Paul,
I too wish you much luck in this decision. Having been through both the surgical option (17 hours; 50% of the mandible removed, rebuilt with fibula, titanium and forearm flap) and the RT, if faced with the option of one or the other would take the surgery again over the RT. Overall, the recovery was much easier.

I think what solidified my decision to go with precautionary RT and surgery ( and yes, Surgery alone was an option) was a comment made by my dental oncologist during the early evaluation phases of my treatment.

He commented that he'd come to really hate the sneaky nature of SCC in his 25 years in practice. He said that it seemed to him that the best successes had been the cases where they threw almost everything in their treatment arsenal at it on the first go-round.

It hit a nerve...I don't want to hae a round two if I can avoid it. That of course remains to be seen, but I really feel that I made the right choice for me.
Wayne