A book I ask everybody on DU to please read if you haven't.

[benburch]

"Hiroshima" by John Hersey

In my not-so-humble opinion, you cannot possibly know what the consequences of nuclear war are unless you have read this book, which was written based on interviews with Hiroshima survivors given while the events of that and subsequent days were still fresh in their minds.

Most public libraries will have this book, or the hotlink above goes to Barnes & Noble, where you can buy it online.

Please K&R this.

[mike6640]

1. give us a link, please...n/t

[Mabus]

5. I don't see the link either

:shrug:

[benburch]

6. Click on the book title...

Or the image of the book...

[benburch]

11. I see the problem!

Fixed the links...

Some people have spam blockers which would have blocked them.

[shaniqua6392]

2. Thank you for the recommendation.

I will be sure to add it to my collection. It sounds very interesting and I have really never read anything on the topic other than in school history books, and we all know how accurate those can be!! LOL! K&R'd.

[knitter4democracy]

3. I did in high school.

Turned me against the use of nuclear weapons right then and there. Our government vaporized people. It's extremely disturbing.

[Supersedeas]

4. yep, I second that recommendation and also suggest:

Ibuse Masiji - Black Rain

Kenzaburo Oe - The Crazy Iris and other stories

Mariko Aratani - White Flash Black Rain

Miyao Ohara - Give Me Water, An Anthology

Kyoko Hayashi - Ritual of Death

[degreesofgray]

7. I read it in high school;

a powerful and horrifying account of the destructive force of nuclear weapons

[lumpy]

10. Required reading in high school

in 47'. Wonder if kids in school today are exposed to the realities of such devistation. My history teacher in high school concentrated on discussion of political philosophy, current events and relativity to past historical events. Hiroshima was reading requirement. It waa exciting.

[benburch]

12. Nope. They are not.

They are not even exposed to WW-II as history.

Doesn't that SUCK?

[EFerrari]

20. I had a great teacher as a freshman, who gave us a short

social history of the world. He had us role play.

One day, he came over to my group, looked at us with utter disgust and said, "You guys just blew up Korea!"

Were we sorry!

[dysfunctional press]

75. required for me too...i still have the cliff notes

i don't know if i ever got around to getting the book.

[izzie]

8. I had to read it years ago and two more he wrote to read

White Lotus and the Wall.

[Sinti]

9. Thanks K&R

[MissMarple]

13. I have an indelible memory of reading it in the early 60's when I was 12

It was the first one. My grandmother had it on one of her book shelves. Whoa, it was not exactly light summer reading, but I couldn't put it down. Short book, very intense.

And no, I'm not quite as old as dirt. ;)

[MissWaverly]

62. I always thought Godzilla was an anti-war movie

I still think that is what Godzilla was about, the H bomb, the happy carefree life and then
total devestation, there is one scene where there is a mother trying to protect her child
against a wall of flames that was very moving; and I remember the sadness of the children
in the movie, the incredible sadness.

[KT2000]

14. Survivors of Hiroshima

who moved to the US have a difficult time getting health insurance here. True capitalism.

[benburch]

15. Aren't we just special?

You'd think we could treat them for free. Dog knows there are few enough of them left!

[Thtwudbeme]

16. Kicked!

I need to read this--thank you for putting this thread up!

[KitchenWitch]

17. I read that book in high school

It was very disturbing, in a good way.

[sinkingfeeling]

18. An oldie, but a goodie.

[EFerrari]

19. Good idea, Ben

:kick:

[newspeak]

22. this reminds me of a story while living in Moab

our town is a tourist town, so we have many people come from around the world and other states. I was talking to this woman at the coffee house and she told me an amazing story. Her father was a POW in Japan during WWII and the camp was near one of our target sites. He, along with other American POWs were exposed to the radioactive fall out from the bomb. She told me that after the war, her father was embittered because there was an argument of allowing these men to return to the US because they might expose the public to some infectious disease. I think they didn't want them to return because they had been exposed and experienced the fall out. Her father had many health problems from exposure and she said that all of her brothers and sisters have some type of health issue caused by the radiation--she has deformed teeth and bad gums. Guess where her father went for treatment? Japan!!!!

[EFerrari]

24. So, so sad. I wonder how they're going to hide all the depleted

uranium problems those vets will come home with -- and that the Iraqi people will also have. We learn very little from our history.

http://www.robert-fisk.com/depleted_uranium_links.htm

[Hissyspit]

51. MOAB - Mother of all bombs.

Set off right before the Iraq War to scare Saddam into giving up the nuclear bombs/programs he didn't have.

