Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

In one of SoxFan's it mentioned the Americans were concerned about the Soviet communists gaining more territory.

Was the Atomic Bombing of Japan Necessary?
[...]This issue of territory in east Asia was especially important because before the war against Japan, China had been embroiled in a civil war of its own. It was the U.S.-favored nationalists under General Chiang Kai Shek against the communists under Mao Ze Dong. If communist Russia were allowed to gain territory in east Asia, it would throw its considerable military might behind Mao, almost certainly handing the communists a victory once the World War was ended and the civil war was resumed.

Once the bomb was proven to work on July 15, 1945, events took on a furious urgency. There was simply no time to work through negotiations with the Japanese. Every day of delay meant more land given up to Russia and, therefore, a greater likelihood of communist victory in the Chinese civil war. All of Asia might go communist. It would be a strategic catastrophe for the U.S. to have won the War against the fascists only to hand it to its other arch enemy, the communists. The U.S. needed to end the War not in months, or even weeks, but in days.
https://investorshub.advfn.com/boards/read_msg.aspx?message_id=149013817

So no doubt that was a factor in the American thinking. I get the

"no patience, no forbearance, no stomach left among the American public for sparing the Japanese whatever wrath the
American military needed to unleash to bring the war to a close before another single mother's son had to be sacrificed."

and

"IF a prolonged blockade and further casualties from kamikaze attacks had ensued and the American public found out about
the unused atomic bombs, after further casualties and the conclusion of the war, there would have been holy hell to pay."

i get. The latter could also be read to suggest the atomic bombs were used not for purely military reasons (as so many other decisions
in war are not) but to protect American leaders from the possible wrath of the American populace at some later date, as you suggest.

Like so many others the debate will never be settled to eveyone's satisfaction.