tag:theconversation.com,2011:/fr/topics/atom-bomb-19303/articlesAtom bomb – The Conversation2023-06-12T12:24:46Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1997372023-06-12T12:24:46Z2023-06-12T12:24:46ZIf humans went extinct, what would the Earth look like one year later?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523673/original/file-20230501-28-b9wqpt.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=58%2C0%2C9664%2C5116&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A glimpse of a post-apocalyptic world.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/post-apocalyptic-urban-landscape-royalty-free-image/1331834934?phrase=post+apocalypse+city&adppopup=true">Bulgar/E+ via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=293&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/281719/original/file-20190628-76743-26slbc.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=368&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/us/topics/curious-kids-us-74795">Curious Kids</a> is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">curiouskidsus@theconversation.com</a>.</em></p>
<hr>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>If humans went extinct, what would the Earth look like one year later? – Essie, age 11, Michigan</strong> </p>
</blockquote>
<hr>
<p>Have you ever wondered what the world would be like if everyone suddenly disappeared? </p>
<p>What would happen to all our stuff? What would happen to our houses, our schools, our neighborhoods, our cities? Who would feed the dog? Who would cut the grass? Although it’s a common theme in movies, TV shows and books, the end of humanity is still a strange thing to think about. </p>
<p>But as <a href="https://www.design.iastate.edu/faculty/carlton/">an associate professor of urban design</a> – that is, someone who helps towns and cities plan what their communities will look like – it’s sometimes my job to think about prospects like this. </p>
<h2>So much silence</h2>
<p>If humans just disappeared from the world, and you could come back to Earth to see what had happened one year later, the first thing you’d notice wouldn’t be with your eyes. </p>
<p>It would be with your ears. </p>
<p>The world would be quiet. And you would realize <a href="https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/noise-pollution/">how much noise people make</a>. Our buildings are noisy. Our cars are noisy. Our sky is noisy. All of that noise would stop.</p>
<p>You’d notice the weather. After a year without people, the sky would be bluer, the air clearer. The wind and the rain would scrub clean the surface of the Earth; all the <a href="https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories/blogpost/young-and-old-air-pollution-affects-most-vulnerable">smog and dust that humans make</a> would be gone.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="An illustration of a large city park with a deer standing in the middle of a tree-lined path." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/523677/original/file-20230501-22-fqdsd2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">It wouldn’t be long before wild animals visited our once well-trodden cities.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/life-after-people-royalty-free-image/1078643476?phrase=post+apocalypse+city&adppopup=true">Boris SV/Moment via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Home sweet home</h2>
<p>Imagine that first year, when your house would sit unbothered by anyone. </p>
<p>Go inside your house – and hope you’re not thirsty, because no water would be in your faucets. Water systems require constant pumping. If no one’s at the public water supply to <a href="https://wonderopolis.org/wonder/how-does-water-get-to-my-faucet">manage the machines that pump water</a>, then there’s no water.</p>
<p>But the water that was in the pipes when everyone disappeared would still be there when the first winter came – so on the first cold snap, the frigid air would freeze the water in the pipes and burst them. </p>
<p>There would be no electricity. Power plants would stop working because no one would <a href="https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-how-does-electricity-work-118686">monitor them and maintain a supply of fuel</a>. So your house would be dark, with no lights, TV, phones or computers. </p>
<p>Your house would be dusty. Actually, there’s dust <a href="https://www.highlightskids.com/explore/science-questions/what-is-dust-made-of#:%7E">in the air all the time</a>, but we don’t notice it because our air conditioning systems and heaters blow air around. And as you move through the rooms in your house, you keep dust on the move too. But once all that stops, the air inside your house would be still and the dust would settle all over.</p>
<p>The grass in your yard would grow – and grow and grow until it got so long and floppy it would stop growing. New weeds would appear, and they would be everywhere. </p>
<p>Lots of plants that you’ve never seen before would take root in your yard. Every time a tree drops a seed, a little sapling might grow. No one would be there to pull it out or cut it down. </p>
<p>You’d notice a lot more <a href="https://www.pestworldforkids.org/pest-guide/mosquitoes/">bugs buzzing around</a>. Remember, people tend to do everything they can to get rid of bugs. They spray the air and the ground with bug spray. They remove bug habitat. They put screens on the windows. And if that doesn’t work, they swat them. </p>
<p>Without people doing all these things, the bugs would come back. They would have free rein of the world again.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Surrounded by hills and mountains is an isolated two-lane road, cracked and crumbling." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/524515/original/file-20230504-25-39fi1z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Given enough time, roads would start to crumble.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/destroyed-asphalt-road-earthquake-consequences-royalty-free-image/1284881863?phrase=apocalypse%2B">Armastas/iStock via Getty Images Plus</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>On the street where you live</h2>
<p>In your neighborhood, critters would <a href="https://sciencetrek.org/sciencetrek/topics/urban_wildlife/facts.cfm">wander around, looking and wondering</a>. </p>
<p>First the little ones: mice, groundhogs, raccoons, skunks, foxes and beavers. That last one might surprise you, but North America <a href="https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/animals/mammals/facts/beaver">was once rich with beavers</a>. </p>
<p>Bigger animals would come later – deer, coyotes and the occasional bear. Not in the first year, maybe, but eventually.</p>
<p>With no electric lights, the rhythm of the natural world would return. The only light would be from the Sun, the Moon and the stars. The night critters would feel good they got their dark sky back.</p>
<p>Fires would happen frequently. Lightning might <a href="https://kids.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/lightning-">strike a tree or a field</a> and set brush on fire, or hit the houses and buildings. Without people to put them out, those fires would keeping going until they burned themselves out. </p>
<h2>Around your city</h2>
<p>After just one year, the concrete stuff – roads, highways, bridges and buildings – would look about the same. </p>
<p>Come back, say, a decade later, and cracks in them would have appeared, with little plants wiggling up through them. This happens because the Earth is constantly moving. With this motion comes pressure, and with this pressure come cracks. Eventually, the roads would crack so much they would look like broken glass, and <a href="https://www.weekand.com/home-garden/article/science-trees-breaking-sidewalks-18025841.php">even trees would grow through them</a>.</p>
<p>Bridges with metal legs would slowly rust. The beams and bolts that hold the bridges up would rust too. But the big concrete bridges, and the <a href="https://kids.kiddle.co/Interstate_Highway_System">interstate highways, also concrete, would last for centuries</a>.</p>
<p>The dams and levees that people have <a href="https://damsafety.org/kids#:%7E:">built on the rivers and streams of the world</a> would erode. Farms would fall back to nature. The plants we eat would begin to disappear. Not much corn or potatoes or tomatoes anymore. </p>
