2023-08-06 06:00:00
The article is adapted from the text of my book Stupid and dangerous. The United States in the Age of Trump published by Éditions du Journal.
The film Oppenheimerwhich chronicles the development of the atomic bomb, has dominated the global box office since its release two weeks ago.
78 years ago, on Monday August 6, 1945, the atomic age began shortly after eight o’clock in the morning when a gigantic ball of hell appeared above Hiroshima, then pulverized the city and its inhabitants. Seventy-five thousand people are killed, many instantly vaporized, by the bomb nicknamed “Little Boy”. For decades, another 75,000 people will die from the appalling effects of nuclear radiation.
In his statement announcing the use of the atomic bomb against Hiroshima, President Truman is lying. He claims that it is military installations that have been attacked, while it is civilian infrastructure and the population that are targeted.
A woman tends to her child following the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. Photo Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
The 2 bombs targeted civilians
The aiming point of the B-29 “Enola Guay” bomber is the city center, not the industrial park or the negligible military installations located on the outskirts. Hiroshima is surrounded by hills on three sides. The US Air Force calculated that the initial shock wave would bounce off them, increasing the craft’s exterminating power.
The American generals and their scientific advisers from the Los Alamos Targets Committee were looking for large urban areas, at least 4.8 km2, which had never been previously attacked, so that the damage was exclusively due to the weapon. atomic: this will allow a precise technical assessment of the destruction caused by the A-bomb.
The bomb hits Japanese Catholicism
President Truman’s directives call for the use of a second bomb, without even pausing to assess the results of the first or the Japanese reaction. The “Fat Man” bomb pulverizes Nagasaki on Thursday, August 9. Its epicenter is the Urakami district, the heart and soul of Japanese Catholicism since the 16th century. Nagasaki was evangelized in 1549, by Portuguese Jesuits, led by Saint Francis–Xavier. Of the 12,000 Catholics in Urakami, 8,500 are roasted alive – including all the faithful who take part in the religious ceremony which was taking place at St. Mary’s Cathedral, the largest church in all of East Asia, at the time of the exterminating flash.
The ‘Fat Man’ bomb being placed on the lifting platform, Tinian Island, August 1945. Public Domain photo
No military objective justifies the destruction of the two cities. The real reason behind the use of the atomic bomb against Japan can only be revenge. Even Truman will recognize it: “We used it against those who attacked us without warning at Pearl Harbor, against those who starved, beat and executed American prisoners of war and against those who abandoned all pretense of obeying the laws international warfare. »
American war crimes
These mass exterminations of Japanese civilians are also war crimes, even though Japan has committed appalling atrocities against civilian populations in China and Korea, mistreated prisoners of war and started hostilities. Also, at Pearl Harbor, the Japanese Navy attacked US military installations and warships, not civilians.
Images of mushroom clouds in Hiroshima (left) and Nagasaki (right). Photo archives, AFP
Some still try today to justify Truman’s decision by asserting that without these nuclear bombardments, the United States would have had to invade Japan to obtain its surrender. By destroying both cities, he would have saved tens of thousands of American lives. Does saving the lives of American soldiers justify cremating alive hundreds of thousands of Japanese children, women and old people? Targeting civilians to coerce a government into adopting a policy is the very definition of terrorism.
In addition, the Americans could strike military objectives (air or naval base, training camp, etc.) far from the major urban centers to demonstrate to the Japanese leaders the infernal power of their new weapon.
Moreover, after the war, American military leaders recognized that Truman’s decision was immoral and inexcusable. Chief of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral William Leahy, believes that “the use of this barbaric weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki has been of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already beaten and ready to surrender.”
The Commander-in-Chief for Europe, the future President of the United States, General Dwight Eisenhower, also believed that “the Japanese were ready to surrender and [qu’]there was no need to hit them with that horrible thing”.
In an unprecedented move, more than 100 leading medical journals around the world on Tuesday called for the abolition of all nuclear weapons. This initiative comes in a context of growing risks of conflict between nuclear powers.
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