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The Military

G-7 Leaders At Hiroshima To Urge More Visits to Nuclear Bombsites (voanews.com) 240

Posted by EditorDavid from the ghost-of-Harry-Truman dept.
An anonymous reader writes: Sunday leaders from the G-7 countries gathered in Hiroshima Sunday, a gesture which the Japanese government hopes will send a message of peace and nuclear nonproliferation. The seven world leaders will first honor the dead at Hiroshima Peace Park and visit an atomic bomb museum, which the Associated Press calls "a dream come true for many surviving victims, who have for decades campaigned to bring leaders of nuclear states to Hiroshima to see the damage." In addition, Japan hopes that the world leaders will also issue a "Hiroshima Declaration," which reportedly will call for more transparency about stockpiles of nuclear weapons, but also more visits to Hiroshima and Nagasaki by both world leaders and young people.
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G-7 Leaders At Hiroshima To Urge More Visits to Nuclear Bombsites More

G-7 Leaders At Hiroshima To Urge More Visits to Nuclear Bombsites

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  • Bring leaders to Hiroshima to see the damage (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    71 years and they still haven't haven't fixed the place?

    • Bringing world leaders to Hiroshima and Nagasaki seems to create too much opportunity for terrorists. I suggest creating more locations where they can see the effects of nuclear weapons so the terrorists don't have just one or two cities to plot their attacks from. North Korea, Iraq and Iran all seem like good locations to create alternate viewing sites in.

    • The have. Hiroshima is a really beautiful city to visit. They have even rebuilt the old castle back to it's original specifications. It was quite close to the blast site and essentially completely destroyed.

      Going to visit the A-Dome in Hiroshima is quite something. It hasn't been restored other than to stabilise it. It was directly under the blast and because of that it remained standing minus its roof. The photos of it standing in an otherwise flat, featureless area is really powerful.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by GuB-42 ( 2483988 )

      Now, it is actually a very beautiful place and besides the various memorials, there is no way to tell this city was bombed. It is worth visiting by itself. Additionally, it is close to Miyajima, which is one of the "3 views of japan".
      One of the most pleasant surprises I had when I visited Japan. Leave the doom and gloom to 1945, it is now a nice, lively city.

      • So if that's the results of a nuclear bomb, I can't see why the US are so afraid of having nukes dropped on their cities.

    • This building, actually close to the hypocenter, [icrc.org] has been left standing. This remaining piece of a church is still standing in Nagasaki [gypsynester.com], similarly close the the hypocenter.

  • Where are the "peace protests" over Bataan? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by FlyHelicopters ( 1540845 ) on Sunday April 10, 2016 @06:42PM (#51881153)

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    How about all the other Japanese War Crimes?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    ---

    Further, the irony is that the firebombings of Tokyo killed as many people as the nukes did. Where are the protests of that?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    ---

    Finally, would invading have been better?

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    "During World War II, nearly 500,000 Purple Heart medals were manufactured in anticipation of the estimated casualties resulting from the planned Allied invasion of Japan. To the present date, total combined American military casualties of the seventy years following the end of World War IIâ"including the Korean and Vietnam Warsâ"have not exceeded that number. In 2003, there remained 120,000 Purple Heart medals in stock. The existing surplus allowed combat units in Iraq and Afghanistan to keep Purple Hearts on-hand for immediate award to soldiers wounded in the field."

    We are STILL handing out WWII Purple Hearts to this day because we ended up not having to invade. If the Japs didn't want to get nuked, perhaps they shouldn't have started a war of aggression.

    • I don't think there are too many educated people who actually argue against having dropped nuclear bombs on Japan. The issue is that nuclear bombs scare the crap out of people because the level of destruction is massive compared to the invested resources. The firebombing of Tokyo required huge numbers of planes 150+ per day. While the destruction was huge I believe people are comfortable with that.