Also, as you well know, John Ford country.

Irony upon irony.

[deadparrot]

21. "On the Beach," by Neville Shute, it also a truly disturbing book

about the possibility of nuclear war. Really horrifying stuff; I read it in high school, on the eve of the 2003 Iraq invasion.

[benburch]

49. Was also made into a movie, BTW. nt

[The Witch]

23. Links of horror follow: please view these

(OP, if you want to add any or all of these to your post please feel free)

Hiroshima WWW museum
(I find this image to be the single most horrifying image.)

Hiroshima photo museum

I also ask everyone who has a video store to see if they carry Barefoot Gen. It is the animated movie of Hiroshima from the eyes of a boy, and it is truly moving and horrific. I will link here to some of the more disturbing images, but nothing is more disturbing than the animation itself of skin burning and charring, peeling off and hanging from the sinews of arms, eyeballs being wrenched out by the fierce winds, shards of glass embedded in faces turned slack-jawed because the skin is hanging loose in strips.

(DU won't let you link to images w/out displaying them so please copy & paste if you are brave enough to view these)

-www. monstersandcritics.com/artman/uploads/gen04.jpg
-www. 10kbullets.com/images/reviews/barefootgen-03.jpg
-www. monstersandcritics.com/artman/uploads/gen03.jpg

This site lists it among their top 10 scary movies, and if you scroll down to see the image they use, you'll have to agree.

Sorry for the gross-out overload, but going to Hiroshima changed my life.

[eek]

25. Relatedly: listen to NPR "Voices of Chernobyl"

I was just listening to NPR doing stories about Chernobyl as this is the 20th anniversary .
Listen to Voices of Chernobyl: Survivors Stories
the NPR site indicates that the feature will be archived at 7:30pm est

I'll not soon (ever) forget the woman talking about her husband's dying days when pieces of his lung and liver were coming out of his mouth.





If this isnt eventually the right link, just go to npr.org and search for the piece by title. It was on "All Things Considered"
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5355810

ps: Hiroshima had a profound and enduring effect on me. As did The Day After.

Randi Rhodes was absolutely right on Lou Dobbs yesterday: if every spare news crew and camera arent there on June 2 to document the nuke test ...well, that's it for us.
See her clip at C&L
http://www.crooksandliars.com/

[mimitabby]

26. my mother made me read it when i was 12

i recommend it to all and wish it WAS required reading in ALL jr high schools.

[0007]

27. John Hersey's "Hiroshima" will bring an outrage to the normal

reader of what had been done. The testimony of Japanese survivors tell it all and should be brought to the front burner of all Americans. And because our leaders thought that because this was a just war, they assumed that dropping the bomb was in behalf of an early victory, that made it morally acceptable.

Many facts were hidden from the American people and many truths were twisted into lies.

Historians say history does indeed repeats itself.

Read it!

[benburch]

28. And I am betting Hersey didn't have access to much of the information.

The US Occupation Authority was not friendly to journalists.

I am quite sure there was more to tell.

[0007]

30. I'm more than quite sure there is much more that was kept from

world. All the reasons given for this act have been shot down.

[alfredo]

29. Some images still remain. One was the shadows of people left on

the sidewalks and walls. They shaded the the surfaces from the flash (pika). I also remember the horrific scene at the hospital. The book is a must read.

One man, a kite builder from Nagasaki survived both nuclear attacks. He was in Hiroshima when the first one hit. He realized that his city might be next and that he needed to warn his wife. He jumped a train at his first opportunity. Three days later he made it back to his kite shop. As soon as he arrived, he saw the Pika (bright flash) of the bomb. He pushed his wife into the cellar where they rode out the destruction. Not only did he survive both attacks, he was quite lucky. It was cloudy that day causing the bomb to miss its target. If it had landed where they wanted it to land, his shop would have been at ground zero.

This kite maker went on to be known world wide for his beautiful Hata kites.

On the back of the pictured gentlemen is a depiction of one of his better known designs.



The Hata kite is probably taken from the Indian fighter kite. the red white and blue is probably from the Dutch flag. It was the Dutch who brought the Indian fighter to Japan.

[benburch]

31. I knew US soldiers who were involved with the A-bomb tests.

Some were at several tests.

All died of odd diseases and far too young.

