Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire
by Richard B. Frank
List Price:
Our Price: $6.83
You Save: $11.17 (62%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $5.19 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions
Book Summary Information
Author: Richard B. FrankEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2001-05-01
ISBN: 0141001461
Number of pages: 496
Publisher: Penguin (Non-Classics)
Book Reviews of Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire
Book Review: The Best Book I've Found On the End of the Pacific War
Summary: 5 Stars
For over forty years, I've been reading about the end of World War II and Japan. Were the Japanese ready to surrender? Were the atomic bombs dropped to intimidate the Soviet Union? Was racism the real motive?
Richard Frank's DOWNFALL: THE END OF THE IMPERIAL JAPANESE EMPIRE, is the best book on this subject I've ever read. Frank takes us back to 1945, and shows what the United States knew then, and how they knew it. Based on the information they had available at the time, the U.S. and British leaders had no reason to believe that the effective leaders of Japan were going to surrender any time soon, or that any alternative course they chose would lead to fewer deaths. Further, he shows that these judgments were correct: there is still no evidence that the effective rulers of Japan would have surrendered in 1945, and all the alternatives to the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki would have definitely led to hundreds of thousands MORE DEATHS of civilians and soldiers.
I regard the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as atrocities and crimes, but the whole of the war was a succession of atrocities and crimes, the greatest bloodbath in history. Frank shows, convincingly, that the use of atomic weapons was the least evil among the choices Harry S Truman faced.
Summary of Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empire
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.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
General Books
Book Subjects
- Arts & Photography
- Audiobooks on Cassette
- Audiobooks on CD
- Biographies & Memoirs
- Business & Investing
- Children's Books
- Comics & Graphic Novels
- Computers & Internet
- Cooking, Food & Wine
- e-Books
- Engineering
- Entertainment
- Gay & Lesbian
- Health, Mind & Body
- History
- Home & Garden
- Horror
- Law
- Literature & Fiction
- Medicine
- Mystery & Thrillers
- Nonfiction
- Outdoors & Nature
- Parenting & Families
- Professional & Technical
- Reference
- Religion & Spirituality
- Romance
- Science
- Science Fiction & Fantasy
- Sports
- Teens
- Travel
Most talked about in Strategic Bombing: A History
Waging Modern War: Bosnia, Kosovo, and the Future of Combatby Wesley K. Clark
Published: 2002-08-09; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.39
Price in other shops:
The Generals' War : The Inside Story of the Conflict in the Gulfby Michael R. Gordon, General Bernard E. Trainor
Back Bay Books; Published: 1995-11-09; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.00
Price in other shops:
Bombing to Win: Air Power and Coercion in War (Cornell Studies in Security Affairs)by Robert Pape
Cornell University Press; Published: 1996-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $20.65
Price in other shops:
Limits of Air Powerby Mark Clodfelter
Free Press; Published: 1989-05-18; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $30.00
Price in other shops:
Linebacker: The Untold Story of the Air Raids Over North Vietnamby Karl J. Eschmann
Ballantine Books; Published: 1989-09-30; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $9.50
Rolling Thunder: The Strategic Bombing Campaign, North Vietnam 1965-1968by John Smith
Crecy Publishing Ltd; Published: 1995-10-20; Paperback; Book
Best price: $19.36
Price in other shops:
Downfall: The End of the Imperial Japanese Empireby Richard B. Frank
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2001-05-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.85
Price in other shops:
Among the Dead Cities: Is the Targeting of Civilians in War Ever Justified?by A.C. Grayling
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC; Published: 2007-02-05; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.63
Price in other shops:
The Strategic Bombing of Germany, 1940-1945by Alan J. Levine
Praeger Publishers; Published: 1992-07-30; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $117.95
Thirty Seconds Over Tokyoby Ted W. Lawson
Pocket Star; Published: 2004-07-27; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.21
Price in other shops:
Similar Books and other products
Prompt and Utter Destruction: Truman and the Use of Atomic Bombs Against Japanby J. Samuel Walker
The University of North Carolina Press; Published: 2005-02-28; Paperback; Book
Best price: $16.15
Price in other shops:
Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945 (Oxford History of the United States)by David M. Kennedy
Oxford University Press, USA; Published: 2001-04-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $14.91
Price in other shops:
Racing the Enemy: Stalin, Truman, and the Surrender of Japanby Tsuyoshi Hasegawa
Belknap Press; Published: 2006-09-30; Paperback; Book
Best price: $12.56
Price in other shops:
Retribution: The Battle for Japan, 1944-45by Max Hastings
Knopf; Published: 2008-03-18; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $15.98
Price in other shops:
Shattered Sword: The Untold Story of the Battle of Midwayby Jonathan Parshall, Anthony Tully
Potomac Books Inc.; Published: 2007-11-19; Paperback; Book
Best price: $17.78
Price in other shops:
Why the Allies Wonby Richard Overy
W. W. Norton & Company; Published: 1997-05; Paperback; Book
Best price: $11.30
Price in other shops:
Eagle Against the Sun: The American War With Japanby Ronald Spector
Vintage; Published: 1985-10-12; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.89
Price in other shops:
With the Old Breed: At Peleliu and Okinawaby E.B. Sledge
Presidio Press; Published: 2007-09-25; Mass Market Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.02
Price in other shops:
Guadalcanal: The Definitive Account of the Landmark Battleby Richard B. Frank
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 1992-01-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.72
Price in other shops:
Invasion of Japan: Alternative to the Bombby John Ray Skates
University of South Carolina Press; Published: 2000-03-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $12.96
Price in other shops: