'Little Boy' Reminds the World of Unnecessary Atrocities

by Arbol | August 6, 2009 at 08:56 am

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Today Hiroshima is mourning the 64th anniversary of the atomic bombing of the city by United States forces during World War II.

Nuclear weapon Little Boy's blinding blast and its infamous mushroom cloud doomed the lives of nearly 140,000 people, including women, children and many elderly on August 6, 1945.

Three days after that, a second bomb was dropped in the southern port city of Nagasaki, killing over 70,000 japanese civilians. This led to the definitive surrender of Japan.

The bombs were supposedly dropped on japanese soil as a response on a japanese attack on the United States' naval base at Pearl Harbor (Hawaii), which had taken place on December 7, 1941. The japanese attack killed some 2,500 people and wounded over a thousand. Many theories have since surfaced regarding the previous knowledge the Roosevelt administration might have had of the attack.

Regardless of this, the US attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki marked the end of World War II, but also the start of the Atomic Age.

64 years later, 50,000 people, including atom bomb survivors (referred to as hibakusha), politicians, the United Nations and representatives from 59 countries, gathered at the A-bomb Dome, which is the remains of a hall badly burned by the bomb's intense heat, to remember the tragedy but also to call for the abolition of nuclear weapons worldwide.

Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba delivered a peace declaration, calling for the abolition of nuclear weapons by 2020.

"The hibakusha still suffer a hell that continues," said Akiba.

"The Japanese government should support hibakusha, including those who were victims of black rain and those who live overseas," he said.

It was reported Wednesday that the Japanese government aims to come to an agreement with all atomic bomb survivors who have sued the government for financial support to help them pay medical bills for illnesses related to the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

At exactly 8:15am (the moment the bomb was dropped in 1945) everyone at the memorial ceremony prayed silently for the japanese victims, and for all those who have developed radiation exposure-related diseases.

Prime Minister Taro Aso, also present at the ceremony, said Japan will maintain its three non-nuclear pledges of not possessing, not producing and not allowing nuclear weapons. However, he doubts that the goal of a world free of nuclear weapons is realistic: "It might be possible... if they were abolished suddenly, on one day in one go (...) but under normal circumstances it is unimaginable."

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Uwe Paschen

at 10:16 on August 6th, 2009

It was simply mass murder and a crime of war.

The US still needs to be tried for this in an International court. In the same manner as we tried all the Japanese and German War criminals before.

Pearl Harbour was a Military base where as Hiroshima and Nagasaki where Civilian Cities.

Arbol

at 12:39 on August 6th, 2009

I agree. And i bet if we come up with the oh-no-you-can't-say-that-word GENOCIDE (I still remember Rwanda), right-wing US nationalists will jump off the couch and play the Pearl Harbor card.

This was the single most monstrous and cruel experiment on "forced peace", and I do hope someday those responsible are justly tried in an international court for crimes against humanity.

everchanging

at 10:26 on August 6th, 2009

Yes humanity has no need or use for these types of weapons either nuclear or hydrogen in any form or type of as a weapon except to kill other human beings. Making it only sensible to disassemble those weapons already made and making them harmless for future generations. While the technology from the creation of the atom bomb has developed for other less deadly uses it does have benefit humanity like medical and energy among other uses.

While Hiroshima and the event in Nagasaki that followed are truly sad and need to be reminders of our human history of war - We as citizen of humanity should also be thankful that these weapons have not been used since this time in any form outside of testing.

Rory Cripps

at 14:05 on August 6th, 2009

Come on! This is stretching it a bit don't you think? The atomic bombs were not dropped in response to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor! The attack on Pearl Harbor occurred years prior. The bombs were dropped because the consensus was that the fanatical Japanese leaders were not about to give up and would have continued fighting until millions more Japanese died. I knew a number of WW II veterans that fought the Japanese (up close and personal in the trenches). I wish they were still around to tell their stories about the atrocities that the Japanese military committed against POWs and civilians. Good lord! The Japanese, just for kicks, threw Chinese infants up in the air and caught the infants on the way down with the ends of their bayonets! The number of civilians killed by both atomic bombs in Japan pales in comparison to those killed in places such as Germany during WW II. All sides engaged in atrocities during WW II. It was a terrible time in the world. And I venture to say that had Japan developed the bomb before the west did, Japan would not have hesitated to drop the bomb on its enemies. And why wouldn't they? History shows that up until the end of WW II, Japan was an extremely war-like nation ruled by fanatics and tyrants.

Arbol

at 15:02 on August 6th, 2009

Excuse me? the """reason""" the US first joined the war was because of the Pearl Harbor incident. And again, whatever the japanese soldiers did to the chinese did not justify the use of a NUCLEAR WEAPON on an entirely civilian population. This were no 'bayonets'. People were not shot, they were burned to death.

Rory Cripps

at 17:35 on August 6th, 2009

Arbol: You, I, and the rest of us civilian/non-governmental "poor soaks" will forever and always never know the real "reason" why our government, or any other government, "joined the war". For all we know, in the case of America's entering WW II, FDR may have had a few drinks that day and an argument with Eleanor and said, "Hey! Let's teach these DIRTY JAPS a lesson!" FDR, for years, didn't give a crap about the German Jews that he knew, for a fact, were being exterminated at Hitler's direction. And FDR didn't give a crap about the millions upon millions that were being exterminated in Russia at Stalin's direction. And the brutality that Japanese citizens suffered at the hands of their leaders (at the time and from day-one of their existence) was unspeakably cruel and heartless.

Hey! If I knew that I and my family had to die, I'd opt to be nuked as opposed to being starved to death; to watching my wife and daughter being raped, killed, and butchered in front of my very eyes; Stripped naked and gassed comes to mind and that's not cool either. The list goes on Arbol . . . do you get the picture? You're a lucky person Arbol . . .count your blessings. In my humble opinion, we all need to read our history a bit more closely and a bit more thoroughly in order to make the world a better place . . . . Blind ideology and adherence to dogma and myth is not conducive to the betterment of humanity and a brighter future for the world . . . .

mj defender (not verified)

at 16:29 on August 6th, 2009

The power of the atomic ic bomb is far to powerful and will hopefully never have to be used again.

Karl Gotthardt - albertacowpoke

at 16:45 on August 6th, 2009

Anyone that has seen the carnage of even conventional weapons knows this kind of behaviour has to stop. It is useless after more than 60 years to discuss the pros and cons of what happened and why.

We should, as a human race remember it but try not second guess those that made the decisions at the time. I did see war torn Germany and again the carnage in Sarajevo. To me it is incredible of what humans beings are capable of doing to one another.