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It was a "military necessity" to the leaders, who knew they couldn't invade Japan, since Admiral Nimitz had written to the Joint Chiefs in June, informing them that the Navy could no longer support an invasion, given the casualties they had suffered at Okinawa (second bloodiest campaign after the naval battles at Guadalcanal) and the expectation the Japanese had even more kamikazes waiting.

Had they put as much thought into the question of retaining the emperor - which they ruled out with the stupidity of FDR's publicity statement about "unconditional surrender" at Casablanca, thus giving the Japanese "dead enders" their reason to continue - and let the Japanese know they would be allowed to keep the emperor (as was later decided), the dead-enders would have lost their argument to continue and t he war would have ended.

But no, they knew that "more bombing" would finally bring them around, despite the fact "more bombing" didn't win with Germany, or later with North Korea/China, or later in Vietnam.

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