Replying to a message of Jeff Snyder to TOM WALKER:

 JS> As far as your rationalization for the two nukes is concerned, sorry,
 JS> but I remain unconvinced of the necessity for dropping them on those
 JS> two cities.

In point of fact the use of those two nukes *was* unnecessary.  Unfortunately
for all concerned the US government didn't find out it wasn't necessary until
some months after the fact.

A month or two before the nukes were used the Japanese government sent a
message to its ambassador in Moscow telling him to ask Stalin to open a
communication line with the Allies in order to talk about ending the war in
the Pacific.  Stalin elected to not pass the message along or take any other
action.  The original message (and any responses) was intercepted by US
intelligence, but was not decrypted or translated until months after the war
had ended.  Diplomatic traffic had a low priority.  The story is is David Kahn's
"The Codebreakers," MacMillan, 1966.

Note that Stalin declared war on Japan *after* the first nuke was used, prior
to that time the two countries were not at war.  In point of fact, there was
considerable shipping between the US west coast and Vladivostok throughout
the war; said shipping was not convoyed and was not bothered by the Japanese
navy.

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