<p>Farm animals would be easy prey for bears, coyotes, wolves and panthers. And pets? The cats would go feral – that is, they would become wild, though many would be preyed upon by larger animals. Most dogs wouldn’t survive, either. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ItYE6y0zMgI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">An asteroid hit and a solar flare are two of the ways the world could end.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Like ancient Rome</h2>
<p>In a thousand years, the world you remember would still be vaguely recognizable. Some things would remain; it would depend on the materials they were made of, the climate they’re in, and just plain luck. An apartment building here, a movie theater there, or a crumbling shopping mall would stand as monuments to a lost civilization. The Roman Empire collapsed more than 1,500 years ago, yet you can see <a href="https://www.headout.com/blog/ruins-in-rome/#:%7E">some remnants even today</a>.</p>
<p>If nothing else, humans’ suddenly vanishing from the world would reveal something about the way we treated the Earth. It would also show us that the world we have today can’t survive without us and that we can’t survive if we don’t care for it. To keep it working, civilization – like anything else – requires constant upkeep. </p>
<hr>
<p><em>Hello, curious kids! Do you have a question you’d like an expert to answer? Ask an adult to send your question to <a href="mailto:curiouskidsus@theconversation.com">CuriousKidsUS@theconversation.com</a>. Please tell us your name, age and the city where you live.</em></p>
<p><em>And since curiosity has no age limit – adults, let us know what you’re wondering, too. We won’t be able to answer every question, but we will do our best.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/199737/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Carlton Basmajian does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Maybe it was a nuclear war, devastating climate change, or a killer virus. But if something caused people to disappear, imagine what would happen afterward.Carlton Basmajian, Associate Professor of Community and Regional Planning, Urban Design, Iowa State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1435242020-08-09T11:20:23Z2020-08-09T11:20:23ZLegacy of Canada’s role in atomic bomb is felt by northern Indigenous community<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351794/original/file-20200807-24-110hvdn.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3003%2C1933&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The beach at Port Radium, where uranium ore used to be loaded onto barges for shipment. The townsite for the mine used to stand on the pit of land on the right.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">CP PHOTO/Bob Weber</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As the world marks the 75th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a little known part of the legacy is the impact on the Délı̨nę First Nation of the Northwest Territories. I explore their stories in the film <a href="https://moralawakening.ca/"><em>A Moral Awakening</em></a>, which is available online.</p>
<p>This heritage connects Indigenous people, Canadians and people all over the world who are concerned with peace, reconciliation and social justice. The film contributes to understanding of the global impact of nuclear weapons and its <a href="http://www.pamphleteerspress.com/hiroshimas-shadow">contested history</a>. But the main goal of <em>A Moral Awakening</em> is to acknowledge the service and sacrifice of <a href="https://www.deline.ca/en/about-us/">the people of Délı̨nę</a>, a story long silenced.</p>
<p>The geographies of the film are spread across Canada, connected through the <a href="http://doi.org/10.3138/9781442674332">mining and transportation of uranium ore</a>. The ore was mined at Port Radium on Great Bear Lake, N.W.T., and then <a href="https://www.mqup.ca/highway-of-the-atom--the-products-9780773537835.php">transported to Port Hope, Ont.</a>, for refining, finally ending up in the United States for use in the Manhattan Project. Of the total amount of uranium used, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s00016-014-0146-4">80 per cent was refined in Port Hope and 11 per cent came from Port Radium</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3042%2C1871&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A vintage black-and-white photograph of a wharf with two shipping vessels docked." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C3042%2C1871&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=370&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351790/original/file-20200807-14-2syi67.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=465&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Wharf used for shipping ore at head of Great Bear River, NWT, 1943.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Library and Archives Canada / RG85, R216, PA-101864)</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Long-lasting impacts</h2>
<p>The people of Délı̨nę were hired to work as ore bag carriers and on the barges. In the decades that followed, many began to reflect on the impact of the mining and the legacy of the atomic bomb on the health and spiritual well-being of the community and its people. </p>
<p>In <em>A Moral Awakening</em>, the people of Délı̨nę demonstrate their fortitude as the community moves forward with greater control of its own future owing to <a href="https://youtu.be/Jp-aIloX5kE">self-government</a>. </p>
<p>As a non-Indigenous person, I am inspired by the people of Délı̨nę. This story is about the strength, courage and perseverance of a culture and a community, universal messages that are particularly relevant today.</p>
<p>The voices and experiences of community leaders and Elders in Délı̨nę are central to <em>A Moral Awakening</em>. The community was directly and deeply affected by their work at Port Radium. Dene workers at Port Radium often carried mined uranium on their backs in sacks and were susceptible to breathing in ore dust. But given limitations of data available, a 2005 government report was <a href="https://assembly.nu.ca/library/Edocs/2005/001195-e.pdf">unable to confirm a link between the levels of cancer in the community and exposure to low-grade uranium</a>. </p>
<p>There has been no closure for the community.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/GSReqj1JX-c?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">The 1999 documentary ‘A Village of Widows’ examines the effects of mining and transporting the uranium ore used in the atomic bomb.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>‘Huge health risk’</h2>
<p><em>A Moral Awakening</em> features members of the Délı̨nę community.</p>
<p>“Our people were never told about the dangers of being exposed to uranium,” says Danny Gaudet, chief negotiator for the <a href="https://www.deline.ca/en/home/">Délı̨nę Got’įnę</a> self-government agreement. “There are letters on file that the federal government knew back then that opening Port Radium was a huge health risk to anybody that operated or worked there.”</p>
<p>Elder Alfred Taniton, who worked in the mine in the 1950s and ‘60s, says not only was the mine hard on people’s health, it was hard on their hearts. </p>
<p>“The poison they took out they made a powerful weapon out of it, so they dropped it on another country, and the people from that country also suffered by it,” he says in the film. “We think about that. It came from our land to be used to make other people suffer.”</p>
<p>The film’s title was inspired by former American president Barack Obama’s words in May 2016 during a visit to Hiroshima. He described a future in which “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/27/barack-obama-japan-hiroshima-reaction">Hiroshima and Nagasaki are known not as the dawn of atomic warfare, but as the start of our own moral awakening</a>.” </p>
<p>In the case of what happened to the people of Délı̨nę, the film calls for a moral awakening in the form of a call to action to overcome the shadow of destruction and injustice that we humans so readily bring upon ourselves, on others and our planet. This would include a formal reconciliation between the governments of Canada and the Délı̨nę Got’įnę.</p>
<h2>Canada’s war heritage</h2>
