What led Japan to surrender in WWII
Whenever the story of World War II is told, there’s the part where the US dropped nuclear bombs on Japan and then they surrendered. It was always clear that there was a connection between the two — Japan surrendered because of the nuclear bombs dropped on them. But Ward Wilson at Foreign Policy disputes this — he argues, persuasively, that it was Stalin invading Japan that led them to surrender.
The Bomb Didn’t Beat Japan … Stalin Did
Why does this matter? Because one of the arguments of the countries with nuclear weapons has always been that Japan surrendered because of nuclear weapons therefore having nuclear weapons provides a deterrent. This analysis throws that argument out the window.