Aug. 6, 01:00 EDT
Lessons of Hiroshima
Using nuclear bombs on Japan was a political, not military, decision
Kevin Black
IT HAS BEEN observed so often that truth is the first casualty of war that it is now a banal remark rather than an insightful critical comment. However, of greater
consequence than the death of truth is the surrender of critical thinking.
Golden anniversaries of crucial events are often used to proclaim the lessons learned from the past. But if history was never truly understood because it was
purposefully misrepresented, exactly what lessons have we learned?
Deeply entrenched and culturally significant historical misrepresentations are very difficult to dispel within the lifetime of those responsible for the event.
Anniversaries of those events are occasions when critical thinking must occur. Received historical stories must be challenged and held up to thorough critical
scrutiny.
Today is one such anniversary. Fifty-seven years ago the first of only two atomic bombs ever used in war was unleashed.
At 8:15 a.m. on Aug. 6, 1945, a 22 kiloton A-bomb was dropped in the commercial heart of a then unknown city: Hiroshima. Fifty thousand people died in the
first few moments of the surprise attack; within five years another 150,000 of the survivors were dead from injuries resulting from massive irradiation. A similar
event happened three days later in Japan's only centre of Christianity: Nagasaki.
