Estimated reading time: 4 minute(s)
On the anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima – Aug 6th – I mentioned that I picked up a book by the name of the city from our local library. It was a fairly short book, detailing the events of the lives of several survivors of the horrible day. It was fairly objective (quite unlike what a similar literary work would be today, I’m sure!) and just told the story plainly, as experienced by those witnesses, and tragically coerced participants.
The most interesting part was that the author visited one year after the bombing to get the stories, and even then, no one (according to the author) was really debating the morality of the atomic bomb. Whether out of a fear of all that had transpired, or truly just not questioning the ethics of such a weapon, there apparently was not much discourse regarding whether or not it “should” have been used.
Funny, cause that’s all I can think about.
I mentioned in my previous post that it had been a long war. War is ugly, and I’m sure it numbs you to the reality of what you are doing. But still, I can not fathom making the decision to obliterate a city and 100,000 of its inhabitants with one swift, instantaneous motion.
I can understand the people who made the weapon. There had been credible rumors that the Germans were working on such technology, and if they had gotten it first – the “Master Race” – it could have been beyond disastrous. So, it made sense for us to race to complete it first. And, we did. (I think it was later discovered that the Germans were not near as close as we had feared.) So, perhaps once the scientists had completed their work – in the form of a functioning “atomic” bomb – they had time to debate the moral implications of their achievements. But I can also see there how not attempting to “discover” the weapon first would have been equally (or perhaps even more) morally questionable.
But once the bomb was ready, and able… that’s where I am glad I did not have to be the decision maker.
From President Truman deciding to drop the bomb on a real city, with hundreds of thousands of people. (And then three days later to drop another one, even after seeing the total devastation!) To the pilots who left the ground, with the knowledge that their mission was to wipe out a city with one bomb. To the technician who had to activate the weapon once they left the ground. (They had not activated it for fear of any sort of accident at take off… would have been messy.) Once he activated it – or even while he was in process – how must that have felt? Knowing he was, by his weapon activation, condemning up to 100,000 people and their city, even their history, to death? What of the pilot(s?) who actually “flipped the switch” (or whatever they did) to drop the bomb?
I’m just glad it wasn’t me.
In retrospect, you can say, “Look, within days the war was over. So, the end justifies the means.” Well, yes. You can say that. But it’s just so hard to swallow when you think that the bomb was used on real people. Not a target. They were not “casualties”. They were moms and dads, children, grandchildren, brothers, sisters… just people. The book was very interesting. Reading how people reacted to such sudden catastrophe, helping each other out as much as they could… too fractured and instantly plunged into chaos to even question really what happened, or why it happened… they just kicked into survival mode. Which included helping the nearest stranger to survive.
One interesting thing after the Japanese surrendered, was the assistance of the Allied forces (likely led by America) in rebuilding Hiroshima, as well as attempting to understand – and find a cure for – the mysterious radiation sickness that had afflicted so many survivors. It seemed so ironic that we who had invented – and implemented – such a device, were right there in the aftermath trying to help “clean up”. I think that is the “American Spirit”, but I’m not sure what the big bomb part was.
I just wonder why we couldn’t have bombed some more remote part of their mainland… wiping out some trees or something? I’m sure many have considered and debated all the possibilities for decades now. But, wouldn’t that have demostrated the same power as actually blowing up cities? Maybe not.
So, anyway, I think I’ll read a few more stories from that time. It’s fascinating to me how we can do that to each other. We continue to do so, just not on that grand scale. Yet.
I may see something even worse in my lifetime. Who knows, it may be here in our own country. That doesn’t seem possible right now, but you never know.
Some day war will end. For now, perhaps we can remember the atrocity of it, and avoid similar atrocities in the future?
Probably not.