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August 7th, 1945. President Harry S. Truman ordered the launch of a new weapon on Hiroshima Japan, carried by the Enola Gay. This weapon will certainly astonish both our, and future generations to come. The single bomb, entitled "The Atomic Bomb", has the capacity of over 100,000 tons of TNT. The bomb was lanuched yesterday leaving the city in complete ruins. There are reports that various people there are suffering from a "radiation sickness" but the United States Army believe's these claims to be lies.

This day, as with Pear Harbor, shall truly live in infamy.

-Taken from a newspaper in my grandfather's attic.

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Hello to all of you.

Tomorrow is the anniversary of the day that the Enola Gay, along with 2 other planes that accompanied it, lauched a weapon with the destructive force to kill 80,000 people in one moment.

These people we're civilians living in Hiroshima, including children.

I feel that the Atomic Bomb was used to kill these innocent people. Which is why I am making a memorial, this topic is part of it.

I want you to know what happpend.

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And now, a moment of silence for those who died.

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I would now like to post a series of image.

Because of some of the sizes of the images, I will have to link them.

Little Boy, the bomb used on Hiroshima.



The atomic cloud over Hiroshima.



Hiroshima after the bombing. Note that one of the pilot's signed their name on the picture.



The Hiroshima Prefectural Commercial Exhibition. Now the Hiroshima Peace Memorial. It was one of the few buildings to survive the bomb.

August 6th, 1945.



2005



The marker that indicated "ground zero". This is the exact place that the second atomic bomb landed in Nagasaki three days later.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/GroundZero7279.JPG

The Cenotaph. The plate says, "Rest in peace, for this mistake will not be repeated."

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/Cenotaph_Hiroshima.jpg

Finally, one of the many watches that stopped when the bomb detonated. The time reads, 8:15 AM.

http://static.flickr.com/45/128396480_36c6c3f065_o.jpg

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If you would like to add any photo's, stories, or anything else for this topic, you may.

A note to the Admins: Because Hiroshima and Nagaski were deystroyed from August 6th to the 9th respectivly, I would like to keep this topic open untill the 9th. After that, it may be locked.

As for me, I have 12 white roses to buy tomorrow.

Well, I suppose I should go make a topic about 9/11 then. And about the tsunami in Thailand. And about the Holocaust. And about Pearl Harbor.

Alex, I know you feel strongly about this, but in my opinion, I don't think it needs it's own thread. Also, you have mentioned it many times before in other threads.

Accually, I will be.

When those days come respectively.

But tomorrow is August 6th, and that is what happend. So I am going to make a topic about it today.

I hope you don't mind that. But I feel it's a very good thing to do a memorial for innocent people who died.

... So you won't be making one about the tsunami? Innocent people died there too, you know.

Anyways, about making memorials, there's so many other ways you can do it. A picture you've made, a post in the Ramdom Thoughts thread, a sig, an avatar...

Or a topic.

Oh! I'm sorry! I accedently erased that when I was quoting you.

I'll edit that.

What? Who says a topic on WWII means there has to be a topic on the tsunami? We have a topic on Bonus Stage, does that mean we need one on Waterman, Couchslave, Geoweasel, and Bloo Toons? We can't have a topic on funny YouTube videos unless we also have one on funny Google Videos? We have one on WWE, so we must also have one on MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL, MLS, and PGA? Of course not.

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why does a serious topic need to be filled with an argument? can't we just let Alexander have a topic about this?

Oh!

Now I know what that clock avvy was about, and what your sig means! It was a bit puzzling before.

The memorials they have in those cities look beautiful. The Nagasaki ground zero memorial is eerie, too, though. It's like an accusing finger pointing up in horror at sky. And the circles and lines are like the spreading explosion. I felt a pull, like it was asking for a visit, but at the same time I felt a push, like I wouldn't want to be seen there by any Japanese person (even though they really wouldn't mind).

There's a manga about this (there's probably several about the bombs) called Barefoot... something. Can't remember the name. It's part of a series about this kid, Barefoot someone, and his life around the end of World War II. Have you read that? It's very sad, but full of the kid's energy.

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ATTN: LOWER BOARD USERS HAVE MOVED TO ANOTHER FORUM. COME JOIN THE FUN!

The atomic bombs were only used because the predicted death toll for both sides of an invasion of Japan was so astronomically high that we needed to do something that would send a message to the Japanese that we want you to give up. Now I am not condoning the use of the bombs, but at the time, it was best idea available.

Correction, the bombs never landed they were detonated at 2,000 and 1,540 feet above the ground, respectivly. The shockwave hit the ground, but the bombs never did.

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If you really want to sympathize with the Japanese war dead during WWII, talk about the carpet-bombing that took place between March 10th and the days leading to the atomic bomb. More than 350,000 people were killed in those raids; counted more than both nuclear bombs. The nuclear bombs were terrible, yes, but does it make a difference with type of bomb is used to kill people? The Americans would have carpet-bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki and many other cities, if in were not for the fact that Russia set precedent to take Japan. The nukes were used due to a short timetable, unfortunately, to keep Japan away from Russia and "decrease" the amount that were killed over time.

It is sad that these events had to occur, anyway...

