What if Japan had surrendered conditionally?

They tried, no less than four times. The Americans really just wanted to test their new bombs.

What they tried was offering conditional armistices which would have left the Japanese military regime intact. And that was not acceptable to any Allied power - and for good reason.
 
The Japanese went from a God Emperor who could literally trace his supposed blood-line back to the start of the Human Race and a a God who walked the Earth to a guy who has less actual authority than The Queen of England.

On the other hand, he did get to retain more prime real estate in his capital city than Queen Lizzy gets to have in hers.
 

CalBear

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In a similar vein as the above, would the Wallies consider conditional surrender if Japan was defeated earlier on, let's say in Malaya, or even in FIC?
It would depend on what the conditions were. There would be a pound or three of flesh demanded (Japan isn't going to get a pass on Pearl, the PoW & Repulse, etc.) but there really haven't been any noteworthy war crimes against the West (tons, of course, in China) so stepping things down will be much easier. As a possible acceptable set of terms reparations for damaged/destroyed materials, payments to the families of those Westerners KIA/WIA, maybe/maybe not turning part of the Mandates over to the UK or U.S. (depends on how bad the Empire's position is at the time of the end of hostilities), and some sort of bone to the Chinese (hand over some senior scapegoats for Nanking, a "commission" to discuss outstanding issues with the Chinese).

The important part is that this is prior to FDR's pronouncement of "Unconditional Surrender". That gives everyone the space to make a deal
so? the guy was a war criminal,keeping him as the head of state for 40 fucking years was the same kind of mistake the allied did with so many nazi criminals who were handes west germany on a tablet to lieve out the rest of their live in peace,comfort and position of authority. at least they didn't put doenitz in charge over here.

I actually don't entirely disagree, way too many War Criminals skated. But that has to be weighed against the reality that at least 100,000 civilians were dying every month in areas under Japanese occupation (it is sometimes forgotten that the IJA was still conducting OFFENSIVE operations against the Chinese when the Surrender was announced, and people were dying across SEA and the DEI). Tee Japanese don't surrender and that slaughter continues. Even if the WAllies don't invade Japan (which is something of an open question, by mid-August 1945 the bloom was off the orchid on Operation Downfall in DC, about the only place it was still popular was MacArthur's HQ) and simply decide to blockade and bomb that is going to mean at least half a million more Japanese civilians die.

There is also the very real possibility that Stalin decides to invade Hokkaido, something that the Americans were bound and determined to prevent after seeing the way that things were shaping up in Europe. The potential consequences of that little disagreement are fairly severe.

The fact is that the Japanese were entirely willing to stay the course and it was only the Emperor's direct intervention that allowed the Peace Party the space to end things; that intervention is vastly less likely if Hirohito thinks he is putting his head in a noose. There is also the reality that U.S. occupation of Japan was a piece of cake, something that could very easily have been a nightmare for all sides became an administrative exercise. Lastly the Japan of today, with all of its wealth, success, and liberal democracy, is 100% the result of a peaceful occupation and the Emperor's acceptance.

If the choice is between: A) an additional million+ dead civilians, a WAllied/Soviet conflict, a long term violent occupation of the Home Islands, and the possibility of Downfall, with casualties over all that could reach the mid seven figures,

Or

B)Hirohito getting to die of old age (which is what is on the table)

I take "B" every time.
 
The Japanese "peace proposals" were much like some of the preliminary "talks" the Nazis tried to do through intermediaries. Basically approaches by those who were not the people who could actually deliver the goods in an attempt to try and get some lifeboats launched before the ship went down. They were desperate attempts to avoid full occupation and the rearrangement of the governing system (in both cases) at a point when the only card either country had to play was "we'll keep fighting and commit suicide and take some of you with us". Not much of a bargaining position.

