James Conant, then the president of Harvard University and a key player in the Manhattan Project, followed the Hersey “Hiroshima” furor with alarm. Oppenheimer was not the only one of the top scientists and policymakers to have regrets, though most hid their second thoughts. This summer, moviegoers will have the chance to experience the moral angst of Oppenheimer as portrayed in a highly anticipated film directed by Christopher Nolan. President Joe Biden and the other leaders of the G-7 meeting last month in Hiroshima were reminded why the bomb has been taboo, even if it is relabeled as a “tactical” weapon. More than 75 years later, the reevaluation that began in 1946 goes on: When, if ever, is the use of nuclear weapons justified? Today, as Russia rattles the nuclear saber, China expands its nuclear arsenal, and other nations vie to join the nuclear club, the debate has an uncomfortable relevance and immediacy. The journalist’s contribution was to humanize what the Air Force publicists had always taken pains to keep abstract: civilian death. Hersey’s article did not moralize or sensationalize. Roosevelt to the potential of an atomic bomb-ordered 1,000 copies. One Princeton resident, Albert Einstein-the scientist who, in 1939, had first alerted U.S.
Aftermath of hiroshima and nagasaki bombing full#
Editorial writers urged readers to get the full story, and in Princeton, New Jersey, even the mayor urged the town’s residents to do likewise. Radio announcers read all 30,000 words aloud over the air. The article, entitled, simply, “Hiroshima,” caused an instant sensation. The details were at once quotidian and ghastly, and Hersey described, for the first time to most readers, the grim effects of radiation poisoning. Writing in a just-the-facts style, made more chilling by understatement, Hersey told the story, hour-by-hour, sometimes minute-by-minute, of six survivors. 31, 1946, a year after Japan’s surrender, the New Yorker published an entire issue devoted to an article by war correspondent John Hersey about the day the bomb fell on Hiroshima.
Their worries focused more on whether Russia would get the bomb, or about whether they could find a new car or a house, a job, or a spouse. Many people-millions of veterans returning home, their long-awaiting families-were grateful to have avoided an invasion. Most Americans approved of dropping two atomic bombs on Japan some wished their countrymen had dropped more.
This article is adapted from Road to Surrender by Evan Thomas (Random House, 336 pp., $28, May 2023)īut it had not-not yet. This article is adapted from Road to Surrender by Evan Thomas (Random House, 336 pp.,, May 2023)
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