My Journey through history is complete
When I was growing up in Pakistan in the 1960s, in the lessons of history taught to us in school, we were told that the bombing of Hiroshima was necessary to stop the war. Yes, many perished, we were told, but more would have perished if the A-Bomb had not been used. Remember, Pakistan was a young country, and its education system was the legacy of British colonialism. We were seeing history through the eyes of the country’s former colonists. We were told that the brutality that the Japanese had unleashed throughout the Far East had to be checked, and nothing short of the A-Bomb would have made the Japanese surrender, in fact, it took two A-Bombs to bring the Japanese to their knees. In our British history books, the A-Bomb was a packaged as mark of achievement. And our very young minds accepted that.
My first encounter with the concept of the Hiroshima bombing as being ‘controversial’ was when I came to the U.S.A. This was the land of free speech, where the sixties generation questioned its country’s decision to use the A-Bomb. My immediate reaction to this controversy was that ‘that is unpatriotic.’ Then President Truman died, and the controversy made headlines. The fact that this was a controversy was very new to my mode of thinking. My opinion was firmly entrenched that the U.S. had done the right thing, and it took some rethinking on my part to even accept the fact that this act was controversial. That was 33 years ago.
Today (2004), I am standing at that very site, at ground zero, Hiroshima. I have seen the history of Hiroshima through the eyes of the British, through the eyes of historians, and now I am seeing it for myself. My journey through history is complete.
The History
The museum tells this story which I penned in 2004:
Hiroshima was an active military establishment and was active during the war with China and Russia. In 1937 the system sought to mobilize the entire Japanese nation. They wanted to control the everyday lives of the Japanese and insisted on spiritual mobilization. Citizens were forced to live austere lives and open their homes as inns to house soldiers; an outright order mobilized all available workers, and many were forced to work under very harsh conditions. It wasn’t a pretty picture.
In 1945, schoolchildren were evacuated from Hiroshima. It was expected that this city would be attacked. The first atomic bombing took place on August 15, 1945.
Whose Idea Was It
Inspired by scientists who feared atomic bomb development by Germany, the US began studying the bomb when WW2 began in 1939—the Manhattan Project. Successfully tested in July 1945, some Jewish scientists who had escaped to the U.S. from persecution in Nazi Germany feared that Germany was already developing a new weapon that would employ nuclear fission. They convinced the renowned physicist Albert Einstein to sign a letter to the US President Franklin Roosevelt urging him to authorize research into a new type of bomb. Roosevelt agreed and the US set out in October 1939 to study how to develop an atomic bomb.
To justify the cost of the bomb, the US hurried to use it. The US had 4 options to end the war in Japan: (1) Invade Japan; (2) Ask the Soviets to join; (3) Assure continuation of the emperor system; or (4) Use the A-Bomb. The US believed that the bomb would be the quickest alternative. The US did not want to involve the Russians in negotiations against Japan because they were afraid that it would make the Russians more powerful. Besides, the cost had to be justified.
There are letters and documents on display in the museum, opposing the use of the A-Bomb without warning and urging the US not to use the bomb without warning.
Why Hiroshima?
Hiroshima was selected as the target because it was believed that it had no Allied forces prisoner of war camps. In May, four target cities had been selected and orders were given not to bomb these 4 cities with conventional bombing so that the effect of the A-Bomb could be accurately ascertained.
The Skies Over Hiroshima Were Clear
The film footage of the bombing, photographed from the plane, is shown over and over again on a circular overhead screen with captions that read:
“It was reported that the skies over Hiroshima were clear.
At 07:38, the Enola Bay was over Hiroshima.
At 07:47 the electronic fuses were tested. They were in working order.
At 08:09 the Enola Gay was within sight of Hiroshima. The target of the bombing was the T-Shaped Bridge.
At 08:15 the atomic bomb was released.
At a height of 580 meters above Hiroshima, it exploded.
The Enola Gay made a sharp turn to get as far away as possible from the point of explosion, yet the plane shook as the shock waves hit it. (you see the plane shaking on the video screen).
5 minutes after they had dropped the bomb, the crew saw a giant cloud as much as 5 kilometers in diameter, spread over the city.
At the airbase US air force General … waited for the Enola Gay. From the plane came a radio message reporting the success of the attack.
‘Hiroshima target attacked under visual observation.’ ‘Attack made in one ten cloud conditions, no opposition from enemy planes or ground fire. All objectives clearly attained. Plane condition normal after bombing’.
Knowing what happened to the people and the children of Hiroshima, when you see the caption ‘objectives … attained’, it makes you shudder and wonder at the inhumanity of the human race.
What happened in the seconds and minutes after the bomb was dropped?
Read Part 4. Objectives Attained.
And read
Part 2: The Museum Speaks
Part 4: Objective Attained
Part 5: The Healing Begins
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