<p>The film is part of the <a href="https://warheritage.royalroads.ca/">War Heritage Research Initiative</a> at <a href="https://www.royalroads.ca/">Royal Roads University</a>, a project started in 2015 and funded primarily by the Government of Canada. I have written, directed and produced more than 30 short documentary films profiling Canada’s heritage related to the World Wars, both in our country and overseas. </p>
<p>These films rely on the concept of a <a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/realms-of-memory/9780231084048">site of memory</a> as the gateways to the past. The stories are narrated by local storytellers deeply connected to these places, people I call “guardians of remembrance.”</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A derelict wharf on a river" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351797/original/file-20200807-22-1ne6xhg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=424&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The old wharf at the head of Great Bear River.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(D. Anthon, 2017)</span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>They help us understand the significance of learning this heritage, how it shapes understandings of our identity and the lessons that can inspire us to make a better world. These films are for educational purposes and <a href="https://warheritage.royalroads.ca/war-memories-across-canada/">are accessible to all online</a>.</p>
<p>Port Radium <a href="https://www.aadnc-aandc.gc.ca/eng/1332423218253/1332441057035">was remediated</a> by 2009. Because the site of memory no longer exists, and with the inevitable passing of all who lived and worked in that era, we face an extra challenge in remembering Canada’s connection to arguably the most seminal event in 20th-century history.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143524/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Geoffrey Bird received funding to cover travel and film editing from Heritage Canada, Government of Canada. </span></em></p>Seventy-five years after the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the people of Délı̨nę remain affected by Canada’s role in the attack. A documentary presents their stories.Geoffrey Bird, Professor of heritage, culture, and tourism, Royal Roads UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1440812020-08-06T15:13:30Z2020-08-06T15:13:30Z‘Atomic plague’: how the UK press reported Hiroshima<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351547/original/file-20200806-24-1ef2kc2.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C4%2C2995%2C2173&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Devastation: how Hiroshima looked the day after the atom bomb was dropped.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Everett Collection via Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>On August 7 1945, few Britons expected the war to end soon. The <a href="https://theconversation.com/ve-day-as-reported-by-british-newspapers-relief-joy-and-a-saucy-comic-strip-137906">relief of VE Day</a> three months earlier had already faded. Thousands of British soldiers, sailors and airmen were still involved in gruelling battles against Japanese imperial forces. Many who had fought across Europe expected to be sent to join them. </p>
<p>On Okinawa, American forces had lost 10,000 in their campaign to expel the Japanese garrison. A Sunday Times correspondent wrote that: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The protracted and extremely bitter fighting and the substantial casualties incurred by the attackers convey the obvious warning that the invasion of the Japanese homeland, if and when it comes, may be a very tough and expensive affair.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>So, the reports about the attack on Hiroshima the previous day came as a complete surprise. My research into newspaper archives, only available electronically by subscription, reveals that journalists were stunned by the scientific breakthrough. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.atomicheritage.org/history/manhattan-project">Manhattan Project</a>, whose team of American, British and Canadian scientists had designed and assembled atomic bombs at the Los Alamos laboratory in New Mexico, was an intensely guarded secret. Beyond a tiny elite, the weapon that would “radically alter the military and diplomatic power of the USA” and define the strategic politics of the post-war world, was unheard of and unimagined.</p>
<p>The Manchester Guardian’s initial report of the Hiroshima bomb explained that it was the result, as its headline related, of “Immense Co-Operative Effort by Ourselves and US”. A combination of awe at the scientific achievement and patriotic pride united newspapers of left and right. </p>
<p>From New York, the Daily Mail’s James Brough predicted that Japan faced obliteration by “the mightiest destructive force the world has ever known – unless she surrenders unconditionally in a few days”. A second report told how the workers who built the bomb had never seen their final product “and until today, they did not know what they were doing”.</p>
<p>Just days later, The Times correspondent in Washington DC explained that Japanese resistance had shaped the decision to attack Hiroshima:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Until early June, the president and military leaders were in agreement that this weapon should not be used … but those responsible came to the conclusion that they were justified in using any and all means to bring the war in the Pacific to a close within the shortest possible time.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Beyond belief</h2>
<p>But, amid astonishment at the new weapon, concern was not entirely buried. Winston Churchill wrote in the Daily Mail that: “This revelation of the secrets of nature, long mercifully withheld from man, should arouse the most solemn reflections in the mind and conscience of every human capable of comprehension.” </p>
<p>The Daily Mirror sought to make sense of the weapon’s power by relating it to its readers’ own lives. In a fine example of quality popular journalism, commissioned just 24 hours after the first bomb fell, the Mirror asked its reporters to explain what would have happened if an atomic bomb had hit their city.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Enola Gay, US bomber, dropped first atom bomb to end the second world war." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=408&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/351549/original/file-20200806-16-rb9ssl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=512&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Photo by James E. Weichers of the Enola Gay, the US Air Force B-29 bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dan Thornberg via Shutterstock</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>From Edinburgh, the Mirror reported that: “All historic Edinburgh would have disappeared.” In London: “There would be a swathe of utter destruction from Kensington Church to the Mansion House, as wide as the parks and the West End, from Bayswater Road and Oxford Street, across to Piccadilly and the Strand.” Manchester believed everything between Victoria Station and Old Trafford would be levelled.</p>
<p>The Manchester Guardian’s London correspondent lamented: “The fact, so suddenly and appallingly revealed to us, is that we have devised a machine that will either end war or end us all.” The Listener, a weekly title owned by the BBC, prayed that work to maintain peace would be pursued with as much vigour as the science that had split the atom. Newspapers hoped the new technology would be used to generate cheap energy.</p>
<h2>Hair-trigger business</h2>
<p>Eyewitness accounts of the condition of survivors poisoned by radiation were slow to emerge. Wilfred Burchett’s account for the Daily Express, headlined “<a href="https://assets.cambridge.org/97805217/18264/excerpt/9780521718264_excerpt.pdf">Atomic Plague</a>”, was published on September 5. The authorised eyewitness account of the second, Nagasaki bombing, by William L Laurence for the New York Times was released on September 9. These would change the tenor of debate.</p>
