Never Forget: The Bombing Of Hiroshima, 64 Years Ago Today

I developed a lifelong opposition to war at the age of ten, when “The World At War” was broadcast by ITV, and today’s anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima has brought those feelings back. To mark this most distressing of anniversaries, I’m posting a commentary from the Boston Globe’s “Big Picture,” plus a few photographs.

From the Boston Globe: August 6th marks 64 years since the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan by the United States at the end of World War II. Targeted for military reasons and for its terrain (flat for easier assessment of the aftermath), Hiroshima was home to approximately 250,000 people at the time of the bombing. The US B-29 Superfortress bomber “Enola Gay” took off from Tinian Island very early on the morning of August 6th, carrying a single 4,000 kg (8,900 lb) uranium bomb codenamed “Little Boy.” At 8:15 am, “Little Boy” was dropped from 9,400 m (31,000 ft) above the city, freefalling for 57 seconds while a complicated series of fuse triggers looked for a target height of 600 m (2,000 ft) above the ground. At the moment of detonation, a small explosive initiated a super-critical mass in 64 kg (141 lbs) of uranium. Of that 64 kg, only 0.7 kg (1.5 lbs) underwent fission, and of that mass, only 600 milligrams was converted into energy — an explosive energy that seared everything within a few miles, flattened the city below with a massive shockwave, set off a raging firestorm and bathed every living thing in deadly radiation. Nearly 70,000 people are believed to have been killed immediately, with possibly another 70,000 survivors dying of injuries and radiation exposure by 1950. Today, Hiroshima houses a Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum near ground zero, promoting a hope to end the existence of all nuclear weapons.

A view of Hiroshima and outlying hills, seen in the autumn of 1945, from the ruins of the Red Cross building, less than one mile from the hypocenter (US National Archives).

The Hiroshima Fire Department’s main fire station, destroyed by the blast and fire of the atomic bomb, 1,200 m (4,000 ft) from ground zero (US National Archives).

A “shadow” of a hand valve wheel on the painted wall of a gas storage tank after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. Radiant heat instantly burned paint where the heat rays were not obstructed, 1,920 m (6,300 ft) from ground zero (US National Archives).

Death on a horrendous scale. This photograph and others, taken by an unknown Japanese photographer, were found in 1945 among rolls of undeveloped film in a cave outside Hiroshima by US serviceman Robert L. Capp, who was attached to the occupation forces.

Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press, distributed by Macmillan in the US, and available from Amazon — click on the following for the US and the UK). To receive new articles in your inbox, please subscribe to my RSS feed, and also see my definitive Guantánamo prisoner list, published in March 2009.

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