Most people don't look at the facts; it's easier to just say, "America bad111" than look at how much worse the fascist governments were (particularly when it's so hard for many to imagine modern Japan as a belligerent military power. ) There's a reason the bomb was necessary; the Japanese people were thoroughly indoctrinated with the belief defeat was IMPOSSIBLE, and the fact is history was on their side. Any short term sacrifices for the sake of the final inevitable victory were acceptable, noble, and they didn't have the first hand experience with the Great War to argue otherwise. The biggest proof of that is that we WERE conducting naval bombardment of their cities, had been for about a year since we won the carrier war and bottled up an IJN that knew it didn't dare leave port or it would get, well, the Battle of Leyte. Halsey raked the 7th fleet down the coast every night, but it didn't induce surrender. Only two things could've done that: A brutal house to house invasion, or the bomb. Everyone agrees the atomic bomb is an incredibly destructive weapon, but if less would've sufficed, why didn't Japan surrender after the FIRST one...?

I think that might be overstating things a touch, if only because the Manhattan Project wasn't exactly common knowledge before the bomb was used.