Potsdam Declaration

• 1. Introduction

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  The Potsdam Declaration named its consequence plainly. "The alternative for Japan is prompt and utter destruction." That warning reached Japan not through diplomatic channels but over the airwaves and from the skies. American bombers dropped over 3 million leaflets carrying its terms above Japanese cities. Collecting those leaflets was illegal in Japan.

  On the 26th of July, 1945, President Harry S. Truman, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Chinese President Chiang Kai-shek jointly issued the document. It formally demanded the unconditional surrender of all Japanese armed forces. The Pacific War had entered its final, most concentrated weeks.

  The declaration's language was precise in some places and deliberately vague in others. Ten days before it was issued, the United States had secretly tested a new kind of weapon in New Mexico.

• 2. Assembling the Declaration

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  Stalin declined to endorse the Potsdam ultimatum for a precise reason. The Soviet Union was not yet at war with Japan. He committed to subscribing to the declaration upon Soviet entry into the war, which was scheduled for early August.

  Truman learned on the 24th of July that the Joint Chiefs of Staff had reached an agreement on military strategy. He passed Churchill a copy of the draft proclamation. It made no mention of the Soviet Union. The American delegation adopted all the British-suggested amendments.

  Chiang Kai-shek had not been invited to the conference, which was held in a suburb of Berlin. Chinese agreement was sought by telegram on the 24th of July. Ambassador Hurley delivered the message the following day in Chongqing. Chiang concurred with a single amendment: his title, "President of the National Government of the Republic of China," was to appear before that of the British Prime Minister. His telegraphic reply left Chongqing at 11:05 a.m. on the 26th of July.

  Churchill had left the Berlin conference for the last time on the 25th of July, flying that afternoon to Northolt with his daughter and aide-de-camp Mary. He authorized the text as Prime Minister before submitting his resignation on the evening of the 26th. The "signatures" of Chiang and Churchill on the document were, in reality, written in Truman's handwriting.

• 3. Terms for an Empire

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  Japan was required to permanently eliminate the authority of those who had "deceived and misled the people of Japan into embarking on world conquest." Allied forces would occupy designated points in Japanese territory. Japanese sovereignty would be confined to Honshu, Hokkaido, Kyushu, Shikoku, and such minor islands as the Allies chose to permit.

  Disarmed Japanese military personnel, the declaration stated, were to be allowed to return home and lead "peaceful and productive lives." The Allies stated they did not intend "that the Japanese shall be enslaved as a race or destroyed as a nation." War criminals, particularly those who had "visited cruelties upon our prisoners," would face what the declaration called "stern justice."

  "Freedom of speech, of religion, and of thought," along with fundamental human rights, were among the guarantees the declaration offered. Japan would be permitted to maintain industries sufficient to sustain its economy and would eventually participate in world trade. The occupying forces would withdraw once a freely chosen, "peacefully inclined and responsible government" had been established. The call for unconditional surrender came only at the document's end. It was paired with a blunt warning: "We will not deviate from them. There are no alternatives. We shall brook no delay."

• 4. Deliberate Silences

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  Contrary to what had been intended at its conception, the Potsdam Declaration made no direct mention of Emperor Hirohito. The original design had been to strip the Japanese leadership of its authority, allowing the people to accept a mediated transition. The final document instead demanded the elimination of those who had "misled the people of Japan." It named no one specifically and left the Emperor's place in any postwar order undefined.

  State Department policy showed an intent to obtain a free hand in running Japan's affairs after the war. Yet the document itself left unresolved whether a Japanese government would remain under Allied supervision or whether Japan would be governed by a foreign military administration. The declaration also left open how many Allied occupation points would be established and what extent of territory Japan might hold after the occupation ended.

  The atomic bomb had been successfully tested in New Mexico on the 16th of July, 1945, the day before the Potsdam Conference opened. The declaration warned of further destruction on the scale of Operation Meetinghouse, the firebombing of Tokyo, and the continued carpet-bombing of Japanese cities. It said nothing about the atomic bomb. Whether Japan's leaders understood that warning as a reference to the weapon just tested would remain one of the war's most debated questions.

• 5. Three Nations, Three Stakes

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  The Republic of China sought the immediate withdrawal of the Imperial Japanese Army, along with its subsidiary force the Kwantung Army, from all Chinese territory, Manchuria included. Until the very end of the war, the Japanese Army had been campaigning in China to maintain its colonial hold. Chinese Nationalist and Communist forces had fought in tandem to expel them.

