Which planned Operation Downfall phase targeted Kyushu in November 1945?

Operation Olympic was the planned Operation Downfall phase targeting Kyushu in November 1945.

Kyushu is the southernmost of Japan’s four main islands. Allied planners intended to seize its southern third and establish air bases that could support the later invasion of the Kanto Plain on Honshu, Japan’s largest island. Okinawa, captured by the Allies in June 1945, was expected to support the operation as a staging area.

Operation Olympic was never launched. Japan accepted the Potsdam Declaration in August 1945, following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Soviet Union’s entry into the war. The surrender made the invasion plan unnecessary.

Olympic formed the first part of Operation Downfall, not a separate completed campaign. The second planned phase was Operation Coronet, which was intended for spring 1946. The names are easy to mix up because both operations were part of the same proposed invasion framework.