<p>The Guardian’s London correspondent described people wondering how the capital “would have stood it had the Germans been first with the atomic bombs. What a hair-trigger business the world has become”.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Tl3_0D2h8BY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>In early September, the Daily Mail reported that Japanese doctors in Hiroshima were seeing patients die “at the rate of about one hundred daily through delayed action effects of the atomic bomb”. The Times reported warnings that: “No state would be more at the mercy of any future atomic bomb attacks than Britain” which had “immense aggregations of people in its great cities”.</p>
<p>Concern about the consequences of atomic warfare emerged more rapidly in newspapers than any about conventional bombing of German or Japanese cities. This had killed more civilians. Within weeks of the bombings, British newspapers had raised questions about how future use of atomic power might be effectively controlled and whether it could be used for peaceful purposes.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/ve-day-as-reported-by-british-newspapers-relief-joy-and-a-saucy-comic-strip-137906">VE Day as reported by British newspapers: relief, joy and a saucy comic strip</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Japan raised the question of moral culpability. “This is not war, not even murder, it is pure nihilism”, declared its state broadcaster. Such responses begin to explain why, eight decades later, few Germans challenge their nation’s war guilt, but many Japanese consider their country a victim as much as a perpetrator of war.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/144081/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tim Luckhurst has received research funding from News UK and Ireland Ltd. This article is based on research conducted in preparation of my book under the provisional title 'Reporting the Second World War: Newspapers and the Public in Wartime Britain'. I am under contract to Bloomsbury Academic, an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc</span></em></p>British newspapers were very quick to see the horrific potential of this new weapon.Tim Luckhurst, Principal of South College, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/965392018-05-15T06:54:40Z2018-05-15T06:54:40ZHow an Australian scientist tried to stop the US plan to monopolise the nuclear arms race<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218942/original/file-20180515-122916-jnoyez.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=18%2C386%2C2506%2C1964&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mark Oliphant in 1939.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">From a collection at the National Portrait Gallery, Canberra. Gift of Ms Vivian Wilson 2004</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Australian scientist Mark Oliphant, who helped push the United States to develop the atomic bombs in World War II, also played a major role during the war in attempting to stop the US dominating the UK in any further development of nuclear weapons.</p>
<p>Details of the Adelaide-born physicist’s efforts are included in new research <a href="https://doi.org/10.1071/HR18008">published today in the CSIRO’s Historical Records of Australian Science</a>, based on documents sourced from the UK Cabinet archives.</p>
<p>These archival documents reveal how Oliphant attempted a British rebellion against scientific collaboration with the US that escalated all the way to the top of Britain’s wartime leadership.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-melbourne-activists-launched-a-campaign-for-nuclear-disarmament-and-won-a-nobel-prize-85386">How Melbourne activists launched a campaign for nuclear disarmament and won a Nobel prize</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>The rise of the physicist</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.science.org.au/fellowship/fellows/biographical-memoirs/marcus-laurence-elwin-oliphant-1901-2000#1">Oliphant</a> (1901-2000) described himself as a “belligerent pacifist” and his humanitarianism and compassion forms an indelible image of the gentle giant of Australian science.</p>
<p>After studying at the University of Adelaide he moved to the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge in the UK. Oliphant joined a freewheeling cabal of atomic physicists led by fellow antipodean <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ernest-Rutherford">Ernest Rutherford</a>. He later took up a position at Birmingham University.</p>
<p>But soon the war was to change everything for him.</p>
<p>In late 1938, <a href="https://www.aps.org/publications/apsnews/200712/physicshistory.cfm">nuclear fission of uranium was discovered in Berlin</a> and within months the thunderclap of war clattered over Europe. After convincing the Americans of the potential of an atomic bomb in 1941, Oliphant joined the <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Manhattan-Project">Manhattan Project</a> in 1943 as a leading member of the collaborative British Mission.</p>
<h2>At war with secrecy</h2>
<p>Oliphant found that wartime secrecy was totally opposite to the usual culture of open science. The US military police opened his mail, and the FBI interrogated him on his casual attitude to rules.</p>
<p>In September 1944 Oliphant complained of his restrictions to the US Army’s no-nonsense military head of the project, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/Leslie-Richard-Groves">General Leslie Groves</a>. Groves was frustrated with progress and gave Oliphant a lecture on war and security.</p>
<p>In doing so, the cabinet documents on Oliphant’s notes show that the normally circumspect Groves also let slip that the US had no intention of honouring an agreement with the British to share atomic technology after the war. Groves stated that even after the war America needed to prepare for an “inevitable war with Russia”.</p>
<p>Oliphant’s notes added:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>In this conversation Groves insisted that he spoke for the armed forces and for every thinking man and woman in U.S.A. He said that any effort U.K. might make must be confined to central Canada. He excluded specifically Australia or any other part of the Empire. Every possible source of supply of raw materials would be monopolised and controlled by U.S.A.-U.K.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>How to warn the UK?</h2>
<p>Oliphant saw weapons development as merely a vehicle on which to carry the potential of almost limitless energy and he was intent on resuming his open research after the war.</p>
<p>He could not risk his mail being opened again. So he headed from Berkeley, California to the British Embassy in Washington to write a secret report to London detailing his conversation with Groves.</p>
<p>Oliphant had a plan. He proposed that, without delay, the entire British Mission leave the Manhattan Project, return to Britain and restart their own programs. In late 1944 he seemingly had traction and the British project, code-named Tube Alloys, was reinvigorated with new plans tabled to construct uranium isotope plants.</p>
<p>Oliphant’s plan escalated up the chain to Lord Cherwell, then Prime Minister Winston Churchill’s scientific advisor, and to Sir John Anderson, the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the authority on atomic matters inside the British War Cabinet.</p>
<p>James Chadwick, the scientific head of the British Mission, was furious at Oliphant’s cavalier approach and wrote to the British polity arguing that the British Mission must stay in America to complete the task at hand.</p>
<p>Oliphant’s bombast, confidence and directness is famous. As he approached the door of 11 Downing Street (the official residence of the Chancellor of the Exchequer) on January 9, 1945, he was likely optimistic that his meeting with Sir John would result in a decision to follow his new plan.</p>
<p>But Sir John was in a pessimistic mood. There was still a war on, and the allies were being pushed back by the Nazis at the Battle of the Bulge. Sir John put a stop to talk of this scientific rebellion, and ordered Oliphant back to America to complete the job.</p>
