Hope in Hiroshima
April 23, 2007
It had to happen. I had always believed that, and going to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial at the very spot made me question that belief. What I'm referring to was the fateful August 6, 1945, when an American bomber dropped the world's first Atomic bomb on enemy territoty in the Japanese coastal city of Hiroshima, killing nearly 80, 000 in one instant. I think I first really learned about what happened to the city of Hiroshima as a 6th grade student, when the class read a book told from one of the hibakusha, or bomb victims. I recall our furthur assignment was to make a Powerpoint presentation on something that had to do with the city. I chose to do what life was like Before and After the bomb. It was the year that we were all taught that the bombing was a complete necessity for both America and Japan. It saved countless lives of Americans, and probably many Japanese as well. It quickly ended the war and brought the country of Japan in to the 21st century. Now there isn't anything wrong with this belief, but it seems to tell only one side. The United States in the latter days of World War II, was faced with a terrible dilemma. The Japanese were a proud, courageous and determined people. Japanese men, women and children were willing to die for the emperor. The invasion of Japan was necessary to end the war, because the Japanese would "lose face" if they considered surrender. In August of 1944, war in Europe was over and the face off between the United States and Japan had finally arrived. The United States had to choose between sending hundreds of thousands of its soldiers, many freshly off the battlefields of Europe, to invade Japan killing and being killed by the hundreds of thousands, or dropping a newly developed weapon called the atomic bomb on two cities in Japan which would result in tens of thousands of civilian lives with little cost to US servicemen. The only hope of ending the war quickly and honorably was to drop the bombs. Calls for surrender were ignored and repugnent to the Japanese hierarchy; Okinawa and Iwo Jima had shown clearly what an invasion of Japan would be like. The decision was made, the bombs were dropped, the war was ended and both military and civilian lives were saved by both countries. I hear many people tell me that what my country did to Japan in World War II was inhumane and downright wrong. I always listen to their point of views, though I have one thing to say about everything. It is very hard to walk in the shoes of the people who made the decisions in 1945. Especially when some of the greatest "concerns" people have today are what Brittany Spears is doing or who just got booted off of American Idol. How could a president, or the others charged with responsibility for the decision, answer to the American people, if, after the bloodbath of an invasion of Japan, it became known that a weapon sufficient to end the war had been available by midsummer and was not used? Japan was given a similair decision after the defeats in Iwo Jima and Okinawa, and the Unconditional Surrender. Except that the government, run by the military, ignored the inevitable. In war, the objective is to defeat your enemy and keep your own men alive. The point of war is to win, not to make friends. When it comes to war, the moral thoughts that govern society are not the same morals that govern the military. One important argument I learned at the museum had to do with the American and Russian rivalry. The bomb was to announce to the world American superiority. It would also stop any Russian advance against Japan and create a situation, as happened, in which the US would dominate the occupation of Japan. The invasion was set for November 1, 1945. By that time, the USSR would have fought long enough to have a say in the partition of the Japanese island group and perhaps even Tokyo itself. The impact of Soviet occupation upon Japan and the part it could have played in Korea and the Cold War cannot be calculated. The only thing I want to point out is that Russia occupied Germany, and failed to leave it without a Communism government. If Russia had occupied Japan, the possibilities of an actual Cold War are really endless. Upon entering the museum, I first noticed that simplicity surrounded by silence. It was very crowded, but no one was speaking, only reading and learning. The first part of the museum described the history of the city of Hiroshima, prior to the bombing. It showed that it was a mere farm town, built up because of it's prosperous castle. Into World War II, the city became an area of manufacturing goods for the war, with a prime port location. It told that in 1945, Hiroshima, like the rest of Japan, realized that the war was becoming hopeless. Yet they refused to surrender and would die for their emperor and their land. As we walked furthur into the building, a lit up container with a small beat up looking wristwatch separated the life of Hiroshima before the bombings and after. The wristwatch is stopped at 8:15, when the atomic bomb was dropped. The museum was incredible. There is really no other way to describe the different emotions you are stricken with. One moment you feel of relief that the war was brought to an end, that lives were saved of Americans and Japanese, while the next you shattered to pieces thinking about all the deaths brought on by one powerful work of man. Some information shows you the reasons that the bomb was absolutely necessary, while other pictures and artifacts make you feel that nothing so painful could really be humane. The middle part of the museum presented information about the current state of nuclear weapons and the world. It called for the disarming of all weapons. A task easier said than done. All the information was presented in entirity and fairly. There was no unlawful blaming or harsh words involved. There was only hope. The museum could make anyone a believer that peace on earth is possible, even if only, briefly, before stepping out in to the real world. But still something happened to me during my visit. Something I did not quite expect, and can not fully explain. Something inside of me snapped, and I found myself in tears. Tears that meant little to anyone but myself as I thought about all that has happened to me on my exchange to Japan. It was in the Main building, or the final part of the museum before the exit. The exhibit was really about what happened to the lives of some victims, or hibakusha in Hiroshima. The pictures of death were brutal, but did not affect me like one particular item. The item, located in a room about the broken lives of children, was a grey and blue sailor school uniform, resting peacefully in a glass exhibit. Had it been before the morning of August 6, it would have been a white and navy blue, with probably a matching necktie, and navy blue skirt. Now it is tattered, charred, and containing all of the elements of death. The student, Nobuko Oshita, was a first-year student at First Hiroshima Prefectural Girls High School, who was exposed to the bomb at her building demolition work site. She fled to a nearby city and stayed at a private house until evening. Relief corps workers, returned her to her parents in Otake. She was still alive when she arrived. She told her parents what had happened to her and asked for water. She died later that night. This summer uniform is one she sewed herself, in which she died wearing. Almost the same kind that my friends and I at Tosajoshi, my host school, wear during the warm months. Nobuko was just one of the girls, I eat lunch with everyday. The girls that are always laughing, singing, chatting with friends, talking about boys, dreaming of what's next to come, and studying hard for a bright future. And all in one instant her life was destroyed by a war, she had little to do with. And I imagined her face, but all I could see was the faces of my friends at school. And I lost it. My Mom did not understand why I was crying. She told me to stop it, once she saw the tears. I understand why she told me to stop now. It's hard to imagine not having lived this year in Japan, but I sometimes forget that it's my life, something that others haven't been involved in. There is a good chance that no one in that museum on that day had the experience I had. No one had to picture their new friends, some of the kindest people in the world, in a charred school girl uniform. A wasted life by a war that they had not asked for. Yes, I do believe that Hiroshima had to happen. And I think that the world needs to see what happened here in Hiroshima. They need to see why it happened, who it affected, and why it can not under any circumstances happen again. Because inside that glass building, full of eternal sadness, reason, and truth, is a place of a hope.