[alfredo]

32. They said that several movie stars died from filming near

(downwind from) a nuclear test site. John Wayne was one that possibly died from exposure to radiation. "The Conqueror" 1956

http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_016.html

[benburch]

33. Many of us are right now paying that price. Here is a calculator...

...which will assess your risk from above ground testing;

http://ntsi131.nci.nih.gov/

For me it says; "The best estimate of the thyroid dose you received is 0.67 rad."

[alfredo]

42. That site gave me pause.

3.8 rad.

[benburch]

43. And that is as offical as can be.

National Institutes of Health.

Think of all the babies whose milk a nuclear war, even a small one, would poison. Look at the testing program; About as many nukes as would go off in a regional nuclear exchange. And you took 3.8 rad!

What if that happened all at once?

And the radioisotopes that will secret themselves within the bones of growing children! Oh my. This calculator was JUST for Iodine-131!

[alfredo]

46. I think it was Strontium 90 that was the big concern. We

were getting it through milk also. It is a bone cancer threat.

I lived in Central Ky at the time. Imagine the kids growing up west of the Mississippi. From 66 to 69 I was 9,000 miles to the east perched high on a mountain overlooking the Red Sea. At that altitude (8,600 ft), the radiation I experienced there was from the sun.

[benburch]

47. Yes, that too!

In fact I think that is worse than the Cobalt isotopes. And "unburned" Plutonium and Uranium too. An A-bomb always leaves unburned fuel.

[alfredo]

58. So that glow I see in my wife's face could be more that

unconditional love.

[benburch]

60. I hope not!

Breathing
by Kate Bush


Outside
Gets inside
Through her skin.
I've been out before
But this time it's much safer in.

Last night in the sky,
Such a bright light.
My radar send me danger
But my instincts tell me to keep

Breathing,
("Out, in, out, in, out, in...")
Breathing,
Breathing my mother in,
Breathing my beloved in,
Breathing,
Breathing her nicotine,
Breathing,
Breathing the fall-out in,
Out in, out in, out in, out in.

We've lost our chance.
We're the first and the last, ooh,
After the blast.
Chips of Plutonium
Are twinkling in every lung.

I love my
Beloved, ooh,
All and everywhere,
Only the fools blew it.
You and me
Knew life itself is

Breathing,
("Out, in, out, in, out...")
Breathing,
Breathing my mother in,
Breathing my beloved in,
Breathing,
Breathing her nicotine,
Breathing,
Breathing the fall-out in,
Out in, out in, out in, out in,
Out in, out in, out in, out...
("Out!")

"In point of fact it is possible to tell the
("Out!")
difference between a small nuclear explosion and
a large one by a very simple method. The calling
card of a nuclear bomb is the blinding flash that
is far more dazzling than any light on earth--brighter
even than the sun itself--and it is by the duration
of this flash that we are able to determine the size
("What are we going to do without?")
of the weapon. After the flash a fireball can be
seen to rise, sucking up under it the debris, dust
and living things around the area of the explosion,
and as this ascends, it soon becomes recognisable
as the familiar "mushroom cloud". As a demonstration
of the flash duration test let's try and count the
number of seconds for the flash emitted by a very
small bomb; then a more substantial, medium-sized
bomb; and finally, one of our very powerful,
"high-yield" bombs

"What are we going to do without?"
Ooh please!
"What are we going to do without?"
Let me breathe!
"What are we going to do without?"
Ooh, Quick!
"We are all going to die without!"
Breathe in deep!
"What are we going to die without?"
Leave me something to breathe!
"We are all going to die without!"
Oh, leave me something to breathe!
"What are we going to do without?"
Oh, God, please leave us something to breathe!"
"We are all going to die without
Oh, life is--Breathing.

[alfredo]

65. Riveting.

[LostinVA]

37. They pretty much ALL died, including the director and some grew

John Wayne, Agnes Morehead, Susan Hayward. Agnes Morehead publicly stated that the movie (which was pretty damn bad, btw) killed them all.

[mopinko]

34. i think this planet is just gonna shake us off

i don't see how we are ever gonna stop ourselves. i cannot believe that we are even considering using these weapons, to say nothing of making new ones.

[benburch]

35. There is only one way to stop Bush from doing this.

But nobody seems to have the balls to do it.

[latebloomer]

40. speaking of the planet shaking us off-

I quote the great-- though depressing-- George Carlin-

"This planet has put up with much worse than us. It's been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, solar flares, sunspots, magnetic storms, pole reversals, planetary floods, worldwide fires, tidal waves, wind and water erosion, ice ages and hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets, asteroids, and meteors. You think a few plastic bags and aluminum cans are going to make a difference?

