Reportage
On 10 August 1945, the day after the Nagasaki bombing,
military photographer Yōsuke Yamahata, correspondent Higashi, and artist Yamada
arrived in the city with instructions to record the destruction for propaganda
purposes. Yamahata took scores of photographs, and on 21 August, they appeared
in Mainichi Shimbun, a popular Japanese newspaper. After Japan's surrender and
the arrival of American forces, copies of his photographs were seized amid the
ensuing censorship, but some records have survived.
Leslie Nakashima, a former United Press (UP) journalist,
filed the first personal account of the scene to appear in American newspapers.
He observed that large numbers of survivors continued to die from what later
became recognized as radiation poisoning. On 31 August, The New York Times
published an abbreviated version of his 27 August UP article. Nearly all
references to uranium poisoning were omitted. An editor's note was added to say
that, according to American scientists,
"The atomic bomb will not have any lingering after-effects."
Wilfred Burchett was also one of the first Western
journalists to visit Hiroshima after the bombing. He arrived alone by train
from Tokyo on 2 September, defying the traveling ban put in place on Western
correspondents. Burchett's dispatch, "The
Atomic Plague", was printed by the Daily Express newspaper in London
on 5 September 1945. The reports from Nakashima and Burchett informed the
public for the first time of the gruesome effects of radiation and nuclear
fallout—radiation burns and radiation poisoning, sometimes lasting more than
thirty days after the blast. Burchett especially noted that people were dying "horribly" after bleeding from
orifices, and their flesh would rot away from the injection holes where vitamin
A was administered, to no avail.
The New York Times then apparently reversed course and ran a
front-page story by Bill Lawrence confirming the existence of a terrifying
affliction in Hiroshima, where many had symptoms such as hair loss and vomiting
blood before dying. Lawrence had gained access to the city as part of a press
junket promoting the U.S. Army Air Force. Some reporters were horrified by the
scene, however, referring to what they saw as a "death laboratory" littered with "human guinea pigs". General MacArthur found the
reporting to have turned from good PR into bad PR and threatened to court martial
the entire group. He withdrew Burchett's press accreditation and expelled the
journalist from the occupation zones. The authorities also accused him of being
under the sway of Japanese propaganda and later suppressed another story, on
the Nagasaki bombing, by George Weller of the Chicago Daily News. Less than a
week after his New York Times story was published, Lawrence also backtracked
and dismissed the reports on radiation sickness as Japanese efforts to undermine
American morale.
A member of the United States Strategic Bombing Survey,
Lieutenant Daniel A. McGovern, arrived in September 1945 to document the effects
of the bombing of Japan. He used a film crew to document the effects of the
bombings in early 1946. The film crew shot 27,000 m (90,000 ft) of film,
resulting in a three-hour documentary titled The Effects of the Atomic Bombs against
Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The documentary included images from hospitals,
burned-out buildings and cars, and rows of skulls and bones on the ground. It
was classified "secret" for
the next 22 years. Motion picture company Nippon Eigasha started sending
cameramen to Nagasaki and Hiroshima in September 1945. On 24 October 1945, a
U.S. military policeman stopped a Nippon Eigasha cameraman from continuing to
film in Nagasaki. All Nippon Eigasha's reels were confiscated by the American
authorities, but they were requested by the Japanese government, and
declassified. The public release of film footage of the city post-attack, and
some research about the effects of the attack, was restricted during the occupation
of Japan, but the Hiroshima-based magazine, Chugoku Bunka, in its first issue
published on 10 March 1946, devoted itself to detailing the damage from the
bombing.
The book Hiroshima, written by Pulitzer Prize winner John
Hersey and originally published in article form in The New Yorker, is reported
to have reached Tokyo in English by January 1947, and the translated version
was released in Japan in 1949. It narrated the stories of the lives of six bomb
survivors from immediately prior to, and months after, the dropping of the
Little Boy bomb. Beginning in 1974, a compilation of drawings and artwork made
by the survivors of the bombings began to be compiled, with completion in 1977,
and under both book and exhibition format, it was titled The Unforgettable
Fire.
