The start of the cold war was Waaaaaaaay before that.

I mean hell, it's worth noting Communist Russia came to power in the middle of a war in which 'White" russia was allied with the USA and Britain.  Many of the "Allies" in World War 2 sent troops and supplies to russia during the russian civil war to prevent the communists from coming to power... Including the United States.

So the two countries who didn't really trust each other in the first place.  With the USA trying to prevent them from taking over in the first place, and then communist rehtoric being that htey were basically the enemy of all capitalism.

That the two would butt heads after becoming two huge fish in a small pond was inevitable.

1) Back then Total War was the definition of the day.  See for example the Nazi bombings of London.  Back then they figured bombing cities would cause a countries people to demand surrender quicker.

2) Army bases were generally based inside or near cities.  The cities they attacked actually did have military facilties that were the targets.  Hiroshima was home to a number of military camps and had a supply base.  

Nagasaki was a huge industrial city that produced a lot of war matierals.  90% of the cities workers built things for the war.

They were honestly probably the best military targets available, because all the other ones had already been bombed into dust.

I though the Japanese were willing to fight until no one was left but America saw that the war was over in Europe and so wanted to end the war there to save American lives. The nuclear bomb was ready by chance by 1945 and could do what it promised for the Americans and the extreme power of it probably shocked the emperor who fought one day it would be dropped on Tokyo if they didn't surrender, as the nuclear bomb acted as a warning. I don't really know what Stalin has to do with, except for the fact that the Soviet Union did declare war on Japan in July 1945, but by then they couldn't do anything

I remember being taught that had America and the British Commonwealth (practically all Australian soldiers most of the time) not moved quickly and occupied the Japanese Archipelago, then the USSR could have taken the top half and caused another East/West Germany / North/South Korea in Japan, Fear of a Russian invasion would have definitely been a factor in surrender, but the bombs likely forced their hand more so.

I still think under the ideas that the Bombs were more for Russia's sake than for the Japanese.

What better way to dissuade the Russians from further aggression than a huge display of force? Unfortunately, the best option for the USA was a massive display, but just dropping a bomb wasnt enough, they needed a target. Much more effective display, dropping the two bombs on Japan.

So it's even worse.

But that's no big surprise, everyone knows that japanese were down before Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

Yeah, USA shot men that were already down with an illegal weapon.

Anyway, Japan giving up before total annihilation doesn't seem right.

From what I've read, the Japanese were already ready to surrender and had begun talks up to a full year before the bombs were dropped. The only reason there had not been a surrender was because America demanded the unconditional surrender of Japan, but Japan was only 99.9% willing, with the exception that the emperor be left in power. America said "sorry, that's not your decision". After the bombs were dropped a year later, America accepted the same surrender terms given by the Japanese that full year before. The emperor was left on the throne. We did not get the unconditional surrender that we've been taught the a-bombs garnered.

That's not true actually.  Tied to this actually, most reports of negotiations of surrender come from Russian sources... because this information was delibritly linked to try and prevent russian invasion.

The few offers out there that were real basically involved Japan keeping full soverignty, no war crimes trials, some even asked for land.

In general, among Japan's "Big six" when the war turned there were 3 who wanted to go down fighting... and 3 who wanted to sue for peace.

I belielve the 3 who wanted to go down fighting uncoincidentally all would have been charged with war crimes. (Well those that didn't kill themselves.)

They wanted to grind out the war until they could get out scott free.

Oh, and it's also worth noting, The US wanted Russia to declare war on Japan... up until right before they dropped the bombs.

So whether it was a deciding factor or not, Truman thought it would be.

Arguably Russia only declared war to get their share of war spoils after the Nuclear Bombs were dropped.

In a way, you could argue the nuclear bombs caused the russian invasion.

I believe it was Japanese time travelers from 2283 that came back and warned Japan that the US would continue to nuke them until they surrendered. Japan in their timeline is mostly a wasteland, owned by Sweden.