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My current avatar is also a memorial. The girl is Setsuko, she's from the film Grave of the Fireflies. My favorite WWII film.



Very much so. Here are quite a few images.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Hiroshima



Accually, the Japanese aren't as bitter as you would think. Isao Takahata, who directed Grave of the Fireflies, is fiercly agaisn't any sort of defence that Japan was forced into the war. He believe's that it was Japan's fault for starting the war with America. Which is true.

That's what this topic is basicly about. It's supposed to be both a memorial and a statement of Japan's anti-war belief. And my own.



Barefoot Gen. And I haven't read it yet. But I am very curious.

I wonder how sad it is...

In my opinion, Grave of the Fireflies was the saddest film I have ever seen. But this might be just as sad...

To BTG:

All I would like to say is, Japan was already suffering before the bomb was launched. The United States had cut off any sort of shipping to the island. The people there were slowly starving.

So, even if the bomb hadn't been used, Japan was going to lose the war either way. The Soviets were also going to invade in just a few days.

And thank you for the correction, but in my opinion, it doesn't matter how the bomb hit, but just that it hit.

There is little doubt that the atomic bombs were horrible. There is also little doubt that they were the best option to end the war quickly and with the fewest casualties possible over the long run. However, don't you think it's sad that the best possible option was this? That the least of all possible evils was one that caused this kind of death and destruction? It is a hard lesson for humanity to learn.

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I agree Didy. My grandfather's troop was one of the first to parachute into the area and witness the near total destruction. He photographed some very sobering scenes. Those photographs were some of the most stark and horrifying images I have ever seen.
It's weird. On one hand I'd love to ask Granny where those photos are now, but at the same time I never want to see them ever again.

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Sig?

To the Japanese, surrender is not an option. Even the word surrender didn't show up in there language until after their surrender in WW2. The Japanese would have lost, yes, but they would have fought to the death like they had throughout the war. It didn't matter if they were starving or not. As I have said, had we gone through with the invasion, who knows how many millions of people would have died as a result. As Didy said, dropping the bombs was the lesser of two evils.

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Dropping the bomb was the best solution at the time. Would you rather have had them not drop the bomb? The war would have gone on and many, many more people would have been killed on both sides.

Innocents are going to get killed in wars. That's the sad truth. Now, I'm not saying they deserved to die. Nor am I saying the bomb is the end all solution. It was the best thing to do at the time.

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To BTG, and Ace:

To some of the Japanese, surrender was not an option, but to many other's, they had a different opinion.

Including Emperor Hirohito, who didn't want to start the war, and was the one who ended it.

The generals of the Japanese army were the ones who were dertimined to continue the war. Infact, they still felt that Japan would be succesful even after the bomb was launched.

Emperor Hirohito had a very different opinon. Infact, even after he ordered an unconditional surrender, a military coup was attempted to prevent the surrender.

And Japan isn't the only nation that fought to the very last person. When the United States army came on the outskirts of Berlin, they found children defending the border.

And about dropping the bomb, there's something interesting to consider.

When congress was voting about the bomb, there were two options: to lanch the bomb near Japan, in the ocean. This would show the Japanese what power the United States had without killing anyone. The other option was to launch it on an area with many civilians.

The votes went to an area with many civilians. The thought at the time was to lower the Japanese hope of survival.

I would also like to say that, it's estimated that 70, 000 children died in the bombs. Why so many? Hiroshima and Nakaski were the two main cities where many Japanese children went to in order to protect themselves from the war.

I should also say, that the bomb's orginal intention was to be used in Nazi Germany. Becuase at the time, Germany looked very powerful.

Oh, and one more thing.

Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard, the two scientists who were the directors of the bomb's construction, spoke out agaisn't it's use.

Einstein & Szilárd weren't involved with constructing the bomb at all; they suggested that the energy released from nuclear chain reactions could be used for bombs, and that the Nazis might be developing a nuke.

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Rest In Peace, Kenneth Gong (September 1, 1924 - August 6, 2006).

Kenneth Gong, the father of one of the members at Good Shepherd, passed away this morning. Mr. Gong was a decorated war hero, a paratrooper of the 101st Airborn who fought at Normandy and the Battle of the Bulge.

He has fought the good fight, and run his race to the finish. We salute you!

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I think that Alex is doing a really good thing. i know I mght be noob but plz respect what happened 61 years today.

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This is a picture of the geddup noise ->

Thank you for the correction Ian.

Mr. Szilard did work on the bomb untill 1942. When he started to work on it less and less. Untill he fully abandoned the project.

But, I can say that he spoke out agisn't it's use many, many times.

"Suppose Germany had developed two bombs before we had any bombs. And suppose Germany had dropped one bomb, say, on Rochester and the other on Buffalo, and then having run out of bombs she would have lost the war. Can anyone doubt that we would then have defined the dropping of atomic bombs on cities as a war crime, and that we would have sentenced the Germans who were guilty of this crime to death at Nuremberg and hanged them?

But, again, don't misunderstand me. The only conclusion we can draw is that governments acting in a crisis are guided by questions of expediency, and moral considerations are given very little weight, and that America is no different from any other nation in this respect."

15th of August, 1960.