The "USA wanted to test bombs on cities" or "the USA wanted to drop bombs to intimidate the Russians" tropes are prominent in revisionist analyses. One piece of "evidence" is that the USA intercepted a diplomatic cable in July, 1945 from Japan to Russia asking Russia to act as an intermediary. Since the USA had this code this is used to show the US had this info and could have negotiated (so no bomb or Olympic or starvation). The reality that decoding this sort of cable would have been low priority and the US resources to decode and translate intercepts was limited so cables like this would sit around for quite some time before being decoded/translated - and am nit sure if this was done until well after the surrender. In any case the Russians were about to attack Japan and had no interest in forwarding such information as if Japan surrenders before Russia attack they get no spoils. As far as "intimidation" goes, between 1945 and 1949 when the US atomic monopoly ended, Stalin abrogated any agreements concerning governance in Eastern Europe, and sponsored the coup in Czechoslovakia as well as supporting the communist side in the Greek civil war. With the exception of the Berlin Airlift and not winning in Greece he got everything he could have hoped for in Europe.
 
It would depend on what the conditions were. There would be a pound or three of flesh demanded (Japan isn't going to get a pass on Pearl, the PoW & Repulse, etc.) but there really haven't been any noteworthy war crimes against the West (tons, of course, in China) so stepping things down will be much easier. As a possible acceptable set of terms reparations for damaged/destroyed materials, payments to the families of those Westerners KIA/WIA, maybe/maybe not turning part of the Mandates over to the UK or U.S. (depends on how bad the Empire's position is at the time of the end of hostilities), and some sort of bone to the Chinese (hand over some senior scapegoats for Nanking, a "commission" to discuss outstanding issues with the Chinese).

The important part is that this is prior to FDR's pronouncement of "Unconditional Surrender". That gives everyone the space to make a deal

I'm trying to even imagine a Japanese defeat in 1942 so severe that the Japanese regime decides to sue for peace. And it's hard to do. The Allies simply did not have anything like assets in theater to do it, and the war with Germany made it extremely difficult to justify diverting enough to alter that equation.

About the best I can come up with (short of an asteroid strike) is that the US and Britain get full wind of the Japanese plans for war several weeks ahead of time, enabling a surprise interception of the Kido Butai, and rolling snake eyes enough times to smash up most of it, combined with dispatch of a much larger Force Z and additional air assets at the last minute to Malaya (and, one hopes, a replacement for Percival) allowing them to crush Yamashita's army and neutralize IJN surface forces. (Hell, even MacArthur could probably fake a competent defense with that much warning.) I still doubt even this would be enough to bring Japan to terms, given how zealous the military leadership was by that point; but let's say, somehow, that it does.

On the one hand, you're right to note that having this happen before Casablanca creates more maneuvering room for the Allies. As does the lack of major atrocities against Western armies and civilian populations. There is no Bataan Death March, Alexandra Hospital massacre, forced labor of POW's in Burma, etc.

Just as critical is the advantage of halting the Pacific War to enable a more complete focus on defeating Nazi Germany.

Against all that is the outrage over the Japanese surprise attack, and the fear that Japan cannot be trusted to keep any deal; that any peace which leaves Japan's regime intact and her Inner Empire largely intact as well is just putting Judgment Day off into the future. (Lurking back in the subconscious might be the thought that a rump Japanese Empire might be valuable as a counter to Soviet ambitions and the possible spread of communism in the Far East, once it becomes clear that the Soviets will not be defeated by Hitler.)

You're probably not far off base for a starting point. A full withdrawal from China, Indochina, Thailand (and whatever they had in the Philippines) and the Pacific Ocean mandates would be non-negotiable. With reparations and cutoff from oil imports, the Japanese economy (and Navy) would be grinding to a halt anyway.
 
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Italian neutrality might make keeping more assets in the Far East easier. No North Africa campaign and all.
 

CalBear

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I'm trying to even imagine a Japanese defeat in 1942 so severe that the Japanese regime decides to sue for peace. And it's hard to do. The Allies simply did not have anything like assets in theater to do it, and the war with Germany made it extremely difficult to justify diverting enough to alter that equation.