<p>The atomic bombs fell on Japan in August 1945. World War II soon ended.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=437&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=549&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=549&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218943/original/file-20180515-122935-1e3igum.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=549&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The wrecked framework of the Museum of Science and Industry in Hiroshima, Japan, shortly after the dropping of the first atomic bomb, on August 6, 1945.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock/Everett Historical</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>After the war</h2>
<p>In mid-1946 the newly formed United Nations debated control of atomic technology and Oliphant was in New York as an Australian advisor. He and other scientists pushed a plan to abolish weapons and throw the science open.</p>
<p>The alternative, the scientists argued, would be an escalation of an arms race. Only openness in science could reduce suspicion between nations. </p>
<p>The US and the Soviet Union almost agreed to the plan. But the Americans refused a Soviet request to first destroy their atomic arsenal and the Soviets refused to allow UN inspections.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/we-may-survive-the-anthropocene-but-need-to-avoid-a-radioactive-plutocene-84763">We may survive the Anthropocene, but need to avoid a radioactive 'Plutocene'</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>The US passed their Atomic Energy Act in August 1946 which prevented any collaboration on atomic technology. Oliphant’s prophecy came true. But the scientists had made another prophecy: atomic secrets cannot be contained.</p>
<p>As the critical mass of international scientists that had gathered together for war radiated back out around the world, they carried with them the secrets of the atom.</p>
<p>The British restarted their bomb project in 1947 and tested their first weapon in 1952, and the Soviets tested their first bomb in 1949. The US monopoly on atomic weaponry was a fleeting moment.</p>
<p>So the opportunity was lost in 1946 to abolish weapons, and today <a href="https://fas.org/issues/nuclear-weapons/status-world-nuclear-forces/">more than 14,000 nuclear weapons exist</a>, held by nine countries. Even in a post-Cold War world this sword of annihilation hangs by a thread over the head of all us.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/96539/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Darren Holden does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Australian scientist Mark Oliphant helped push the development of nuclear weapons during World War II but later riled at US attempts to keep the UK and others out of the nuclear arms race.Darren Holden, PhD Candidate, University of Notre Dame AustraliaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/754842017-04-10T13:19:01Z2017-04-10T13:19:01ZWhy efforts to secure a deal on banning all nuclear weapons are so important<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/163308/original/image-20170330-4557-1ggub4o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Reuters</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Last week negotiations to ban nuclear weapons started in <a href="http://www.icanw.org/campaign-news/negotiations/">New York</a>. The talks came as a result of United Nations General Assembly <a href="http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/RES/71/258">resolution</a> adopted in December last year.</p>
<p>The resolution takes forward multilateral negotiations on complete nuclear disarmament. </p>
<p>States started negotiations on <a href="http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/the-united-states-presents-the-baruch-plan">nuclear disarmament</a> in 1946, a year after the atom bombs were <a href="http://zazenlife.com/2011/12/29/the-after-effects-of-the-atomic-bombs-on-hiroshima-nagasaki/">dropped on Japan</a>. But the talks faltered as the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-cold-war-anxieties-still-shape-our-world-today-65612">Cold War</a> <a href="http://www.dummies.com/education/history/american-history/warming-up-after-the-cold-war/">warmed up</a>. </p>
<p>Fearing that the spread of nuclear weapons would make those states that had them even more reluctant to give them up, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of <a href="https://www.un.org/disarmament/wmd/nuclear/npt/">Nuclear Weapons</a> was negotiated and entered into force in 1970. </p>
<p>The treaty was the first building bloc on the road to a world without nuclear weapons. It prevented states that didn’t have nuclear weapons before 1968 from acquiring them. And it prohibited states that had nuclear weapons from providing other states with them.</p>
<p>The non-proliferation obligation of the treaty has been exceptionally successful. Nuclear weapons have spread to only four other states since its inception. Today there are <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2016/01/06/nine-nations-possess-nuclear-weapns/78350588/">nine states with nuclear weapons</a>: the original five, namely the US, Russia, the UK, France and China. The other nuclear armed states are India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea. They are not members of the nonproliferation treaty.</p>
<p>The non-proliferation obligation of the treaty should be seen in the context of <a href="http://www.un.org/en/conf/npt/2005/npttreaty.html">Article VI</a> of that treaty, requiring all its members – including the five original nuclear weapon states – to negotiate in good faith general and complete disarmament of nuclear weapons, in other words, to negotiate a world without nuclear weapons.</p>
<p>This is the disarmament obligation of the treaty. Unfortunately, it stated no deadline for these negotiations. This legal loophole has been used by the nuclear weapon states to delay giving up their arsenals. </p>
<p>In fact, the treaty is disingenuously interpreted to suggest that the five original nuclear weapon states should be allowed to have these weapons, but not any other states. India has referred to this situation as <a href="https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/asia/1998-09-01/against-nuclear-apartheid">“nuclear apartheid” </a> and therefore refused to join the treaty.</p>
<p>For the first decade and a half after the treaty entered into force, the number and size of nuclear weapons in the arsenals, particularly the US’s and Russia’s, spiked to irrational levels. In the event of a <a href="http://www.globalzero.org/blog/how-many-nukes-would-it-take-render-earth-uninhabitable">nuclear war</a> they could destroy the world several times over </p>
<p>The end of the Cold War saw a decline in nuclear weapons, but there are still an estimated <a href="https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Nuclearweaponswhohaswhat">15 000</a> around and, worryingly, plans to modernise them. </p>
<p>As a co-sponsor of the resolution, South Africa is playing a key role in the negotiations. <strong>The country holds the moral high ground because it was the only country to voluntarily give up</strong> its <a href="http://www.isis-online.org/publications/southafrica/ir0594.html">nuclear weapons</a>. </p>
<h2>The Nuclear Ban Treaty</h2>
<p>Since 2010 states, civil society and individuals working for nuclear abolition engaged in what has come to be labelled the <a href="http://nwp.ilpi.org/?p=2214">humanitarian initiative</a>. This aims to shift the focus from which states are “responsible” enough to have nuclear weapons to the fact that nuclear weapons are inhumane and illegitimate no matter who has them.</p>
<p>The International Committee of the Red Cross has been outspoken about the unspeakable <a href="https://www.icrc.org/en/international-review/human-cost-nuclear-weapons">suffering and destruction</a> that a nuclear detonation by intent or accident would have.</p>
<p>Because nuclear fallout and radiation cannot be contained within the borders of a country, or for that matter a generation, nuclear disarmament is a matter for humanity at large.</p>
<p>Several precedents for banning inhumane weapons already exist, such as conventions banning <a href="https://www.un.org/disarmament/wmd/chemical/">chemical</a> and <a href="https://www.un.org/disarmament/wmd/bio/">biological weapons</a> as well as the <a href="https://www.apminebanconvention.org/">antipersonnel mine ban treaty</a>.</p>