The planet isn't going anywhere, folks, we are! We're going away. Pack your shit - we won't leave much of a trace. Thank God for that. Nothing left. Maybe just a little Styrofoam. The planet will be here, and we'll be gone. Another failed mutation; another closed-end biological mistake.

The planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas. And it will heal itself, because that what it does; it's a self-correcting system. The air and water and earth will recover and be renewed. And if plastic isn't really degradable, most likely the planet will incorporate it into a new paradigm: The Earth Plus Plastic.

The Earth doesn't have a particular prejudice against plastic. Plastic came out of the earth. Perhaps she sees it as one of her many children. It could be the reason the Earth allowed us to be spawned here in the first place. She wanted plastic, but didn't know how to get it!
Philosophers say, "Why are we here?" The planet says, "Plastic, asshole!"

[LostinVA]

36. I first read this in high school in about 1980

I grew up with alot of Japanese-Americans, all of whose families were in internment camps... and quite a few who had relatives in Hiroshima and Nagasaki affected -- or killed -- by the bombs.

[uppityperson]

38. Read it as a young teen, greatly influenced my life

good book.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

39. I read it at the age of 12, too

Believe it or not, it was a selection of the Junior Scholastic Book Club back in the early 1960s.

I've also been to the museums at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

To me, the most moving and impressive part of the visit was seeing the Hiroshima Industrial Exhibition Hall (the "atom bomb dome") close up at dusk. It's visible from a distance in much of the city, but if you go right up to it, you can see that the inner steel framework of the building is actually twisted.

That sight somehow hit me more than all those old black and white photographs.

[Swamp Rat]

41. Gave me nightmares when I was a child that continue to this day

:hide:



Some of my family were ranchers near White Sands (it used to be our property before the U.S. Govt. seized it via Immanent Domain). Much of the cattle were affected and my grandmother died of stomach cancer many years later (no one else has died from cancer in my family - she was on a ranch within visual range of the Child Bomb blast).

[sellitman]

44. junior will read it as soon as he finishes "My Pet Goat"

:sarcasm:

[CoffeeCat]

48. Oh great!

He's just now turned to page 4 of "My Pet Goat", so don't hold your breath!

(He's the decider...he'll decide what he reads and how fast he reads it!)

[librechik]

45. also check out Hersey's "White Lotus"(Red China conquers/enslaves US)

chilling, unforgettable social "scifi"

also good as field manual for surviving 2017

[benburch]

50. Sure enough they own our pawn ticket.

And I suspect we shall never be able to redeem it.

[NNadir]

52. My parents read it at the dinner table back in the 1960's.

My parents - my father in particular - were conservatives, but for some reason this was a book chosen for our nightly reading. I suppose that one reason was that we all feared nuclear war. This was the era of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

It was very powerful, and never really left my mind.

[benburch]

59. You'd have been a pretty tough case if it hadn't effected you!

The USA is the only nation to have ever used these weapons in war.

And now we appear to be itching to be the only nation to have ever used these weapons in TWO wars.

And it makes me ill to the core of my being.

[NNadir]

66. It makes us all ill.

On some level it is easier to understand the first nuclear war, but it will far more obviously damnable to have a second.

I was a child when we read Hiroshima, and of course, we really didn't grasp what nuclear war really meant. I recall thinking that it was vaguely exciting in some way: Like the movie On the Beach.

We stocked up on food in the basement. We thought we'd all be coming out after the blast to have a look around, and drink cans of the Metrical dietary supplement, which had all the essential vitamins and made you look slim and fit as well. Even though we read the book, it still seemed remote, unreal.

I don't think anyone grasps what nuclear war is really about any more. We are forgetting.

If you want real graphic scientific detail, the windily named Committee for the Compilation of Materials on Damage Caused by Atomic Bombs published an interesting book back in 1981 called Hiroshima and Nagasaki, The Physical, Medical, and Social Effects of the Atomic Bombings (Basic Books, 1981). Here see tables of the blast pressures in kg-cm^-2 at various distances, or read about the autopsies of victims and see slides of the bone marrow of a man standing outside at 1000 meters. Somehow, even in clinical terms, the nature of the affair comes through with unparalleled power. It is still one of the most disturbing books in my library.