About the best I can come up with (short of an asteroid strike) is that the US and Britain get full wind of the Japanese plans for war several weeks ahead of time, enabling a surprise interception of the Kido Butai, and rolling snake eyes enough times to smash up most of it, combined with dispatch of a much larger Force Z and additional air assets at the last minute to Malaya (and, one hopes, a replacement for Percival) allowing them to crush Yamashita's army and neutralize IJN surface forces. (Hell, even MacArthur could probably fake a competent defense with that much warning.) I still doubt even this would be enough to bring Japan to terms, given how zealous the military leadership was by that point; but let's say, somehow, that it does.

On the one hand, you're right to note that having this happen before Casablanca creates more maneuvering room for the Allies. As does the lack of major atrocities against Western armies and civilian populations. There is no Bataan Death March, Alexandra Hospital massacre, forced labor of POW's in Burma, etc.

Just as critical is the advantage of halting the Pacific War to enable a more complete focus on defeating Nazi Germany.

Against all that is the outrage over the Japanese surprise attack, and the fear that Japan cannot be trusted to keep any deal; that any peace which leaves Japan's regime intact and her Inner Empire largely intact as well is just putting Judgment Day off into the future. (Lurking back in the subconscious might be the thought that a rump Japanese Empire might be valuable as a counter to Soviet ambitions and the possible spread of communism in the Far East, once it becomes clear that the Soviets will not be defeated by Hitler.)

You're probably not far off base for a starting point. A full withdrawal from China, Indochina, Thailand (and whatever they had in the Philippines) and the Pacific Ocean mandates would be non-negotiable. With reparations and cutoff from oil imports, the Japanese economy (and Navy) would be grinding to a halt anyway.
Ya, the only thing I could think of to make this possible is the Japanese to sending everything out in a low grade code that the American and British listening post in Shanghai and Hong Kong intercept and/or Sorge get a full copy of the plans and Stalin decides its in his best interest to share the intel.

Then you would need the Americans, the British AND the Dutch to agree to bushwack them.
 
Ya, the only thing I could think of to make this possible is the Japanese to sending everything out in a low grade code that the American and British listening post in Shanghai and Hong Kong intercept and/or Sorge get a full copy of the plans and Stalin decides its in his best interest to share the intel.

Then you would need the Americans, the British AND the Dutch to agree to bushwack them.

Yeah.

The bushwacking agreement might take some doing. It's still a risk. It requires diversion of assets Churchill cannot easily spare. FDR's instinct might well be to confront the Japanese with the knowledge, even at the risk of revealing that Japanese codes had been penetrated.

That said: the U.S. intel community might well threaten to commit seppuku if that's under consideration. Churchill, absolutely desperate to bring FDR into the war, might think a major sudden commitment to Singapore worth the price of admission, and would push hard for an ambush. An ambush which, by the way, would intensely raise Japanese suspicions that their codes were compromised anyway.

I'd think you would need a solid 8 weeks of advance notice - minimum - to assemble the necessary forces in theater. What you really need are quality air assets, as many as you can scrounge up.
 
I seem to remember reading that the British plan for war with Japan involved conditional surrender. IIRC, it was developed assuming a solely Anglo-Japanese War: their plan was 'Beat them at sea; blockade the Home Islands; status quo ante with reparations'.

Of course, it was operating under a set of assumptions there... :D
 
I seem to remember reading that the British plan for war with Japan involved conditional surrender. IIRC, it was developed assuming a solely Anglo-Japanese War: their plan was 'Beat them at sea; blockade the Home Islands; status quo ante with reparations'.
British military diplomacy was historically focused on conditional surrenders. There were always Treaties of this or that, such as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Utrecht and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Paris_(1783)

Conditional surrenders were the norm amongst all the Great Powers until Versailles.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_treaties
 
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