<p>For these reasons 113 states voted for the UN resolution to negotiate a nuclear weapons ban <a href="http://www.icanw.org/campaign-news/voting-on-un-resolution-for-nuclear-ban-treaty/">last December</a>. Some observers are worried about the fact that 35 states voted against the resolution and <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/03/leads-boycott-talks-nuclear-weapons-ban-170327191952287.html">13 abstained</a>. Although 130 states joined the talks, more than 40 states, including those with nuclear weapons, are boycotting the negotiations.</p>
<h2>Important first step</h2>
<p>Some fear the boycott will mean that the ban treaty is a nonstarter. </p>
<p>But the ban treaty should be seen as an interim step to global denuclearisation. It’s the second building block towards a world free of nuclear weapons. </p>
<p>It will create the political space to stigmatise nuclear weapons. Those who have them will come to feel increasingly isolated and on the wrong side of morality.</p>
<p>The aim of the ban treaty shouldn’t be to force nuclear armed states to give up their nuclear weapons. Rather, it should be to create an atmosphere in which they themselves understand that there’s no prestige, security or power in having these weapons.</p>
<p>Moreover, the ban will strengthen the so-called nuclear taboo that’s kept states from using nuclear weapons since 1945. </p>
<p>As an interim step, the nuclear ban treaty need not be a complicated legal document outlining the technicalities of, for example, verification measures.</p>
<p>For now the nonproliferation treaty provides a sufficient foundation for the nuclear ban treaty to draw on. The technical work would be the job of the third building bloc, a convention on the complete elimination of nuclear weapons. This would be negotiated with the nuclear armed states on board.</p>
<h2>South Africa’s activist position</h2>
<p>South Africa joined the nonproliferation treaty late. Given its international isolation under apartheid, it developed <a href="http://www.isis-online.org/publications/southafrica/ir0594.html">nuclear weapons</a> to blackmail western states to come to the regime’s rescue in case of an attack by the Soviet Union, which supported the armed struggle against apartheid.</p>
<p>Towards the closing years of apartheid, President FW de Klerk decided to dismantle South Africa’s nuclear weapons. Some observers argue that this was a racist move to ensure that nuclear weapons weren’t left in the hands of a black government. But the African National Congress came into power with a longstanding policy <a href="http://www.scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0018-229X2012000200008">against nuclear weapons</a>, intent on using nuclear power for peaceful purposes only.</p>
<p>This policy was informed by an African and Non-Aligned Movement <a href="https://www.iiss.org/en/publications/adelphi/by%20year/2011-2c64/nuclear-politics-and-the-non-aligned-movement-fce1">perspective </a>. South Africa therefore holds a special place in the nuclear order because it was the first state to voluntarily give up nuclear weapons. </p>
<p>The country’s nuclear diplomats built on this moral high ground and have worked tirelessly for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament since 1994, while ensuring access to peaceful nuclear technology. </p>
<p>The fact that the ban treaty negotiations are taking place despite opposition from the permanent members of the UN Security Council may even suggest a democratic turn in <a href="http://www.ipsnews.net/2017/04/a-transformational-moment-in-nuclear-international-affairs/">UN politics</a>. South Africa is working with like minded states and civil society on the front line to make this next step toward a world without nuclear weapons a reality.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/75484/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joelien Pretorius receives funding from National Research Foundation. She is a member of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, an international civil society organisation working for arms control and world peace. </span></em></p>The treaty to stop the proliferation of nuclear weapons has been exceptionally successful. Only nine states have them. Now, efforts are underway to completely rid the world of them.Joelien Pretorius, Associate Professor in Political Studies, University of the Western CapeLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/528412016-01-06T17:38:40Z2016-01-06T17:38:40ZExplainer: what is a hydrogen bomb? (And why it may not be what North Korea exploded)<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/107410/original/image-20160106-14955-1q7kvju.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption"></span> </figcaption></figure><p>Reports that North Korea has launched a <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2016/01/05/asia/north-korea-seismic-event/">fourth nuclear weapons test</a> – backed by <a href="https://www.ctbto.org/press-centre/press-releases/2016/ctbto-executive-secretary-lassina-zerbo-on-the-unusual-seismic-event-detected-in-the-democratic-peoples-republic-of-korea/">convincing seismic data</a> – have caused widespread alarm. North Korean officials announced in advance that the test would involve “<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2016/01/06/south-koreas-official-line_n_8920554.html">a totally different type of nuclear bomb</a>” from those trialled in previous years. Following the test, North Korean state television lauded the first detonation of a “hydrogen bomb” as a “<a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a8bf22be-b42a-11e5-aad2-3e9865bc6644.html#axzz3wTeyOpES">national epoch-making event</a>”.</p>
<p>Moving to a new form of nuclear weapons technology will likely have significant implications for North Korea, although some experts <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-35241686">have expressed scepticism</a> about these claims and there are clear benefits for Pyongyang to exaggerate its nuclear capabilities. While details of the test will remain unclear for some time, the term “hydrogen bomb” is also somewhat ambiguous, leaving further room for speculation about the true nature of North Korea’s nuclear technology.</p>
<h2>Fission devices</h2>
<p>There are two basic types of nuclear weapons: fission weapons and fusion weapons. First developed during World War II through the US-led <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-american-journalists-covered-the-first-use-of-the-atomic-bomb-45746">Manhattan Project</a>, fission devices (commonly known as atom bombs) create an explosion by splitting the nuclei of heavy atoms. These type of weapons were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan, killing hundreds of thousands of people.</p>
<p>The core of a fission weapon is composed of weapons-grade fissile material such as highly enriched uranium or plutonium, which on its own is not explosive. When detonated, this core is compressed using conventional high explosives into a critical mass capable of sustaining a nuclear chain reaction.</p>
<p>Firing neutrons at the atomic nuclei in the core causes them to split (or fission) into several lighter nuclei, releasing energy and, crucially, more neutrons. These extra neutrons create further fissions in the core that, in turn, release even more neutrons giving rise to a self-sustaining chain reaction. This releases huge quantities of energy, many orders of magnitude greater than that of conventional explosives.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=360&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/107413/original/image-20160106-14935-1pl0qyp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=453&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ivy King detonation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">United States Department of Energy</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>A totally different type of nuclear bomb</h2>
<p>After the Soviet Union also developed fission devices in the late 1940s, the US began to work on new technology known as thermonuclear weapons or hydrogen bombs. Thermonuclear weapons differ from atom bombs in that most of their explosive power comes from nuclear fusion, the binding together of light atomic nuclei, as opposed to fission or splitting atoms.</p>
