[Buddha-l] Re: Greetings from Oviedo

[L.S. Cousins]

Stephen,

>The views of Tsuyoshi Hasegawa as summarized in the BBC link you 
>gave are not particularly new.  I have Japanese books dealing with 
>the end months of the Pacific War from which it is apparent that 
>these claims about Japanese peace overtures have been commonplace in 
>Japan for decades.  Without benefit of access to all the surviving 
>primary sources, it would seem plausible that the both the US and 
>Japan would have a vested interest in presenting a somewhat 
>different account of these peace overtures, each favouring and 
>justifying their own perspective.  But as they say, it's the victors 
>who always write the history.
>

The claim about peace overtures was actually made by the Japanese 
leadership in 1945. See their letter of August 10th, offering to 
surrender: http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/war.term/093_03.html . My 
understanding is that this is confirmed from Allied sources.

>If the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had not occurred [typos 
>corrected], it is difficult to determine who would have ultimately 
>prevailed.  However, Japan was virtually exhausted and would have 
>found it difficult to defend the country in any meaningful sense 
>within a very short space of time after August 1945.  I also have 
>the testimony of a very high-ranking Japanese officer based in the 
>military headquarters in Tokyo, whom I knew personally, who also 
>believed that the pro-peace faction would have prevailed within a 
>matter of weeks after the late Soviet entry into the Pacific War -- 
>perhaps all the Allies need to have done would have been to sit back 
>and wait.

I think we are basically in agreement.

Lance Cousins