Philippines, were dying because of the war each month the war lasted.

Needless to say, given the facts above, and many others presented in the book, the author of Downfall believes that the decision to use atomic bombs against Japan was almost inevitable, and morally defensible.

73 of 77 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars how the war ended, and why it ended that way, December 15, 2003

By 

Daniel Ford (at danford dot net) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire (Paperback)

Was Hiroshima necessary? What about Nagasaki? Would the invasion of Japan really have cost the lives of a million American soldiers, or were the Japanese eager to give up? And hey, what about those Russians?

People know amazingly little about the Pacific War, compared to the epic conflict between the white nations in Europe. Indeed, the first two weeks of August 1945 loom larger for the chattering classes than do the four years that preceded them--eight years if you date the war from the invasion of China proper--fourteen years if you consider that it started with Japan's annexation of Manchuria. I've been reading about the events of August 1945 for a decade, and I have to say that the analysis gets better as the years go by. Richard Frank's book is the best yet.

Olympic: First off, Frank gives a good capsule description of Operation Olympic, the invasion of Kyushu planned for November 1, and Ketsu-go, the preparations being made to destroy the American invasion force at the beaches. Frank then brings up evidence that during the summer of 1945, the Japanese reinforcement of Kyushu was so fearsome that American planners were beginning to turn against the invasion. By October 15, they now believed, 625,000 troops would be defending Kyushu. On Luzon, Okinawa, and Iwo Jima, the Japanese had shown their willingness to fight almost to the last man, with death tolls running as high as 97 or 98 percent. Meanwhile, they inflicted casualties at the rate of one American for every one or two defenders. To me, that suggests 600,000 Japanese soldiers dead on Kyushu, and upwards of 300,000 Americans killed, wounded, or missing. No wonder Truman wanted the Russians in the war, and no wonder he dropped the atomic bombs.

The Russians are coming! After stringing Japan along for several weeks--the Japanese foolishly hoped that the Soviet Union would broker a negotiated peace with the Allies--the Russians attacked on August 9. So poor were the communications that neither Tokyo nor the Japanese armies on the mainland were aware of how massive the onslaught would be. The battles continued to August 22 in Manchuria--a week after the Japanese surrender--and in Korea the Russians continued to advance until they reached the 38th parallel at the end of the month.

The third object of the Russian attack was Japanese-occupied Sakhalin, and from there an amphibious landing on the northernmost island of Hokkaido. As might be expected, the Japanese fought more ferociously in defense of the homeland than they did for their mainland possessions, and the Russian advance was slow. That resistance, plus an equally stubborn reaction by President Truman, prevented the Soviet Union from gaining a foothold on Hokkaido and thus a voice in the occupation of Japan. On August 22, Stalin halted operations in this area.

Frank estimates that 2.6 million overseas Japanese were captured by the Russians and sent into slave labor. Of this number, about 350,000 died or disappeared into the Gulag--a loss that probably exceeded all of Japan's losses to American air raids in the last year of the war, including the great Tokyo fire-bombing raid and the two atomic attacks.

National suicide: "Even though we may have to eat grass, swallow dirt, and lie in the fields, we shall fight on to the bitter end, ever firm in our faith that we shall find life in death"--so said General Anami, the army minster and one of three (possibly four) hard-liners in the Big Six war cabinet. Given the Japanese requirement for consensus, the military men held veto power over cabinet deliberations. They were backed by officers at all levels of the army and navy: on August 13, Admiral Onishi broke into a government conference to urge: "Let us formulate a plan for certain victory, obtain the Emperor's sanction, and throw ourselves into bringing the plans to realization. If we are prepared to sacrifice 20,000,000 Japanese lives in a special [suicide] effort, victory will be ours!"

Prime Minister Suzuki: "[T]he atomic bombs and the Soviet entry into the war are, in a sense, gifts from the gods." Lacking these new incentives, he feared a revolution that would topple the throne.

General Anami, by the way, wasn't just talking the talk. He walked the walk, committing suicide when the government finally agreed to surrender.

The atomic arsenal: Frank believes that "another bomb was not ready anyway" at the end of the war, because George Marshall and Leslie Groves had delayed transport of the core to Tinian, "making it impossible to ready a third bomb until about August 21." (See the third bomb on this site.) "Groves and Marshall took this action because they believed two bombs would move the Japanese to capitulation, concurring with [SecWar] Stimson's policy that [atomic] bombs should be used only to end the war." Elsewhere, Frank says that on August 13, Maj Gen John Hull telephoned an officer at the Manhattan Project on behalf of General Marshall, saying that the chief of staff wanted all future bombs reserved for tactical use in Operation Olympic.

The Manhattan Project officer estimated that seven bombs would be ready by October 31--the day before the projected invasion. Displaying the then-universal ignorance of long-term radioactivity, he advised a 48-hour "safety factor" before American soldiers advanced into areas hit by atomic weapons. (In an earlier report, the same officer had guessed that radioactivity could be lethal out to 3,500 feet from an explosion, but that the ground would be safe just one hour later.)

At noon on August 14 in Washington, President Truman met with the Duke of Windsor and British ambassador John Balfour. He told them that the latest Japanese message indicated no acceptance of the surrender terms, and that (in Balfour's words) "he had no alternative but to order an atomic bomb dropped on Tokyo." It was at 4:05 p.m. local time that he learned that the Japanese had indeed surrendered.

This is an extraordinary book that belongs on the shelf of anyone with an interest in how the Pacific War was concluded, and why it ended that way -- Dan Ford

39 of 41 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The End and The Beginning, June 2, 2000

By 

"rdoherty" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire (Hardcover)

It is an overworked cliche but still true: the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan is one of those crucial, pivotal events in human history. Richard Frank's "Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire" is undoubtedly the finest history written about the end of World War II and, thus, the beginning of the post-war tribulations. Using many Japanese primary sources as well as new American information, he provides a view into the events, emotions, and intentions nowhere previously available. He succeeds at showing us what people thought and felt and believed in addition to what they did. The insights into the Japanese plans and deliberations are especially illuminating and are essential to understanding the unfolding of events. I don't believe that Mr. Frank will put to rest the argument over the efficacy of using atomic weapons but he has provided the best narrative and explication of the analysis, plans, and decision to use them against Japan. My sole quibble with the writing in "Downfall" is that Mr. Frank breaks Barbara Tuchman's dictum never to argue the sources in the midst of the narrative. If ever there is a book to be an exception to that rule, this one is it.