Just a couple of quick answers, to add to your thought process. First chemo alone in oral cancer treatment is never the primary mode of treatment, it is an addition to surgery and radiation. So chemo alone is unlikely to be a choice. If doctors are recommending chemo alone it is usually for palliative care, to extend life, but not to affect a cure. Surgery is not worse after radiation, but it is more difficult for the doctors as the consistency of the tissues becomes gummy and difficult to work with. It is done all the time however, and was on me, radiation first then surgery for the cervical lymph nodes that were in the radiated field. I believe that we all have a natural fear of surgery, and when I went into treatment I didn't want it either. But sometimes it is the best solution to the problem. We suspected that my neck nodes were cancer free after the massive radiation treatments, but the only way to know for sure was to take them out. They were indeed cancer free, but I have no regrets about having the surgery in retrospect.