The bombing amazed Otto Hahn and other German atomic
scientists, whom the British held at Farm Hall in Operation Epsilon. Hahn
stated that he had not believed an atomic weapon "would be possible for another twenty years"; Werner
Heisenberg did not believe the news at first. Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker
said "I think it's dreadful of the
Americans to have done it. I think it is madness on their part", but
Heisenberg replied, "One could
equally well say 'That's the quickest way of ending the war'". Hahn
was grateful that the German project had not succeeded in developing "such an inhumane weapon";
Karl Wirtz observed that even if it had, "we
would have obliterated London but would still not have conquered the world, and
then they would have dropped them on us".
Hahn told the others, "Once
I wanted to suggest that all uranium should be sunk to the bottom of the
ocean". The Vatican agreed; L'Osservatore Romano expressed regret that
the bomb's inventors did not destroy the weapon for the benefit of humanity.
Rev. Cuthbert Thicknesse, the dean of St Albans, prohibited using St Albans
Abbey for a thanksgiving service for the war's end, calling the use of atomic
weapons "an act of wholesale,
indiscriminate massacre". Nonetheless, news of the atomic bombing was
greeted enthusiastically in the U.S.; a poll in Fortune magazine in late 1945
showed a significant minority of Americans (23 percent) wishing that more
atomic bombs could have been dropped on Japan. The initial positive response
was supported by the imagery presented to the public (mainly the powerful images
of the mushroom cloud). During this time in America, it was a common practice
for editors to keep graphic images of death out of films, magazines, and
newspapers.
Post-attack
casualties
Silent film footage taken in Hiroshima in March 1946 showing
survivors with severe burns and keloid scars. Survivors were asked to stand in
the orientation they were in at the time of the flash, to document and convey
the line-of-sight nature of flash burns, and to show that, much like sunburn,
thick clothing and fabric offered protection in many cases. The sometimes
extensive burn scar contracture is not unusual, being common to all second- and
third-degree burns when they cover a large area of skin.
An estimated 90,000 to 166,000 people in Hiroshima (between
26 and 49 percent of its population) and 60,000 to 80,000 people in Nagasaki
(between 22 and 32 percent of its population) died in 1945, of which a majority
in each case was killed on the days of the bombings, due to the force and heat
of the blasts themselves. Nearly all of the remainder of victims died within
two to four months, due to radiation exposure and resulting complications.
One Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission report discusses 6,882
people examined in Hiroshima and 6,621 people examined in Nagasaki, who were
largely within 2,000 meters (6,600 ft) of the hypocenter, who suffered injuries
from the blast and heat but died from complications frequently compounded by
acute radiation syndrome (ARS), all within about 20 to 30 days. Many people not
injured by the blast eventually died within that timeframe as well after
suffering from ARS. At the time, the doctors had no idea what the cause was and
were unable to effectively treat the condition. Midori Naka was the first death
officially certified to be the result of radiation poisoning or, as it was
referred to by many, the "atomic
bomb disease". She was some 650 meters (2,130 ft) from the hypocenter
at Hiroshima and would die on 24 August 1945 after traveling to Tokyo. It was
unappreciated at the time but the average radiation dose that would kill
approximately 50 percent of adults (the LD50) was approximately halved; that
is, smaller doses were made more lethal when the individual experienced
concurrent blast or burn polytraumatic injuries. Conventional skin injuries
that cover a large area frequently result in bacterial infection; the risk of
sepsis and death is increased when a usually non-lethal radiation dose moderately
suppresses the white blood cell count.
In the spring of 1948, the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission
(ABCC) was established in accordance with a presidential directive from Truman
to the National Academy of Sciences–National Research Council to conduct
investigations of the late effects of radiation among the survivors in
Hiroshima and Nagasaki. In 1956, the ABCC published The Effect of Exposure to
the Atomic Bombs on Pregnancy Termination in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The ABCC
became the Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF) on 1 April 1975. A
binational organization run by the United States and Japan, the RERF is still
in operation today.
