Atomic bomb survivor who became anti-war activist dies at 82

[bananas]

Source: Asahi Shimbun

Senji Yamaguchi, who suffered terrible burns in the 1945 atomic bombing of Nagasaki and later became a leading figure opposing war and nuclear weapons, died July 6 at a hospital in Unzen, Nagasaki Prefecture.

Yamaguchi, the first hibakusha (atomic bomb survivor) to address the United Nations, was 82.

“We have lost a very important person,” said Sumiteru Taniguchi, 84, a chairman with the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organizations.

Yamaguchi was 14 when he was working at a Mitsubishi ammunitions factory in Nagasaki 1.1 kilometers north of ground zero when the atomic bomb was dropped on the city on Aug. 9, 1945.

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Read more: http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/people/AJ201307070022

[WestStar]

1. A 14 year old working in a munitions factory

And some people still wonder why Truman deemed it necessary to hasten the end of the war to avoid our troops having to invade the Japanese homeland.

It would have been a bloodbath of historic proportions.

[NutmegYankee]

2. Please hold off for another month.

We can have our famous bloodbath of a debate on this in August like normal.

[happyslug]

3. And that is why the US Air Force was FORBIDDEN to bomb four cities from 1944 onward???

Please note, the US Air Force General in Charge of the Conventional Bombing of Japan was complaning he had no more targets he could bomb with his B-29s. His biggest complaint was why his bombers could NOT bomb the last four cities which had not been bombedyet.

This included Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Kyoto, and Kokura. Kokura and Hiroshima had major munitions plants, Nagasaki was a major point and Industrial center. Thus all four were major military targets but where NOT bombed by conventional bombs for the US wanted to see the full effect of Atomic bombing and not have to separate what had been done by other means (for example, pictures of Berlin post war, is often used to show the effect of the bombing of Berlin, but most of the damage appears to have been done by Russia Artillery as the Red Army took Berlin in late April 1945).

Nagasaki had seen some bombing, but the Planes that made those bomb drops were later reprimanded for they had been given other alternative targets NOT Nagasaki. Nagasaki had never been the target of an Allied Bomb attack, but had been listed as an alternative target if for some reason the B-29 could not bomb their primary target.

For more details:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_and_Nagasaki#Choice_of_targets

Sorry, while these cities were military targets, but then it was forbidden to bomb them. That makes sense only if the Military targets were minor compare to seeing how much damage an Atomic Bomb could do.

[ET Awful]

4. I'll take the word of Eisenhower over you . . .

"Secretary of War Stimson visited my headquarters in Germany, [and] informed me that our government was preparing to drop an atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who felt that there were a number of cogent reasons to question the wisdom of such an act.... During his recitation of the relevant facts, I had been conscious of a feeling of depression and so I voiced to him my grave misgivings, first on the basis of my belief that Japan was already defeated and that dropping the bomb was completely unnecessary, and second because I thought that our country should avoid shocking world opinion by the use of a weapon whose employment was, I thought, no longer mandatory as a measure to save American lives. It was my belief that Japan was, at that very moment, seeking some way to surrender with a minimum loss of 'face.' The Secretary was deeply perturbed by my attitude, almost angrily refuting the reasons I gave for my quick conclusions."

So your opinion is that the solution to employing 14 year-old kids in munitions factories is to incinerate the factories with the kids.

[Bigmack]

6. OK, I AM a Democrat, BUT

I still like Ike. And I admire and respect him too. I'm sure folks out there can find things that he said or did to be critical of, but that's true for EVERYONE! Ms Bigmack

[icarusxat]

5. Timing is everything...

The nukes were dropped in order to coincide with the times that hibachi grills would be hot and the blast wave would tip them over. Paper and bamboo fires ensued, and burns were primarily from house fires.

Not saying it was right, but it was what it was...