alt Hacker NewsYou are probably right that Japan were close to surrendering and had begun some signaling around it, particularly via the soviets, but my understanding is that they hadn't actually done that, and according to the sources I read, they absolutely weren't willing to unconditionally surrender and demilitarize before the bomb.
But I don't understand why you put the ground invasion plans in quotes - are you claiming that all the effort spent on Operation Downfall[0] was just a misdirection intended to fool everyone, including the high-ranking officers involved in the planning?
I don't think it was a misdirection, but I do think it was an obviously bad idea that should've never materialized, and it didn't. I'm arguing it wouldn't have materialized anyway, and if it did, it wouldn't have been necessary.
Things did work out for Japan in the long run, but I still believe a conditional surrender + no atomic bombs should have been the solution. The US was very greedy with its demands, and I think a large part of that is our history of militarism and our desire to use new weaponry. The atomic bomb was already made, and I think realistically we were just itching to use it.