Cancer increases
Cancers do not immediately emerge after exposure to
radiation; instead, radiation-induced cancer has a minimum latency period of
some five years and above and leukemia some two years and above, peaking around
six to eight years later. Jarrett Foley published the first major reports on
the significant increased incidence of the latter among survivors. Almost all
cases of leukemia over the following 50 years were in people exposed to more
than 1Gy. In a strictly dependent manner dependent on their distance from the
hypocenter, in the 1987 Life Span Study, conducted by the Radiation Effects
Research Foundation, a statistical excess of 507 cancers, of undefined
lethality, were observed in 79,972 hibakusha who had still been living between
1958 and 1987 and who took part in the study. As the epidemiology study continues
with time, the RERF estimates that, from 1950 to 2000, 46 percent of leukemia
deaths which may include Sadako Sasaki and 11 percent of solid cancers of
unspecified lethality were likely due to radiation from the bombs or some other
post-attack city effects, with the statistical excess being 200 leukemia deaths
and 1,700 solid cancers of undeclared lethality. Both of these statistics being
derived from the observation of approximately half of the total survivors,
strictly those who took part in the study. A meta-analysis from 2016 found that
radiation exposure increases cancer risk, but also that the average lifespan of
survivors was reduced by only a few months compared to those not exposed to
radiation.
Birth defect
investigations
While during the preimplantation period, that is one to ten
days following conception, intrauterine radiation exposure of "at least 0.2 Gy" can cause
complications of implantation and death of the human embryo. The number of
miscarriages caused by the radiation from the bombings, during this
radiosensitive period, is not known.
One of the early studies conducted by the ABCC was on the
outcome of pregnancies occurring in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and in a control
city, Kure, located 29 km (18 mi) south of Hiroshima, to discern the conditions
and outcomes related to radiation exposure. James
V. Neel led the study which found that the overall number of birth defects
was not significantly higher among the children of survivors who were pregnant
at the time of the bombings. He also studied the longevity of the children who
survived the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, reporting that between 90 and
95 percent were still living 50 years later.
While the National Academy of Sciences raised the possibility
that Neel's procedure did not filter the Kure population for possible radiation
exposure which could bias the results, overall, a statistically insignificant
increase in birth defects occurred directly after the bombings of Nagasaki and
Hiroshima when the cities were taken as wholes, in terms of distance from the
hypocenters. However, Neel and others noted that in approximately 50 humans who
were of an early gestational age at the time of the bombing and who were all
within about 1 kilometer (0.62 mi) of the hypocenter, an increase in
microencephaly and anencephaly was observed upon birth, with the incidence of
these two particular malformations being nearly 3 times what was to be expected
when compared to the control group in Kure.
In 1985, Johns Hopkins University geneticist James F. Crow
examined Neel's research and confirmed that the number of birth defects was not
significantly higher in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many members of the ABCC and
its successor Radiation Effects Research Foundation (RERF) were still looking
for possible birth defects among the survivors’ decades later, but found no
evidence that they were significantly common among the survivors or inherited
in the children of survivors.
Investigations into
brain development
Despite the small sample size of 1,600 to 1,800 persons who
came forth as prenatally exposed at the time of the bombings, that were both
within a close proximity to the two hypocenters, to survive the in utero
absorption of a substantial dose of radiation and then the malnourished
post-attack environment, data from this cohort do support the increased risk of
severe mental retardation (SMR), that was observed in some 30 individuals, with
SMR being a common outcome of the aforementioned microencephaly. While a lack
of statistical data, with just 30 individuals out of 1,800, prevents a
definitive determination of a threshold point, the data collected suggests a
threshold intrauterine or fetal dose for SMR, at the most radiosensitive period
of cognitive development, when there is the largest number of undifferentiated
neural cells (8 to 15 weeks post-conception) to begin at a threshold dose of
approximately "0.09" to "0.15" Gy, with the risk then
linearly increasing to a 43-percent rate of SMR when exposed to a fetal dose of
1 Gy at any point during these weeks of rapid neurogenesis.
However either side of this radiosensitive age, none of the
prenatally exposed to the bombings at an age less than 8 weeks, that is prior
to synaptogenesis or at a gestational age more than 26 weeks "were observed to be mentally
retarded", with the condition therefore being isolated to those solely
of 8–26 weeks of age and who absorbed more than approximately "0.09" to "0.15" Gy of prompt radiation energy.