  The United Kingdom had lost Singapore, Malaya, North Borneo, and Hong Kong to the Japanese advance in 1941-42. The British government's central motivation was restoring control over those prewar possessions in Southeast Asia. A prompt end to the fighting on the Indian front in Burma was also a priority.

  The United States had made unconditional Japanese surrender its core peace requirement before Potsdam, and the declaration restated that long-standing position. Washington also aimed at a complete rollback of Japan's overseas possessions and at preventing Soviet-backed communist expansion across East Asia and Southeast Asia. The outcome depended on a question none of the three governments had fully resolved before the declaration was issued: how Tokyo would respond.

• 6. Tokyo's Debate

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  The Japanese ambassador to Moscow reacted to the declaration by calling it "a big scare-bomb directed against us." Inside Japan, the initial English radio broadcast was received by the Foreign Ministry, the Dōmei News Agency, the Imperial Army, and the Imperial Navy. Takeso Shimoda of the Treaty Division of the Foreign Ministry translated it into Japanese. An internal Foreign Ministry discussion concluded that acceptance was unavoidable but that room for negotiation remained. The internal guidance was blunt: "Remaining silent is prudent; the news media should be instructed to print it without any comments."

  Foreign Minister Shigenori Tōgō moved quickly. He met with Prime Minister Kantarō Suzuki and Cabinet Secretary Hisatsune Sakomizu. Sakomizu later recalled that all three felt the declaration had to be accepted. Tōgō was personally sympathetic to accepting the terms. He found them too vague on the eventual form of Japan's government, on disarmament procedures, and on the fate of accused war criminals. He also still hoped that the Soviet Union might agree to mediate negotiations with the Western Allies.

  Tōgō then met with Emperor Hirohito and advised treating the declaration with great caution. He recommended postponing any reply until Japan received a response from Moscow. According to Foreign Ministry official Toshikazu Kase, Hirohito "said without hesitation that he deemed it the declaration acceptable in principle." The Supreme Council for the Direction of the War met the same day. War Minister Korechika Anami, General Yoshijirō Umezu, and Admiral Soemu Toyoda argued the terms were "too dishonorable" and urged open rejection. Suzuki, Tōgō, and Admiral Mitsumasa Yonai leaned toward acceptance but agreed that clarification on the Emperor's status was needed. Tōgō's suggestion to await the Soviet reply was adopted.

  Suzuki subsequently told the Japanese press that government policy toward the declaration was one of what he described as mokusatsu. The United States interpreted this as "rejection by ignoring." Whether mokusatsu meant that, or simply meant "withholding comment," has been debated ever since. Historians have alleged that the misinterpretation may have contributed to the White House's decision to carry out the threat of destruction. That claim remains contested.

• 7. From Silence to Surrender

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  The United States Army Air Forces dropped the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima on the 6th of August, 1945. The second fell on Nagasaki on the 9th of August, 1945. Both blasts devastated their targets, killing tens of thousands of people. The destruction of infrastructure, military bases, and factories took seconds. It extended across a radius stretching more than 1 mile, or 1.6 kilometers.

  American historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa found that no governmental record from immediately after the Hiroshima bombing showed a shift toward accepting the Potsdam Declaration's terms. Truman issued a stark warning in a widely broadcast speech after Hiroshima. He told Japan to expect "a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth." Suzuki, meeting the press, reiterated Japan's commitment to ignore the Allied demands and fight on.

  On the 9th of August, Joseph Stalin declared war on Japan. He was acting on a secret agreement reached at the Yalta Conference in February and formally abrogated the 1941 Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact. Soviet forces invaded Manchuria on three fronts. The previous day, the Soviet Union had agreed to adhere formally to the Potsdam Declaration.

  The Japanese government's surrender offer of the 10th of August attempted to preserve the Emperor's administrative prerogative within the declaration's framework. Secretary of State James F. Byrnes replied. From the moment of surrender, Byrnes stated, the Emperor's authority would be subject to the Allied Supreme Commander. At 1200 JST on the 15th of August, 1945, Emperor Hirohito announced his acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration. For many Japanese people, it was the first time they had ever heard the Emperor's voice. Formal surrender documents were signed on the 2nd of September, 1945.

  General MacArthur landed in Japan in September 1945. The Potsdam Declaration then became the legal basis for the occupation's reforms, as stipulated in the Japanese Instrument of Surrender. The People's Republic of China cites the Potsdam Declaration as one of the foundations of the One-China Principle. That principle holds that Taiwan is part of China.