Our nation will forever be damned in history should we allow a second nuclear war. This is independent of politics. Had the nuclear war associated with the Cuban Crisis taken place, Kennedy would have been every bit as damnable as Bush will be (should he do this thing worse than what he has already done - which is terrible even before another nuclear war).

It is, frankly, weird that nuclear weapons have not all been dismantled. It is way beyond weird that even after the terrible events in Iraq - the obvious lies, the fraud, the misrepresentation, that we would even contemplate yet another war, never mind a nuclear war. I can't believe it. Ethics plays no role here of course: Bush is a pyschopath entirely incapable of moral reasoning.

[benburch]

67. When I was a kid, I believed in Heinlein's "Space Cadet" as an answer...

In that, all of the nuclear weapons were given to the UN, and were stationed in orbit to be dropped upon any nation that dared to acquire its own. Which of course meant that none did because no nation can survive as an international outlaw under those terms.

In modern times, however, look at what the isolation of a nation from important trading partners can do. North Korea has been reduced to eating all of its dogs and cats, and only the vastly repressive nature of its regime has kept it from revolution. And I think that might be the answer. Embargo. The rest of the world MUST embargo the "nuclear club" until they (we) all disarm.

[Peter Frank]

53. You Cannot Be More Wrong...

I grew up with air-raid drills where everyone knew that the wooden desk we were ducking under wouldn't protect us from the radiation.

I saw footage of Hiroshima & Nagasaki victims (living and dead) countless times in school before entering junior high. I never got used to the magnitude of the history and of the threat.

Please don't insult my formative experience by arrogantly stating, "..you cannot possibly know what the consequences of nuclear war are unless you have read this book..."

What I lived teaches me far more than any friggin' book. Thank you listening, and reducing your arrogance.

[Peter Frank]

54. Thank you also for caring so deeply about this...

Please keep posting your conscience.

[benburch]

57. Well, that was rude as hell.

I lived the much the same experiences, I even built a fallout shelter kit so we could all hide in the walk-in cooler at our family's business (this when I was 8), but still I think this book was essential in my understanding. Pictures don't convey what the actual stories of the survivors does. And never can. You, of course are entitled to your opinion.

[Peter Frank]

61. You misread my intention...

Yes, my first post was sardonic; but I was not being sarcastic when I said, "Thank you also for caring so deeply about this. Please keep posting your conscience." I meant that sincerely.

[benburch]

63. Fair enough.

Sorry!

[Peter Frank]

64. No apology necessary...

...but thanks.

[hamerfan]

55. Kicked!

Thanks for the tip, Ben. As voracious a reader as I am, sorry to say I've never heard of this book. Gives me a great reason to walk down to the library this afternoon.
dumpbush

[Peter Frank]

56. As long as you're into reading...

...how about reading some responses to the OP?

[Taxloss]

68. I've read that, in the Penguin edition.

You're right, Ben, it's sobering.

I would recommend the DVD "Threads" as a companion piece.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcfour/cinema/features/threads.shtml

[Disturbed]

69. Why did the US Govt. chose to drop two bombs on...

populated territory?

[benburch]

70. The usual goal of bombing, of course!

To hurt the enemy and force him to capitulate.

The mindset then was quite different, you have to understand. Nobody knew that this would be so different from our usual 1000-bomber raids, like we used on Tokyo and Dresden. These were just seen as big very efficient bombs.

[pitohui]

74. that is not what oppenheimer etc. said

you need to read a little history beyond this short book, written before much of the information was declassified, try richard rhodes two volumes on the subject, it will open your eyes to political realities

they knew damn well it was much more than just a bigger more efficent bomb

i recently talked to a man who is one of the last surviving witnesses of the trinity test

they knew

they all knew

[pitohui]

73. there were two kinds of bombs -- it was a science experiment

ben's answer is not factually correct, although i understand his cynicism

the hiroshima and nagasaki bombs represented two v. different designs, as you will see if you ever visit our nat'l atomic museum in albuquerque new mexico where you can see the huge design and size/shape differences

hence the nicknames fat man and little boy for the huge visible differences in design

so it was a science experiment

good people can disagree abt the need for hiroshima but the fact that they then went ahead and dropped nagasaki too -- that is very troubling and wrong because it was done simply as a test of the second design to see how it compared on a live human population

so we were no better than any nazi w. that one

[benburch]

71. kick!

:kick:

[benburch]

72. kick!

:kick:

[KAT119]

76. K&R! K&R! K&R!K&R! K&R! X a Trillion!

[bananas]

77. k&r nt