Examination of the prenatally exposed in terms of IQ
performance and school records, determined the beginning of a statistically
significant reduction in both, when exposed to greater than 0.1 to 0.5 gray, during
the same gestational period of 8–25 weeks. However outside this period, at less
than 8 weeks and greater than 26 after conception, "there is no evidence of a radiation-related effect on scholastic
performance."
The reporting of doses in terms of absorbed energy in units
of grays and rads – rather than the biologically significant, biologically
weighted sievert in both the SMR and cognitive performance data – is typical.
The reported threshold dose variance between the two cities is suggested to be
a manifestation of the difference between X-ray and neutron absorption, with
Little Boy emitting substantially more neutron flux, whereas the Baratol that
surrounded the core of Fat Man filtered or shifted the absorbed
neutron-radiation profile, so that the dose of radiation energy received in
Nagasaki was mostly that from exposure to X-rays/gamma rays. Contrast this to
the environment within 1500 meters of the hypocenter at Hiroshima, where the
in-utero dose depended more on the absorption of neutrons which have a higher
biological effect per unit of energy absorbed. From the radiation dose
reconstruction work, the estimated dosimetry at Hiroshima still has the largest
uncertainty as the Little Boy bomb design was never tested before deployment or
afterward; as such, the estimated radiation profile absorbed by individuals at
Hiroshima had required greater reliance on calculations than the Japanese soil,
concrete and roof-tile measurements which began to reach accurate levels and
thereby inform researchers, in the 1990s.
Many other investigations into cognitive outcomes, such as
schizophrenia as a result of prenatal exposure, have been conducted with "no statistically significant linear
relationship seen". There is a suggestion that in the most extremely
exposed, those who survived within a kilometer or so of the hypocenters, a
trend emerges akin to that seen in SMR, though the sample size is too small to
determine with any significance.
Hibakusha
The survivors of the bombings are called hibakusha (被爆者,
pronounced [çibaꜜkɯ̥ɕa]
or [çibakɯ̥ꜜɕa]), a
Japanese word that translates to "explosion-affected
people". The Japanese government has recognized about 650,000 people
as hibakusha. As of 31 March 2024, 106,825 were still alive, mostly in Japan,
The government of Japan recognizes about one percent of these as having
illnesses caused by radiation. The memorials in Hiroshima and Nagasaki contain
lists of the names of the hibakusha who are known to have died since the
bombings. Updated annually on the anniversaries of the bombings, as of August
2024, the memorials record the names of more than 540,000 hibakusha; 344,306 in
Hiroshima and 198,785 in Nagasaki.
If they discuss their background, hibakusha and their children
were (and still are) victims of fear-based discrimination and exclusion for
marriage or work due to public ignorance; much of the public persist with the
belief that the hibakusha carry some hereditary or even contagious disease.
This is despite the fact that no statistically demonstrable increase of birth
defects/congenital malformations was found among the later conceived children
born to survivors of the nuclear weapons used at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or has
been found in the later conceived children of cancer survivors who had
previously received radiotherapy. The surviving women of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki, that could conceive, who were exposed to substantial amounts of
radiation, had children with no higher incidence of abnormalities/birth defects
than the rate which is observed in the Japanese average. A study of the
long-term psychological effects of the bombings on the survivors found that
even 17–20 years after the bombings had occurred survivors showed a higher
prevalence of anxiety and somatization symptoms.
