Causation...

...I have written about the power of accepted history in the past. The below is a reminder that popular and conventional wisdom around all historical events is generally wrong and is designed to guide perception away from reality.

The below is from this article.

On Aug. 6, the American bomber Enola Gay dropped its payload on
Hiroshima, leaving the signature mushroom cloud and devastation on the
ground, including something on the order of 100,000 killed. (The
figures remain disputed, and depend on how the fatalities are
counted.)

As Hasegawa writes in his book “Racing the Enemy,” the Japanese
leadership reacted with concern, but not panic. On Aug. 7, Foreign
Minister Shigenori Togo sent an urgent coded telegram to his
ambassador in Moscow, asking him to press for a response to the
Japanese request for mediation, which the Soviets had yet to provide.
The bombing added a “sense of urgency,” Hasegawa says, but the plan
remained the same.

Very late the next night, however, something happened that did change
the plan. The Soviet Union declared war and launched a broad surprise
attack on Japanese forces in Manchuria. In that instant, Japan’s
strategy was ruined. Stalin would not be extracting concessions from
the Americans. And the approaching Red Army brought new concerns: The
military position was more dire, and it was hard to imagine occupying
communists allowing Japan’s traditional imperial system to continue.
Better to surrender to Washington than to Moscow.