<p>The explosive power of thermonuclear devices dwarfs that of fission devices: the most powerful pure-fission device tested by the United States was <a href="http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Usa/Tests/Ivy.html">Ivy King</a>, a 500 kiloton weapon. This bomb was 25 times more powerful than the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki at the end of World War II. Yet Ivy King paled in comparison to <a href="https://www.ctbto.org/specials/testing-times/1-march-1954-castle-bravo/">Castle Bravo</a>, the largest hydrogen bomb tested by the US, with a yield of 15 megatons. While crude fission weapons obliterated two small Japanese cities, megaton-class thermonuclear weapons are comfortably capable of wreaking <a href="http://www.visualnews.com/2012/04/24/visualizing-the-frightening-power-of-nuclear-bombs/">much more destruction</a>, causing nuclear burns many miles from the blast site.</p>
<p>Although precise technical details remain highly classified, the basic two-stage thermonuclear weapon design was laid down by <a href="http://nuclearweaponarchive.org/Library/Teller.html">Edward Teller and Stanislaw Ulam</a> in the early 1950s. The first stage or “primary” consists of a fission device that, when detonated, provides the necessary energy in the form of X-ray radiation to trigger a fusion reaction in the second stage.</p>
<p>The secondary generally consists of dry fusion fuel, often lithium deuteride, and a “sparkplug”, a sub-critical mass of fissile material. Detonating the primary compresses the secondary, causing the “sparkplug” to undergo fission. This releases neutrons that react with the fusion fuel to produce a mixture of tritium and deuterium, isotopes of hydrogen that are chemically similar but have different nuclear properties. The extreme temperature provided by the primary then causes fusion between these hydrogen isotopes, releasing vast quantities of energy.</p>
<h2>The North Korean test</h2>
<p>The North Koreans’ claims imply they have successfully developed a thermonuclear weapon. But initial data suggests that this may not be the case. While as yet unconfirmed by the <a href="https://www.ctbto.org">Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation</a>, the seismic shock of the test registered <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-35241686">5.1 on the Richter scale</a>. This indicates an explosive yield somewhat less than the “Fat Man” device dropped on Nagasaki, and far less than the high yields typically associated with thermonuclear weapons.</p>
<p>However, it is possible North Korea has tested a third weapon type: a boosted fission weapon. While this incorporates hydrogen isotopes and can be conflated with a “hydrogen bomb”, it is a technically distinct weapon. A boosted fission device is essentially a normal fission device, similar to the “Fat Man”, with a small amount of fusion fuel added to its core. Upon detonation of the weapon, the fusion fuel is compressed and heated, undergoing nuclear fusion.</p>
<p>While some energy is released by this process, this is relatively small when compared to that released by fission. The major contribution of the fusion reaction is to supply a large number of additional neutrons. These flood the core of the fission weapon, inducing many more fission reactions and significantly increasing the efficiency and so the yield of the weapon.</p>
<p>The efficiency of early fission weapons was relatively low: <a href="http://www.atomicheritage.org/history/little-boy-and-fat-man">only 1.4%</a> of the highly enriched uranium in the core of the “Little Boy” device dropped on Hiroshima actually underwent fission. Boosting can increase this efficiency drastically without a significant penalty in terms of weight, making it an attractive design option for smaller missile systems. Given North Korea’s interest in this arena, it is possible that a boosted fission weapon was the aim of the most recent test.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52841/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Robert Downes receives funding from the MacArthur Foundation and the UK Department for Energy and Climate Change.</span></em></p>What are the implications of North Korea’s claims to have detonated a thermonuclear weapon?Robert J Downes, MacArthur Fellow in Nuclear Security, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/457462015-08-06T20:02:09Z2015-08-06T20:02:09ZHow American journalists covered the first use of the atomic bomb<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91042/original/image-20150806-5263-6skc75.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hiroshima, Aug. 6, 1945, and Nagasaki, Aug. 9, 1945. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>More than seventy-five years ago this week, the U.S. military revealed the greatest and best-kept secret of the Allied effort to win World War II. </p>
<p>The use of the atomic bomb proved to the world that it was indeed possible to make one. </p>
<p>But how had it been possible to keep the secret? And how did U.S. journalists break the news?</p>
<h2>From New York to Oak Ridge</h2>
<p>In April of 1945, General Leslie Groves of the U.S. Army approached the managing editor of The New York Times. Based on the research for my history of journalism, <a href="http://www.umass.edu/umpress/title/covering-america">“Covering America</a>,” my belief is that this was a critical step in finally informing the public. The general wanted to borrow the Times’ science writer, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/29/science/3manharchive.html?_r=0">William Laurence</a>, for the remainder of the war. </p>
<p>Without many more preliminaries, Laurence headed off to his new assignment in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. There, Groves pulled back the shroud protecting the nation’s biggest wartime gamble and introduced Laurence to the Manhattan Project. </p>
<p>The Army wanted a civilian on board who could help with drafting press releases, writing news stories and explaining the vast and complex undertaking to the general public. </p>
<p>Laurence was a good choice. A native of Lithuania, Laurence had immigrated to the United States as a teenager and attended Harvard and Boston University. At the Times, he had pioneered covering science for a general newspaper and had won a <a href="http://www.pulitzer.org/awards/1937">Pulitzer Prize</a> in 1936. </p>
<p>Once attached to the Manhattan Project, Laurence had virtual carte blanche to travel to the various bomb-making sites around the country, interviewing the top scientists and engineers, and he soon knew more about the project than all but a handful of the thousands of people working on it. </p>
<p>In July, Laurence went to a site near Alamagordo in the New Mexico desert to witness the first test explosion of an A-bomb, code-named <a href="http://www.abomb1.org/trinity/trinity1.html">“Trinity.”</a> </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/l8w3Y-dskeg?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
</figure>
<p>It was Laurence who wrote the false press release that the Army used to concoct a cover story. The few civilians in the surrounding areas who saw the great flash on July 15 were assured that there was nothing to worry about, just an old ammo dump that had blown up. In fact, the Army was exposing everyone in the surrounding states to their first dose of <a href="http://www.science20.com/news/first_atomic_bomb_test_exposed_new_mexico_residents_to_radiation">airborne radiation</a>. </p>
<h2>A New York Times exclusive</h2>
<p>In gratitude for Laurence’s services, the Army tipped the top management of the Times on August 2 about the impending use of the bomb against Japan, so the paper could prepare. </p>
<p>On Aug. 6, 1945, the world first learned about the atomic bomb when the United States dropped it on the Japanese city of Hiroshima. Three days later, the Army Air Corps struck again, this time at Nagasaki. On board one of the aircraft on Aug. 9 was Laurence. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=779&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=779&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=779&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=979&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=979&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91046/original/image-20150806-5229-1fu6jad.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=979&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">William Laurence (left) in the Pacific on the eve of the bombings.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:William_Laurence.jpg">US Air Force</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>As the official journalistic witness to the Manhattan Project, he was now the first American civilian to observe the use of the terrible new weapon in war. His detailed, <a href="http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/science/20071030_MANHATTAN_GRAPHIC/sept9_1945.pdf">poetic narrative</a> (which appeared in the Times a month later) began simply: “We are on our way to bomb the mainland of Japan.”</p>