      Hiroshima, however, was done by a single plane. That is where people freak. Especially since current nucle

      • Yep, the people who tend to argue against it didn't live in that time.

        Oh sure, there were people back then who didn't like the idea of it, there always will be. But at the end of the day, most Americans were tired of war and wanted it to end. If blowing up a few Japanese cities ensured that happened, then so be it.

        It is worth noting from President Truman's speech on the Atomic Bomb:

        "We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have above ground in

        • To be fair to the Japanese how were they meant to know about the existence of anything like the bomb that later hit them. They had planned to surrender, but they had hoped to achieve a better outcome. In addition to this the surrender they did later accept wasn't an unconditional surrender. They were allowed to keep the imperial structure something that, if refused, probably would have seen the war continue despite the bombs.

          MacArthur was of the opinion that had the original surrender demand allowed them

          • To be fair to the Japanese how were they meant to know about the existence of anything like the bomb that later hit them.

            A fair point, to be sure...

            ---

            May I suggest that if all the "anti-nuclear" efforts were instead put into "anti-war" efforts, we might get further along...

            For all the fuss about a "nuclear-free world" that the Japanese want, how about a "war-free world"?

            If the time, money, resources, and brains used in war were instead used in science and technology, imagine what we could do?

            • Post WW2 Japan has been one of the best countries in trying to stay out of wars. They have the capabilities but you don't see them out there.

          • Why was the US under any obligation to take the Japanese wishes into account?

            They started a war, behaved abominably during it, and lost it. I don't see why people are claiming they were owed anything.

            • I said nothing about the Japanese being owed anything. But if you take everything away from someone then they will fight to the end because they have nothing left to lose.

              Japan had lost the war. Didn't mean they couldn't make the Allies bleed a hell of a lot more.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by gtall ( 79522 )

        I think it depends upon the people as to whether nukes scare the crap out of them. The leaders of N. Korea and that little sawed off runt of Russia think of nuclear weapons as an essential part of their military doctrine, and not primarily as defensive weapons. If the thought the latter, they'd be open to negotiating the removal of all nukes, which they aren't. The militaries of India and Pakistan also think of nuclear weapons as essential. A fair part of Iran's military thinks similarly. And if Iran ever g

    • We are STILL handing out WWII Purple Hearts to this day because we ended up not having to invade. If the Japs didn't want to get nuked, perhaps they shouldn't have started a war of aggression.

      Needless to say they had plenty of opportunities to surrender before Hiroshima, after Hiroshima and before Nagasaki and they didn't. The Japanese minister of war was running a total war against the Americans until the Japanese Emperor discovered his motivations and decided and order to surrender after Nagasaki. The Japanese were actually warned about Hiroshima or rather than a blast out of proportion with anything previously seen and asked to surrender. They simply ignored the notice.

      • Needless to say they had plenty of opportunities to surrender before Hiroshima, after Hiroshima and before Nagasaki and they didn't. The Japanese minister of war was running a total war against the Americans until the Japanese Emperor discovered his motivations and decided and order to surrender after Nagasaki. The Japanese were actually warned about Hiroshima or rather than a blast out of proportion with anything previously seen and asked to surrender. They simply ignored the notice.

        ^ Yep, this, pretty much this...

        It is worth noting that I don't think ANYONE doubts the outcome of the war either way. Clearly the outcome was no longer in doubt.

        The question was, how long would it take and how many more lives would be lost? Another 6 months? 1 million more dead and millions more wounded?

        Would that have been a "better" outcome? People love to argue about what did happen and love to ignore what would have happened if reality had been changed.

        "Not nuking" doesn't equal "everything else st

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        That's not true. The Japanese had some idea that the US might have an atomic bomb as they were in the early stages of developing one with Germany before the war ended in Europe. By that stage many in the Japanese government saw defeat as inevitable and wanted to end the war while they could still negotiate some concessions. There was a huge internal struggle between various groups in the government and military.

