Japan 1945

"In addition to the official photographs he turned over to his superiors, O'Donnell recorded some three hundred images for himself, but following his discharge from the Marines he could not bear to look at them. He put the negatives in a trunk that remained unopened until 1989, when he finally felt compelled to confront once more what he had seen through his lens during his seven months in post-war Japan." "Exhibited in Europe and Japan during the 1990s, O'Donnell's photographs were first published in book form in a 1995 Japanese edition. This edition, the first to appear in the United States, includes an additional twenty photographs and will bring O'Donnell's eloquent testament to the horrors of war to an even wider audience."--BOOK JACKET.

In 1945, with her fleet destroyed and her armies beaten, the only thing that stood between Japan and an Allied invasion was the numerous coastal defence positions that surrounded the islands. This is the first book to take a detailed look at the Japanese home island fortifications that were constructed during 1941-45. Utilizing diagrams, specially commissioned artwork, and sources previously unavailable in English, Steven Zaloga examines these defences in the context of a possible Allied invasion, constructing various arguments for one of the greatest 'what if' scenarios of World War II, and helping to explain why the Americans decided to go ahead with a nuclear option.

"Japan has long wrestled with the memories and legacies of World War II. In the aftermath of defeat, war memory developed as an integral part of particular and divergent approaches to postwar democracy. In the last six decades, the demands placed upon postwar democracy have shifted considerably—from social protest through high economic growth to Japan’s relations in Asia—and the meanings of the war shifted with them.This book unravels the political dynamics that governed the place of war memory in public life. Far from reconciling with the victims of Japanese imperialism, successive conservative administrations have left the memory of the war to representatives of special interests and citizen movements, all of whom used war memory to further their own interests.Franziska Seraphim traces the activism of five prominent civic organizations to examine the ways in which diverse organized memories have secured legitimate niches within the public sphere. The history of these domestic conflicts—over the commemoration of the war dead, the manipulation of national symbols, the teaching of history, or the articulation of relations with China and Korea—is crucial to the current discourse about apology and reconciliation in East Asia, and provides essential context for the global debate on war memory."

A “what if?” look at allied plans to invade Japan, and the story of the creation and use of the atomic bomb. In this 200th Campaign series title Clayton Chun examines the final stages of World War II as the Allies debated how to bring about the surrender of Japan. He details Operation Downfall (the planned invasion of the Japanese home islands). Chun explains why these plans were never implemented, before examining the horrific alternative to military invasion – the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki with nuclear weapons. With a series of illustrations, including detailed diagrams of the atomic bombs, a depiction of the different stages of the explosions and maps of the original invasion plans, this book provides a unique perspective of a key event in world history.

Examines the social, cultural, and political underpinnings of Japan's postwar and post-industrial trajectories.

Hiroshima is the story of six people—a clerk, a widowed seamstress, a physician, a Methodist minister, a young surgeon, and a German Catholic priest—who lived through the greatest single manmade disaster in history. In vivid and indelible prose, Pulitzer Prize–winner John Hersey traces the stories of these half-dozen individuals from 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945, when Hiroshima was destroyed by the first atomic bomb ever dropped on a city, through the hours and days that followed. Almost four decades after the original publication of this celebrated book, Hersey went back to Hiroshima in search of the people whose stories he had told, and his account of what he discovered is now the eloquent and moving final chapter of Hiroshima.

A “what if?” look at allied plans to invade Japan, and the story of the creation and use of the atomic bomb. In this 200th Campaign series title Clayton Chun examines the final stages of World War II as the Allies debated how to bring about the surrender of Japan. He details Operation Downfall (the planned invasion of the Japanese home islands). Chun explains why these plans were never implemented, before examining the horrific alternative to military invasion – the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki with nuclear weapons. With a series of illustrations, including detailed diagrams of the atomic bombs, a depiction of the different stages of the explosions and maps of the original invasion plans, this book provides a unique perspective of a key event in world history.

The history of Imperial Japan, from the Meiji Restoration through to defeat and occupation at the end of the Second World War, is central to any understanding of the way in which modern Japan has developed and will continue to develop in the future. This wide-ranging accessible and up-to-date interpretation of Japanese history between 1868 and 1945 provides both a narrative and analysis. Describing the major changes that took place in Japanese political, economic and social life during this period, it challenges widely-held views about the uniqueness of Japanese history and the homogeneity of Japanese society.