[legitster]

The truth is that bombing campaigns alone have never been an effective way to end a conflict. All they do is strengthen resolve.

Even the most extreme case of the nuclear bombs in Japan - had Russia not also invaded from the North with 1.5 million troops, there's a chance they would not have surrendered (and even then it was after a multi-year bombing campaign that eviscerated every other city).

The only realistic scenario for regime change is boots on the ground. The Iran "experts" who suggested a bombing campaign were never serious people.

[opo]

>...had Russia not also invaded from the North with 1.5 million troops, there's a chance they would not have surrendered

The Japanese had already moved all of their experienced troops from Manchuria before the Soviet invasion. They were maybe surprised that the USSR would break the Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact, but the defense of the home islands was their main concern at that point.

The Japanese knew the USSR was not a threat to the main islands as the Soviets could never have done a large invasion of Japan. The Soviets had a few ships that the USA had given them as part of Project Hula, but that is nothing compared to what would be needed for a full scale invasion of Japan. The Soviets did have plans to possibly attack Hokkaido, but as the wikipedia entry says "...Historians have generally considered it unlikely that an invasion of Hokkaido would have succeeded. "

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_Soviet_invasion_of_Ho...

In comparison, the proposed allied invasion was planned to have 42 aircraft carriers, 24 battleships, and 400 destroyers and destroyer escorts. Even that wasn't considered enough:

>...Ken Nichols, the District Engineer of the Manhattan Engineer District, wrote that at the beginning of August 1945, "[p]lanning for the invasion of the main Japanese home islands had reached its final stages, and if the landings actually took place, we might supply about fifteen atomic bombs to support the troops."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Downfall

[leonidasrup]

The bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was just the beginning. At the time of bombing of Nagasaki already a third nuclear weapon was been assembled.

There were plans to increase the A-bomb production rate. After November 1945 U.S. would produce a atomic bomb every 10 days. The production rate for year 1946 was planned to be 6 bombs every month.

https://blog.nuclearsecrecy.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/1...

So after 1946 there would be not much of Japan left to invade.

The bombing of Iran is nowhere the scale of bombing of Japan, see for example the fire bombing of Tokyo.

[defrost]

Kind of moot given Japan surrendered.

Had they not, the carpet bombings would have continued - not just the fire bombing of Tokyo, another 71 cities had also been bombed flat. With H&N that made a total of 74 cities down and a list of targets for future bombing still ready to work through.

FWiW the HE+incendiaries bombings used more planes but were cheaper overall than (at that time) atomic weapons - and (at that time) caused much the same amount of damage, injury, and death.

[orbital-decay]

Korean war was way more extreme. NK has been bombed into an absolute moonscape, yet never surrendered.