        On the US side, the military wanted to test those weapons in anticipation of future nuclear wars.

        • There are many theories.

          There's also the theory that the US wanted the Japanese to surrenger RIGHT THE HELL NOW because they were worried about the communists approaching from the other side and that Japan might eventually surrender to them instead.

          Given how well the 1950s communists regimes worked out for the populace, I'll leave an analysis of the two alternatievs as an exercise to the reader.

  • The Military G-7 Leaders At Hiroshima To Urge More Visits to Nuclear Bombsites

    And in other news, American military leaders urge more visits to Pearl Harbor.

    (And Dachau)

    • Picking at scabs (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Tailhook ( 98486 ) on Monday April 11, 2016 @12:07AM (#51882267)

      No actual problems left so lets go back and wallow in the old ones. The direct result of the bombs, the surrender, the subsequent governance and unwavering economic and military allied status with the US is that Hiroshima is a thriving metropolis worth hundreds of billions and populated by 1.17 million healthy, safe Japanese. But lets set all of that aside and haunt the remnants of a 70 year old war so we can tsk tsk at the US.

      Pathetic.

  • Meanwhile in an alternate universe (Score:3, Interesting)

    by rossdee ( 243626 ) on Sunday April 10, 2016 @06:56PM (#51881211)

    where atomic weapons weren't used, there is no nation of Japan, just the mass graves of thousands of allied soldiers, millions of Japanese soldiers and civilians (most of whom died of disease and starvation).
    Nothing grows there because of the defoliants that were used. The Japanese are extinct.

    Still the whales and dolphins are a lot better off than in our timeline.

    • Out of interest. Why are you using defoliants in Japan? It's not exactly a Jungle country. It has terrain that is more like the UK than Vietnam.

    • "where atomic weapons weren't used, there is no nation of Japan, just the mass graves of thousands of allied soldiers, millions of Japanese soldiers and civilians"

      Meanwhile in *another* alternate universe where atomic weapons weren't used either, Japan is still there and not a single victim, soldier or civilian, Japanese or American, died after august the first 1945 when USA decided, on the military front, just to sit on their pants knowing that Japan had no navy nor aerial reserves to make any harm and, on

      • What about an alternate universe where the Japanese never bombed Pearl Harbor? We could play this game all day.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Copid ( 137416 )
        I'm having a hard time getting that from the document in question unless you're referring to something other than this [lmu.edu]. There's a lot of good discussion about the effects of the other aspects of the war, but it also says:

        The atomic bombings considerably speeded up these political maneuverings [attempts by those seeking surrender to convince had liners that it was an unwinnable war] within the government. This in itself was partly a morale effect, since there is ample evidence that members of the Cabinet we

        • "It's an interesting read, and I don't think the conclusions are as clear cut as what you're describing."

          "Based on a detailed investigation of all the facts, and supported by the testimony of the surviving Japanese leaders involved, it is the Survey's opinion that certainly prior to 31 December 1945, and in all probability prior to 1 November 1945, Japan would have surrendered even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped, even if Russia had not entered the war, and even if no invasion had been planned or c

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Copid ( 137416 )
            Then it is a different document than the one you cited. You want the summary report, July 1, 1946.

      • Meanwhile in *another* alternate universe where atomic weapons weren't used either

        And in another one, without the knowledge and experience of the use of these weapons, WWIII ends up happening because too many people simply don't know how bad nuclear weapons really are.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      And in yet another alternate universe the US just waited a few more weeks and negotiated a surrender.

  • Does it matter how you kill people, or how efficiently, surely it is the number of people killed that is most relevant? Ideology killed far more people than technology ever did. Total dead in WWII, about 70 million, number of people killed by communism in the following decades, about 60 million.

  • ... as tourism destinations? Somehow, that's not fair. They have a monopoly and can generate all sorts of tourism income. All we have is Detroit.

  • If only a bombing site were closer to me. Perhaps we could drop some more bombs so that more people can witness the destructive power they hold. That way people won't have to travel all the way to Japan.

