The Context Behind Hiroshima And Nagasaki Bombings Justified

I decided to write about detonation of atomic bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Relevance and significance of this topic is certainly present because the problem of applying atomic weapons is now more relevant than ever in our contemporary world. Even since 1940s, a lot of experiments have been carried out in order to determine the truly power of these nuclear opportunities. My question here if it’s worth keeping such weapon in possession or our world has to give it up completely.

Let’s start from historical context. According to it, it was August 1945, the World War II between countries of Europe from the Western side has come to its end, however an issue between the USA and Japan continued. America provided the Japanese with an ultimatum, stating that the latter has to surrender, otherwise a previously unknown, powerful weapon will be applied to ensure the full destruction of the country. It had no effect on Japan, who still didn’t want to be defeated. Therefore, on August 6th, 1945, the USA dropped a first atomic bomb (‘Little Boy’) on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Its destructive power has claimed 90,000-166,000 of lives and devastated about 12 km2 of the city (Wikipedia).

And still, Japan didn’t give up because they counted on some peace negotiations with the USSR, which weren’t successful anyways. There came another bomb – less thought out by Americans, had less human losses (about 60,000-140,000), but led to inevitable result of the Japanese surrender. As have been noticed by the Japanese Emperor at that time, Hirohito: “The enemy now possesses a new and terrible weapon with the power to destroy many innocent lives and do incalculable damage. Should we continue to fight, not only would it result in an ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but also it would lead to the total extinction of human civilization” (Denman Collins, 48). With that being said, the World War II was officially ended, however leaving a plenty of negative consequences.

Now it seems very far (more that 70 years ago), but the problem of keeping and applying nuclear weapons today arises with every more or less serious confrontation in the world. There are positive and negative arguments concerning this issue. Although I do not support this idea, I suggest considering both sides.

First positive thing which comes to mind about nukes is a relative safety of the country having it. It was a primary reason, why countries started to develop atomic bombs, after prohibition of other weapons of mass destruction. After Japanese defeat the USA started to position itself as a mighty, strong country which can destroy anyone disobeying. However, arms race took place in the years of Cold War (1947-1991), where the USA and USSR were showing their great powers in order to threat each other. When the latter “won” the race with its “Tsar Bomba”, the largest nuclear device with 50 megaton of TNT ever detonated on the Earth (Atomic Heritage Foundation, 2014), countries stopped measuring their potential. Nowadays, the so-called Nuclear Club exists, having 9 countries by official data: the USA, Russia, the Great Britain, France, China, India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea.

Second good point for the country, implementing it, is a quick end to the war with saving a lot of people’s lives (from one side, mainly). It frees those people from compulsory participation in the war as well. About 10 million of them would’ve died simply from hunger. Referring to the same bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, who knows how many lives they could’ve lost if Japan didn’t surrender?

Let’s talk now about negative effects. Firstly, the global community in general is not in favor of nukes applied anywhere. The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which passed on July 7, 2017, fully confirms this statement. 122 countries supported the Nuclear Ban, while 1 was against (interestingly enough, Netherlands), and 1 abstained (Singapore). It will become live when 50 countries ratify it. (United Nations, 2017). Because of controversiality of this topic and aforementioned safety, the states having nuclear weapons do not support it for some reason. Secondly, devastation. Thirdly, (subjective) we could’ve applied those intellectual powers onto the more peaceful areas.