Double survivors
Perhaps as many as 200 people from Hiroshima sought refuge
in Nagasaki. The 2006 documentary Twice Survived: The Doubly Atomic Bombed of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki documented 165 nijū hibakusha (lit. double
explosion-affected people), nine of whom claimed to be in the blast zone in
both cities. On 24 March 2009, the Japanese government officially recognized
Tsutomu Yamaguchi as a double hibakusha. He was confirmed to be 3 km (1.9 mi)
from ground zero in Hiroshima on a business trip when the bomb was detonated.
He was seriously burnt on his left side and spent the night in Hiroshima. He
arrived at his home city of Nagasaki on 8 August, the day before the bombing,
and he was exposed to residual radiation while searching for his relatives. He
was the first officially recognized survivor of both bombings. He died in 2010
of stomach cancer.
Korean survivors
During the war, Japan brought as many as 670,000 Korean
conscripts to Japan to work as forced labor. About 5,000–8,000 Koreans were
killed in Hiroshima and 1,500–2,000 in Nagasaki. Korean survivors had a
difficult time fighting for the same recognition as Hibakusha as afforded to
all Japanese survivors, a situation which resulted in the denial of free health
benefits to them in Japan. Most issues were eventually addressed in 2008
through lawsuits.
Memorials
Hiroshima
Hiroshima was subsequently struck by Typhoon Ida on 17
September 1945. More than half the bridges were destroyed, and the roads and
railroads were damaged, further devastating the city. The population increased
from 83,000 soon after the bombing to 146,000 in February 1946. The city was
rebuilt after the war, with help from the national government through the
Hiroshima Peace Memorial City Construction Law passed in 1949. It provided
financial assistance for reconstruction, along with land donated that was
previously owned by the national government and used for military purposes. In
1949, a design was selected for the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Hiroshima
Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, the closest surviving building to the
location of the bomb's detonation, was designated the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.
The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum was opened in 1955 in the Peace Park.
Hiroshima also contains a Peace Pagoda, built in 1966 by Nipponzan-Myōhōji.
On 27 January 1981, the Atomic Bombing Relic Selecting
Committee of Hiroshima announced to build commemorative plaques at nine
historical sites related to the bombing in the year. Genbaku Dome, Shima
Hospital (hypocenter), Motoyasu Bridge all unveiled plaques with historical
photographs and descriptions. The rest sites planned including Hondō Shopping
Street, Motomachi No.2 Army Hospital site, Hiroshima Red Cross Hospital, Fukuromachi
Elementary School, Hiroshima City Hall and Hiroshima Station. The committee
also planned to establish 30 commemorative plaques in three years.
Nagasaki
Nagasaki was rebuilt and dramatically changed form after the
war. The pace of reconstruction was initially slow, and the first simple
emergency dwellings were not provided until 1946. The focus on redevelopment
was the replacement of war industries with foreign trade, shipbuilding and
fishing. This was formally declared when the Nagasaki International Culture
City Reconstruction Law was passed in May 1949. New temples were built, as well
as new churches owing to an increase in the presence of Christianity. The
Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum opened in the mid-1990s.
Some of the rubble was left as a memorial, such as a torii
at Sannō Shrine, and an arch near ground zero. In 2013, four locations were
designated Registered Monuments to provide legal protection against future
development. These four sites, together with "ground zero" (the hypocenter of the atomic bomb
explosion) were collectively designated a National Historic Site in 2016. These
sites include:
Former Nagasaki City
Shiroyama Elementary School (旧城山国民学校校舎). There were no children in the school
building at the time as the building was being used for the payroll department
of the Mitsubishi Arms Factory, but 138 of the 158 people inside, mostly
civilian payroll staff, died.
Former Urakami
Cathedral Belfry (浦上天主堂旧鐘楼). The cathedral was located close to the hypocenter
and completely destroyed. At the time, it was crowded with worshippers for
confession as the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary was
approaching on 15 August. All were killed.
Former Nagasaki
Medical University gate (旧長崎医科大学門柱). The school building and facilities were
destroyed by the atomic bomb. Over 850 people, including faculty, staff,
students, and nurses, were killed.
Sannō shrine second
torii gate (山王神社二の鳥居).