<p>As the hours ticked by en route to the target, Laurence mused in print about the morality of setting out to wipe an entire city off the map. </p>
<p>He asked himself if he felt any pity for the “poor devils” who would be obliterated by the bomb. His answer: “Not when one thinks of Pearl Harbor and of the Death March on Bataan.” In other words, he figured – as did many Americans – that the “Japs” had it coming. </p>
<p>Then, over Nagasaki, Laurence and the crew beheld the existential chaos unleashed by splitting the atom: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“Awe-struck, we watched it shoot upward like a meteor coming from the earth instead of from outer space, becoming ever more alive as it climbed skyward through the white clouds. It was no longer smoke, or dust, or even a cloud of fire. It was a living thing, a new species of being, born right before our incredulous eyes.</p>
<p>At one stage of its evolution, covering millions of years in terms of seconds, the entity assumed the form of a giant square totem pole, with its base about three miles long, tapering off to about a mile at the top. Its bottom was brown, its center was amber, its top white. But it was a living totem pole, carved with many grotesque masks grimacing at the earth…</p>
<p>It kept struggling in an elemental fury, like a creature in the act of breaking the bonds that held it down. In a few seconds it had freed itself from its gigantic stem and floated upward with tremendous speed, its momentum carrying into the stratosphere to a height of about 60,000 feet…</p>
<p>As the mushroom floated off into the blue it changed its shape into a flowerlike form, its giant petal curving downward, creamy white outside, rose-colored inside. It still retained that shape when we last gazed at it from a distance of about 200 miles.”</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Laurence’s critics</h2>
<p>Laurence struck a note of awe at the dawn of the atomic age. In the coming weeks, he elaborated on the theme in a series of <a href="http://www.pulitzer.org/awards/1946">Pulitzer Prize-winning</a> articles in the Times, explaining for a lay audience the basic principles of atomic energy. </p>
<p>In recent years, Laurence has been criticized by some journalists who believe that he was compromised as a reporter because of his attachment to the military.</p>
<p>He was also faulted for downplaying the effects of radiation, and <a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2005/8/5/hiroshima_cover_up_stripping_the_war">some have called</a> for the Times to return the 1946 Pulitzer Prize awarded to Laurence. </p>
<p>In addition, it should be noted that, for all the poetic power of his Nagasaki piece, there were limits to Laurence’s perspective; he was seeing the experience from the point of view of the attackers. </p>
<p>Through no fault of his own, he was peering outward and downward at an object, not observing the individual human agonies unfolding on the ground. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=327&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=327&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=327&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91048/original/image-20150806-5236-1w3o3n3.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=411&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The day after in Hiroshima.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Hiroshima_Aftermath_-_cropped_Version.jpg">US Navy</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There were, of course, no Allied journalists on the ground in Japan at the time of the bombing, although an advance unit streamed into the country as soon as peace was declared and the occupation began.</p>
<h2>Reporting from the ground</h2>
<p>Among the first in was <a href="http://www.pbs.org/weta/reportingamericaatwar/reporters/bigart/">Homer Bigart</a> of the New York Herald Tribune, who went with a group of journalists to Hiroshima in early September 1945. </p>
<p>His reporting attempted to reckon the loss of lives – which he put, fairly accurately, at 53,000 dead and 30,000 missing and presumed dead – and then went on to describe the ruins. Starting about three miles from the center of the blast, Bigart reported seeing signs of destruction, typical of what he had seen in bombed cities in Europe: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>But across the river there was only flat, appalling desolation, the starkness accentuated by bare, blackened tree trunks and the occasional shell of a reinforced concrete building.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>He reported that residents were still dying, at the rate of about 100 a day, mostly from burns and infection, and he hinted at some of the problems eventually recognized as radiation sickness.</p>
<p>The following year, the reporter and author John Hersey visited Hiroshima for the New Yorker magazine. He stayed longer than Bigart had been allowed to, and he created one of the masterpieces of war correspondence. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=843&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=843&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=843&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1059&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1059&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/91049/original/image-20150806-5236-r1p0zf.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1059&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">John Hersey.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Johnhersey.jpg">Carl va Vechten</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Through meticulous reporting, Hersey followed the experiences of six individuals who had been in Hiroshima on the morning the bomb exploded. Moment by moment, scene by scene, he recreated the thoughts and actions of each of those survivors, from the minutes before the blast through the first few days and weeks that followed. His reporting was finished in August 1946. </p>
<p>When his editor at the New Yorker, Harold Ross, got a look at the material, he decided to dispense with all the rest of the contents scheduled to run and devoted the <a href="https://archive.org/stream/hiroshima035082mbp/hiroshima035082mbp_djvu.txt">August 31 issue</a> to Hersey’s account. </p>
<p>In the mythology surrounding this piece, it is often said that Ross cleared the entire magazine for Hersey’s story. In fact, Ross decided to rip out all the editorial matter, but not the ads or entertainment listings. </p>
<p>Thus, Hersey’s somber masterpiece appears disconcertingly alongside ads for “perma-lift” bras and the “latest hilarity” from S. J. Perelman, as well as full-page spreads offering civilian versions of such familiar items as the Willys Jeep.</p>
<p>Hersey’s story is a key document of 20th-century history as well as a touchstone for the human imagination in the nuclear age. </p>
<p>His hyperfactual tale of immense suffering has become part of the worldview of most people on the planet. He said almost nothing in his own voice – no pontificating, no summarizing.</p>
<p>Instead, he brought particular people to life by setting them in action and thereby showing the reader what had happened. </p>
<p>The account of the bombing was quickly published as a book, titled simply <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=1z89O0uIlLwC">Hiroshima</a>, which became a bestseller and has remained in print ever since. </p>
<p>Many consider it the greatest work of journalism by an American.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/45746/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher B. Daly does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>From the air and on the ground: the reporters who told the HIroshima and Nagasaki stories to the American public.Christopher B. Daly, Professor of Journalism, Boston UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.