    This is stupid, IMHO, and sounds like a means to guilt people into visiting Japan and spend some money there.

    I made a trip to Germany some years ago to visit a friend stationed there while in the US Army. We took a look at some old castles, churches, drank some German beer and ate some German food. We also saw Hitler's "eagles nest", the remains of the Berlin wall, a memorial to the Jews killed, and a concentration camp museum. A memorable experience but not near as memorable as seeing films on the concentration camps, or Youtube videos of talks on the subject, or just listening to my grandparents talk about what World War II meant to them. There are ways to relate the horrors of war to people besides a viewing of where it happened. I admit that we should not destroy these sites, or prevent people from visiting them, but visiting the sites is not the only way to understand what happened there.

    What is also lost is how "mutually assured destruction" may have kept the Cold War from becoming a one that burned at a million degrees over Manhattan.

    I think that the USA should keep it's nuclear weapons. Even if we never use them again in anger I do believe that their mere presence keeps us safer than if we got rid of them.

    • I have been to both places. In Europe I have been to check point charlie, seen the remains of the wall, where the nuremberg rallies were held and I've been to Auschwitz. In Japan I have been to Hiroshima and I have stood next to the A-Dome.

      In Berlin the wall has become hard to find and most of it is gone. Where the Nuremberg rallies were held has been turned into a truck park and we only managed to find it with the help of a local. Auschwitz I found a really powerful place to visit. The A-Dome and the

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by lazarus ( 2879 )

        Thank you. I have been to Hiroshima as well and found it powerful and moving. Judging by other posts here it seems as though people who have not visited or lived in Japan do not understand just how much it has changed. The sense of honor that the Japanese have did make them into ferocious fighters, but it also meant that surrender was surrender.

  • Given that the nuclear powers have decided that Iran should have nuclear weapons ASAP, the Japanese notion that world leaders should visit the site of nuclear attacks will come much quicker than they might have dreamed!

  • The invasion (Score:5, Interesting)

    by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 ) on Monday April 11, 2016 @12:50AM (#51882371) Homepage

    Fun fact: the US military was going full-on for the invasion of the Japanese home islands. The atom bomb was top-secret, remember? Casualty estimates were huge for both sides. The Japanese had a defense plan, and it was a good one. They had correctly predicted what the Americans were going to do. It would have been a bloodbath. When the Japanese surrendered it was a huge relief to both sides.

    August 5, 1963

    Dear Kup:

    I appreciated most highly your column of July 30th, a copy of which you sent me.

    I have been rather careful not to comment on the articles that have been written on the dropping of the bomb for the simple reason that the dropping of the bomb was completely and thoroughly explained in my Memoirs, and it was done to save 125,000 youngsters on the American side and 125,000 on the Japanese side from getting killed and that is what it did. It probably also saved a half million youngsters on both sides from being maimed for life.

    You must always remember that people forget, as you said in your column, that the bombing of Pearl Harbor was done while we were at peace with Japan and trying our best to negotiate a treaty with them.

    All you have to do is to go out and stand on the keel of the Battleship in Pearl Harbor with the 3,000 youngsters underneath it who had no chance whatever of saving their lives. That is true of two or three other battleships that were sunk in Pearl Harbor. Altogether, there were between 3,000 and 6,000 youngsters killed at that time without any declaration of war. It was plain murder.

    I knew what I was doing when I stopped the war that would have killed a half a million youngsters on both sides if those bombs had not been dropped. I have no regrets and, under the same circumstances, I would do it again -- and this letter is not confidential

    . Sincerely yours,

    Harry S. Truman

  • as those first nuclear bombs were exploding just partly. They are not even close to modern nuclear bombs, which are much more damaging.

    After such a visit a politician who does not have a technical background may think that it is survivable, and that there could be even PR ceremonies and visits afterwards. What is not true at all.

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