Debate over bombings
The role of the bombings in Japan's surrender, and the
ethical, legal, and military controversies surrounding the United States'
justification for them have been the subject of scholarly and popular debate.
On one hand, it has been argued that the bombings caused the Japanese
surrender, thereby preventing casualties that an invasion of Japan would have
involved. Stimson talked of saving one million casualties. The naval blockade
might have starved the Japanese into submission without an invasion, but this
would also have resulted in many more Japanese deaths.
However, critics of the bombings have asserted that atomic
weapons are fundamentally immoral, that the bombings were war crimes, and that
they constituted state terrorism. The Japanese may have surrendered without the
bombings, but only an unconditional surrender would satisfy the Allies. Others,
such as historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, argued that the entry of the Soviet Union
into the war against Japan "played a
much greater role than the atomic bombs in inducing Japan to surrender because
it dashed any hope that Japan could terminate the war through Moscow's mediation".
A view among critics of the bombings, popularized by American historian Gar
Alperovitz in 1965, is that the United States used nuclear weapons to
intimidate the Soviet Union in the early stages of the Cold War. James Orr
wrote that this idea became the accepted position in Japan and that it may have
played some part in the decision-making of the US government.
Legal considerations
The Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, which address the
codes of wartime conduct on land and at sea, were adopted before the rise of
air power. Despite repeated diplomatic attempts to update international
humanitarian law to include aerial warfare, it was not updated before World War
II. The absence of specific international humanitarian law did not mean aerial
warfare was not covered under the laws of war, but rather that there was no
general agreement on how to interpret those laws. This means that aerial
bombardment of civilian areas in enemy territory by all major belligerents during
World War II was not prohibited by positive or specific customary international
humanitarian law.
In 1963 the bombings were subjected to judicial review in Ryuichi Shimoda v. The State. The
District Court of Tokyo ruled the use of nuclear weapons in warfare was not illegal,
but held in its obiter dictum that the atomic bombings of both Hiroshima and
Nagasaki were illegal under international law of that time, as an
indiscriminate bombardment of undefended cities. The court denied the
appellants compensation on the grounds that the Japanese government had waived
the right for reparations from the U.S. government under the Treaty of San
Francisco.
Legacy
By 30 June 1946, there were components for nine atomic bombs
in the US arsenal, all Fat Man devices identical to the one used at Nagasaki.
The nuclear weapons were handmade devices, and a great deal of work remained to
improve their ease of assembly, safety, reliability and storage before they were
ready for production. There were also many improvements to their performance
that had been suggested or recommended, but that had not been possible under
the pressure of wartime development. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
Fleet Admiral William D. Leahy, decried the use of the atomic bombs as adopting
"an ethical standard common to the
barbarians of the Dark Ages", but in October 1947 he reported a
military requirement for 400 bombs.
The American monopoly on nuclear weapons lasted four years
before the Soviet Union detonated an atomic bomb in September 1949. The United
States responded with the development of the hydrogen bomb, a thousand times as
powerful as the bombs that devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Such ordinary
fission bombs would henceforth be regarded as small tactical nuclear weapons.
By 1986, the United States had 23,317 nuclear weapons and the Soviet Union had
40,159. In early 2019, more than 90% of the world's 13,865 nuclear weapons were
owned by the United States and Russia.
By 2020, nine nations had nuclear weapons, but Japan was not
one of them. Japan reluctantly signed the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons in February 1970, but is still sheltered under the American
nuclear umbrella. American nuclear weapons were stored on Okinawa, and
sometimes in Japan itself, albeit in contravention of agreements between the
two nations. Lacking the resources to fight the Soviet Union using conventional
forces, NATO came to depend on the use of nuclear weapons to defend itself
during the Cold War, a policy that became known in the 1950s as the New Look.
In the decades after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the United States would threaten
many times to use its nuclear weapons.
On 7 July 2017, more than 120 countries voted to adopt the
UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. Elayne Whyte Gómez, president
of the UN negotiations, said, "The
world has been waiting for this legal norm for 70 years". As of 2024,
Japan has not signed the treaty.
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