Neither this fanciful story nor the crocodiles had anything to do with gozilla. Godzilla ( gojira in japanese ) is a result of joining two japanese words - gorira ( gorilla ) and kujira ( whale ). The impetus for the creation of godzilla were the genocidal firebombings and nukings of japanese cities. Godzilla represented america ( a barbaric nuclear monster that destroyed japanese cities without morals or remorse ). It was created as anti-america and anti-occupation propaganda in post-war japan but has since been co-opted or "appriopriated" by hollywood and turned into a generic and farcical monster trope.
We know what godzilla was about because the creators have told us so. Also, it's rather obvious given the context and the environment in which godzilla was created.
It was a thought and that’s why I said “one of the seeds”. I guess there’s such a thing as a “cultural zeitgeist” and when artists are creating stories and narratives they incorporate metaphors from things around them. They may not have explicitly read the newspaper article and said “giant lizards are a good bad guy” but that representation may have been culturally apt at the moment due to this story.
The creature design had to elicit fear and the actual representation on film may have been influenced by it. The stance may be more t-Rex than crocodile and I’m really not sure “whale” factored into the final appearance on film.
No one is questioning the impetus and relation to the fire bombings and nukes.
> We know what godzilla was about because the creators have told us so.
That’s the funny thing about culture and creation: a creator doesn’t always know their sources or have definite aspects to point to. Creation is a bit fuzzy. ;) (the same applies for LLMs!)
We know what godzilla was about because the creators have told us so. Also, it's rather obvious given the context and the environment in which godzilla was created.