Hi there. Welcome though its not a club you want to join unless necessary! My tumor was similar, but not as aggressive, and despite having biopsies, etc... I'd had it for some time. That said, surgery is a very easy recovery compared to radiation. I opted for surgery as my surgeon is the top guy at the top ccc in Canada. Despite my surgery being 14 hrs (they took a 3rd of my tongue - 40 lymphnodes - despite my having 3 negative scans - and reconstructed my tongue) I was out of the hospital in 10 days and in Mexico a week later eating and speaking ok.

There are two types of scc - HPV related and non HPV. Oral tongue is usually non HPV - HPV positive scc responds well to just rads and chemo, non HPV is usually treated with surgery first (as it can be very aggressive, and move quickly and microscopic cancer can move into the nodes and travel quickly to distant locations,) if you have surgery, after your post op biopsy your dr. Will decide if rads and chemo is called for. Some do suggest it as a precaution (with good reason - as I said it can be highly aggressive and often times the surgeon will think he got it all, only to have a recurrence in the nodes this is why they remove nodes too despite having an clean neck scan - factoid - microscopic cancer doesn't highlight on scans )
Anyway, I had the works. And recovery from surgery was far easier!
Best of luck and do see someone at a ccc.

smile take care

Cheryl : Irritation - 2004 BX: 6/2008 : Inflam. BX: 12/10, DX: 12/10 : SCC - LS tongue well dif. T2N1M0. 2/11 hemigloss + recon. : PND - 40 nodes - 39 clear. 3/11 - 5/11 IMRT 33 + cis x2, PEG 3/28/11 - 5/19/11 3 head, 2 chest scans - clear(fingers crossed) HPV-, No smoke, drink, or drugs, Vegan