Japan marks Hiroshima anniversary as regional conflicts rage

On August 6, 2024, 1:06 PM

The governor of Hiroshima in Japan has made an impassioned plea to world leaders to get rid of nuclear weapons as the Japanese city marks the 79th anniversary of a nuclear attack that left around 140,000 people dead and caused massive devastation.

“As long as nuclear weapons exist, they will surely be used again someday,” Hidehiko Yuzaki said in his address at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.

“Nuclear weapons abolition is not an ideal to achieve far in the future, ” he said. “Instead, it is a pressing and real issue that we should desperately engage in at this moment since nuclear problems involve an imminent risk to human survival.”

Hiroshima experienced untold destruction in the US attackImage: Moritz Wolf/imageBROKER/picture alliance

Gaza, Ukraine wars sowing ‘fear and distrust’

Hiroshima’s mayor, Kazumi Matsui, used his speech at the same event to highlight how current conflicts were normalizing the use of military force as a means to solve problems.

Matsui said Russia’s ongoing war in Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza are “claiming the lives of countless innocent people and shattering normal life.”

“These global tragedies are deepening distrust and fear among nations, reinforcing the public assumption that to solve international problems we have to rely on military force, which we should be rejecting.”

The ceremony in Hiroshima was attended by some 50,000 people, including Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.

They observed a minute of silence with the sound of a peace bell at 8:15 a.m., the time when a US B-29 bomber dropped the bomb on the city.

The commemorative event comes just days after Japan and the US reaffirmed Washington’s commitment to “extended deterrence,” which includes the possible use of atomic weapons, to protect its Asian ally amid growing regional tensions.

Open discussion of nuclear deterrence in Japan is a radical shift away from the country’s previous reluctance to touch on such issues as the only nation in the world to have suffered atomic attacks.

Hiroshima horrors endure through memorial and survivors

The Peace Memorial Museum and atomic bomb survivors are a reminder of the horror that took place on August 6, 1945. As the number of living survivors dwindles, documenting their stories is becoming ever more vital.

Image: Reinhard Schultz/imago images

Remembering the tragic events of August 1945

What was previously scorched rubble is now Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima. The world’s first atomic bomb used as a weapon of war was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, killing around half of the city’s population of 350,000. Almost everything within a 2,000-meter (6,500-foot) radius was incinerated. Three days after the tragedy, another atomic bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki.

Image: Rodrigo Reyes Marin/ZUMAPRESS.com/picture alliance

A ceremony for peace

This artist is performing a dance in front of the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima, as part of the ceremonies marking the 79th anniversary of the tragedy. Every year, August 6 is commemorated not only to honor all the unidentified innocent victims of the attack, but as a reminder of the devastating impact of nuclear bombs and the need to free the world from such weapons of mass destruction.

Image: David Mareuil/Anadolu/picture alliance

Museum and memories

Located in the Peace Park created in the aftermath of the war, the museum designed by Kenzo Tange opened its doors in 1955. Renovated in 2019, it highlights testimonies of survivors, known as the “hibakusha,” and offers public talks where they share their stories. The museum offers a virtual reenactment of the moment the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, seen here.

Icon for peace

Sadako Sasaki’s parents bequeathed a number of accessories that once belonged to the little girl to the museum. Sasaki, exposed to radiation at the age of 2, later died of leukemia. A statue of “genbaku no ko no zo” — literally “Statue of the Children of the Atomic Bomb” — is displayed at the Peace Memorial Park in Hiroshima City. The model of the statue is Sasaki, who became an icon for peace.

Ensuring stories don’t fade

Sadae Kasaoka was at home, 3.5 kilometers (2.2 miles) from the hypocenter of the explosion, when the atomic bomb fell. “I saw in the sky the color of the rising sun, and a loud roaring sound. The window broke, shattering into pieces that came flying toward me,” she remembers. In 2005, after years of silence, she became part of Hiroshima City’s survivors’ and successors’ program

What happened in Hiroshima?

On August 6, 1945, shortly before the end of World War II, US forces detonated a nuclear bomb over the city in a bid to force Japan to surrender.

In addition to the tens of thousands of people who immediately died in the explosion, the attack left a terrible legacy in the many survivors of the bombings who had lasting injuries and illnesses resulting from the explosions and radiation exposure.

Days after the attack, a second US nuclear bomb hit Nagasaki in southwest Japan, killing around 74,000 people.

The two attacks led to Japan’s surrender on September 2.

Story By DW