66 years since the atomic bombing of Nagasaki

"Landep News"

Bell Rings in Nagasaki

Japanese people commemorated on Tuesday 66 years since the atomic bombing of Nagasaki killed 80,000 people on August 9, 1945, three days after an atomic bomb was dropped over the city of Hiroshima, killing 140,000 people. For the first time in 66 years the United States sent a representative to Nagasaki to attend the ceremony. U.S. charge d’affairs James P. Zumwalt, carried a wreath to the altar set up in the Peace Park in Nagasaki.
In a statement, Zumwalt said that the Obama administration hoped to work with Japan toward the goal of having a world without atomic weapons, a claim made by Japan ever since the end of the WWII.
U.S. ambassador to Tokyo John Roos was sent by president Obama last year to Hiroshima, and visited Nagasaki twice.
A moment of silence was observed in Nagasaki on Tuesday at 11:02 a.m. local time, exactly the moment the bomb hit Nagasaki 66 years ago, causing Japan to end the war and surrender six days after.

Atomic Mushroom

A bell rang in a prayer for peace, while bomb victims who were children in 1945 sang a song called “Never again.”
Mayor of Nagasaki said Japan must change nuclear policy, speaking of nuclear energy plants the type of the one in Fukushima that created a third nuclear disaster earlier this year in the country.
The mayor asked why should a country that had to suffer so much because of the atomic bomb and has citizens that lived in fear of radiations for generations and decades go through the same fear again.
He added that it was time for a serious discussion to be made on what kind of society Japan wants, and whether they want to live in the constant fear of the radiation. He called for replacing the 54 atomic reactors of Japan with renewable energy sources.
Prime minister Naoto Kan promised on the same occasion that the country will increase efforts to diminish dependence on atomic energy. He added that “we must never forget,” and that “it must never be repeated.”
The drop of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki represents one of the saddest moments in history, and happened at the end of the WWII, being the only two instances when an atomic bomb was used in war to date.

Explosion of the Atomic Bomb

The WWII ended in Europe on May 9, 1945 with the defeat of Germany and its allies in Europe and Northern Africa.
In June 1945, the United States, the Republic of China and the United Kingdom delivered Japan an ultimatum, demanding the surrender of the militarist power of Japan. The Japanese government ignored it.
On August 6, 1945, by order of President Harry Truman, the atomic bomb “Little Boy” was launched on Hiroshima, and three days later “Fat Man” was launched on Nagasaki.
90,000 to 166,000 people were killed in Hiroshima within the first two to four months, and up to 80,000 in Nagasaki. Half of these people died in the first day. 60% of the people died from flash or flame burns, and 30% from falling debris. Most of the dead were civilians in both cities.
Six days after this tragedy, Japan surrendered and then adopted Three Non-nuclear Principles, a parliamentary resolution that has been guiding the national policy of the country on nuclear weapons.

Atomic Bomb Survivor

According to it, the nuclear weapons were not to be admitted on Japanese soil, nor were they to be manufactured or possessed. The resolution was passed by the parliament in 1971.
Every since Japan developed a framed called The Four-Pillar Nuclear Policy, comprising four principles: promoting peaceful use of nuclear power; work toward global disarmament; rely on U.S. nuclear deterrent policy and uphold the three non-nuclear principles.
The nuclear bomb was produced under the supervision of U.S. physicist Julius Robert Oppenheimer, called “the father of  the nuclear bomb.” Oppenheimer lived a rich live until 1967, with the only trouble of mind publicly recorded being an investigation into his pro-Communist stance. In an interview for the BBC in 1965, speaking “irrespectively” about what was done with the bomb in 1945, Oppenheimer ascribed it the fascinating attribute of contributing to a world without any kind of war.
There is a debate in the American society on the ethical justification on dropping two bombs on the civilian population of Japan.
The supporters of the theory that in fact the drop of the bombs practically helped the Japanese avoid even more casualties argue that unless the bomb had been dropped an ground invasion would have followed with estimated one million people killed.
At the time Japan had 2.3 million Japanese soldiers ready to defend Japan, four million army and navy employees, and a militia of 28 million people. They had as slogan “One hundred million will die for the Emperor and the Nation.”
There was an argument made by the chief commander of the army Korechika Anami, who said in the wake of the nuclear disaster that Japan should not surrender but defend its national land and even attempt to keep some of the lands conquest. His argument was overrun by Emperor Hirohito, who ordered the surrender.

Japanese Emperor Brings Wreath at Nagasaki Altar

There are some estimates that said that the bombings have saves as much as one million American lives, and half that number of British soldiers, that would have had to die to bring Japan down.
There was even an idea of Robert Wilson, member of the Manhattan project that helped build the bomb, who said that in stead of dropping it on the Japanese, a team of Japanese experts should have been called to see what the bomb can do.
His argument is overrun by the fact that it took a second bomb to convince the Emperor of Japan not to wait for the third.
To quote Oppenheimer, “irrespective” of the scholarly debate in the United States, the Japanese legislation decided by a sentence passed by Tokyo District Court that the dropping of the bomb was “an act of hostilities under the rule of international law,” and that it constituted a “wrongful act… ascribable to the United States and President Harry Truman”.
The same decision says that even though the bomb was aimed at military installations the damaged suffered by the population render it inexcusable.

Thank's for link:

Tweet