Death to the General-San

Author says: what if the the USA did not have the Bomb to cower the Japanese into defeat?. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).

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icon to follow us on Facebook.on this day the US Occupation Authority issued an arrest for forty-seven officerless Japanese warriors following the gruesome discovery of the severed head of the hated General-san Douglas MacArthur in a bucket on the samurai grave of Asano in Sengaku-ji.

But in the turmoil of post-war Japan the men had little difficulty in fleeing to Hokkaidõ where they were concealed by the communist government of the Democratic People's Republic of Japan.

Of course the signs had been omninous ever since a massive typhon had ripped apart Admiral Halsey's invasion fleet. Exceptionalists in Japanese society issued a reinvigorated call to arms, believing that the "kamikaze" divine wind was an omen that the defenders could repel the invaders, as Shinto Priests had intepreted the destruction of Kubla Khan's Mongol Navy in 1274 and 1281.

Unable to prevent X-Day from succeeding albeit at huge cost, they sharpened their focus on a new goal. Sending the severed head of the invading commander back to Washington, as their forefathers had with Commodore Matthew C. Perry who insulted the long-standing policy of international isolation known as "sakoku".

The subjugation of the exceptionalists stretched US Forces to the absolute limit of their resources, forcing a reluctant Truman to share the burden of the American occupation with the Soviet Union. Fighting for their cultural and national survival, only one legend remainded intact, that of the forty-seven ronin who avenged their samurai by placing the severed head of their enemy in a bucket on their master Alano's grave.

Author says in the preamble to Kim Stanley Robinson's short story "The Lucky Strike" Mark McNally argues that the ferocity of the Pacific War was due to the combatants shared sense of exceptionalism:
"The historian John Dower has documented how race was an especially prominent feature of the Pacific War. Although the United States was a great world power by the outbreak of the war, to many Japanese, Americans were a "mongrel" people, fundamentally lacking Japan's own racial purity. Purity, Dower contends, was the basis for Japanese claims of racial superiority. On the other hand, Americans had equally racist views of the Japanese and they used various slurs and epithets against them. Thus to the Japanese, the Americans were inferior humans, to the Americans, the Japanese were sub-human"
To view guest historian's comments on this post please visit the Today in Alternate History web site.

Imagine what would be, if history had occurred a bit differently. Who says it didn't, somewhere? These fictional news items explore that possibility. Possibilities such as America becoming a Marxist superpower, aliens influencing human history in the 18th century and Teddy Roosevelt winning his 3rd term as president abound in this interesting fictional blog.