75 years ago today (Hiroshima bomb)

[Magicpole]

sorry for the late reply
exactly your point, it says whats on the tin 'no one wins' i kill you you kill me so whats the point, someone drops their arms and it very tempting for an aggressor, while your armed it reduces the risk of attack, its a good job JC didnt win the election because faslane would be a cod packing building by now

Well he wouldn't have moved them. But if we win they are getting to fuck. Not convinced we will but hopefully soon and for the rest of our lives.

 

[crazyg]

The UK had US nuclear missiles based at Greenham Common, England until 1992.

From what I understand (I may be wrong), they were also stored at RAF Burtonwood near Warrington, which used to be a very large American base. I went gliding there in the 60s with the ATC.

 

[RadcliffeRick]

The bombs were very nearly dropped by the,RAF

 

[Mazzarelli's Swiss Cheese]

The bombs were very nearly dropped by the,RAF

Very interesting that - news to me.

 

[GoatersLeftShin]

I don't know if you've seen this before but it's a superb essay on the impact of the Hiroshima bomb from the perspective of those who survived it. It is harrowing, scary and fascinating all at once.

I believe it was of such importance at the time that the New Yorker magazine devoted an entire edition to printing it.

A truly remarkable account by any measure

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/1946/08/31/hiroshima

 

[ZenHalfTimeCrock]

I always feel a degree of cognitive dissonance when contemplating the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

This is because my wife is Japanese and I lived in Japan for a while. I have also visited Hiroshima and the memorial park. Additionally, I have read and watched a few things that look at the Hiroshima bombing from a Japanese point of view. They can be enjoyed (if that is the right word) regardless of the standpoint one adopts in relation to this incident.

The most striking and harrowing example of the above is the anime Barefoot Gen which was adapted from a manga drawn by a cartoonist who survived the Hiroshima bombing. Here is the sequence where the bomb is dropped and its immediate aftermath depicted. It’s extremely graphic, though the dvd I have is rated a 12.



There’s also a novel that is very good and available in an English translation called Black Rain by the author Shiga Naoya.

Given the well-known sadism and brutality of the Japanese army, it may come as some surprise to learn that there were some dissenting voices in the ranks. One of them is the movie maker Masaki Kobayashi. His Human Condition Trilogy is well worth viewing and is set in Manchuria during the Japanese occupation.Better still is his film Hara Kiri. Although it is a samurai movie that located itself in the Tokugawa period, it actually serves as an oblique condemnation of the fanatical martial spirit that informed the Japanese military and their horrendous conduct during the Pacific war.

Kobayashi is a remarkable director who, for my money, made films that are superior to those of the better known Akira Kurosawa and Yasujiro Ozu.

There’s also a superb, hallucinatory novel about the Pacific war by Shohei Ooka called Fires on the Plain. Anyone who likes JG Ballard would almost certainly enjoy it as Ooka’s style (in English translation) is similar to his.

To reiterate my earlier point, the aim of this post is not to take up a moral position with regard to the Hiroshima bombing. I will save that for later. All I wanted to do was alert readers of this thread to some interesting Japanese novels and films to do with WW2 and Hiroshima. Suffice it to say that the cognitive dissonance I mentioned above is because I feel conflicted about this whole business. Although I can understand the reasons for the bombing and find them compelling, I also cannot approve of the indiscriminate nature of the effects of the two attacks. Incinerating then inhabitants of two cities seems repugnant to me.

There’s one last clip that I want to mention. Episode 8 of the Twin Peaks revival is probably one of the most surreal pieces of television ever made. In part of it, David Lynch created the following sequence that deploys Penderecki’s Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima as an accompanying soundtrack.

 

[Trevor Morley's Tache]

From what I understand (I may be wrong), they were also stored at RAF Burtonwood near Warrington, which used to be a very large American base. I went gliding there in the 60s with the ATC.

Quite possibly true.

Burtonwood was a joint RAF/USAF base during WW2. After the war it became a storage base. The M62 follows the line of the old runway and when the 62 was built there were no lights on that section of motorway. As a Cold War contingency I believe that the central reservation barriers were constructed in such a way that they could be easily removed and replaced with a temporary runway to be used in an emergency.

 

[Thorin Oakenshield]

I always feel a degree of cognitive dissonance when contemplating the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

This is because my wife is Japanese and I lived in Japan for a while. I have also visited Hiroshima and the memorial park. Additionally, I have read and watched a few things that look at the Hiroshima bombing from a Japanese point of view. They can be enjoyed (if that is the right word) regardless of the standpoint one adopts in relation to this incident.

The most striking and harrowing example of the above is the anime Barefoot Gen which was adapted from a manga drawn by a cartoonist who survived the Hiroshima bombing. Here is the sequence where the bomb is dropped and its immediate aftermath depicted. It’s extremely graphic, though the dvd I have is rated a 12.



There’s also a novel that is very good and available in an English translation called Black Rain by the author Shiga Naoya.

Given the well-known sadism and brutality of the Japanese army, it may come as some surprise to learn that there were some dissenting voices in the ranks. One of them is the movie maker Masaki Kobayashi. His Human Condition Trilogy is well worth viewing and is set in Manchuria during the Japanese occupation.Better still is his film Hara Kiri. Although it is a samurai movie that located itself in the Tokugawa period, it actually serves as an oblique condemnation of the fanatical martial spirit that informed the Japanese military and their horrendous conduct during the Pacific war.

Kobayashi is a remarkable director who, for my money, made films that are superior to those of the better known Akira Kurosawa and Yasujiro Ozu.

There’s also a superb, hallucinatory novel about the Pacific war by Shohei Ooka called Fires on the Plain. Anyone who likes JG Ballard would almost certainly enjoy it as Ooka’s style (in English translation) is similar to his.

To reiterate my earlier point, the aim of this post is not to take up a moral position with regard to the Hiroshima bombing. I will save that for later. All I wanted to do was alert readers of this thread to some interesting Japanese novels and films to do with WW2 and Hiroshima. Suffice it to say that the cognitive dissonance I mentioned above is because I feel conflicted about this whole business. Although I can understand the reasons for the bombing and find them compelling, I also cannot approve of the indiscriminate nature of the effects of the two attacks. Incinerating then inhabitants of two cities seems repugnant to me.

There’s one last clip that I want to mention. Episode 8 of the Twin Peaks revival is probably one of the most surreal pieces of television ever made. In part of it, David Lynch created the following sequence that deploys Penderecki’s Threnody for the Victims of Hiroshima as an accompanying soundtrack.

Damn that was crazy

What is the reputation of the emperor who surrerender to the allies?

 

[Blue Hefner]

Question: How soon after the bomb dropped did the railway in Hiroshima re-open?
Answer: The next day! Amazing.

I can’t imagine there were many passengers, though....

 

[Cotswold Knight]

Omd did write a good song though