I recently came across the very interesting war plan called Operation Downfall, prepared in 1945 by the Americans and outlining their invasion of mainland Japan. The dropping of the two atom bombs on Nagasaki and Hiroshima in August 1945 led to Japan's capitulation and the forestalling of the invasion plans. However, as can be studied in the above link, the plan makes fascinating reading. I had been browsing through Mike Davis's amazing study of apocalypse and Los Angeles, 'The Ecology of Disaster', and pondering how cities become targets, when I stumbled across the invasion plans. The map above in particular shows how US led forces would have landed on beaches in and around Tokyo bay and Yokohama, and worked their way inland from various directions, effectively surrounding Tokyo. This particular element of the plan was called Operation Coronet. I began to think whether other cities around the world have also been the subject and target of invasion plans - and what such plans reveal about the geographies of the cities and the priorities of the invaders. No doubt, numerous Cold War era nuclear target plans exist. However, looking through the 1945 invasion plans of Japan, I was struck by the very human nature of them - relying not on the dropping of bombs, but on the landing of troops who would move into and through populations, neighbourhoods, wards....I find it amazing that the city I live in was subject to such intense strategic scrutiny and analysis. It has made me want to visit the various landing beaches and trace the routes which would have been taken by the Americans.
For Tokyo though, there is always Godzilla.....the ultimate excuse to knock down buildings and neighbourhoods to make way for a new shopping mall or Roppongi Hills.
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