Richard Shimooka: Eighty years later, the lessons of Hiroshima are still relevant

For example, one of the more groundbreaking works of recent years was Implacable Foes, by Waldo Heinrichs and Marc Gallicchio, which shows just how fragile the American political consensus was that sustained support for continuing the war, and how projected losses for the invasion of Japan would have shattered this resolve. Yet this was tempered by a broader fear: that failure to obtain unconditional surrender would create the conditions for a future conflict to reignite, as it did with Germany in 1918, the authors write. The Imperial Japanese government’s decision-making clearly factored into this context. It should be noted that Tokyo had given every indication of its willingness to fight right to the last person—right up until its final decision to accept unconditional surrender. Furthermore, rather than being an adversary, Soviet involvement was seen as critical for the ultimate success of an invasion. A key challenge of studying this area has been deciphering the Imperial Japanese government’s decision making. The release of an official history of Emperor Hirohito’s reign in 2014 has raised more questions than answers on this matter. It deepened the debate concerning Hirohito’s culpability for supporting the war, and prolonging it into 1945, but also how his efforts may have provided the basis that ultimately resulted in its surrender. One aspect is clear, however: the dropping of the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima started a serious shift towards Japan’s capitulation, particularly for the emperor.. The Soviet entry would further undercut the position of key Japanese army and navy leaders who remained ardent supporters of the war.1One has to wonder, if 80 years after the events we are still unable to determine a clear answer about what drove Japan to surrender, how could the Truman Administration divine this in 1945? It really should give pause to popular discussion of these events that state with certainty the motives of various actors. Contemporary accounts following the use of these first atomic weapons primarily viewed them as a more efficient delivery method for the continuing destruction of Japan’s war-fighting abilities, which had been ongoing through devastating firebombing raids over the previous four months. While there were moral considerations that affected the use of the bomb, including an effort to limit civilian casualties, the strong ethical and legal parameters we’ve since developed to curtail these weapons did not exist in 1945.2All major combatants in the Second World War deemed inflicting some civilian casualties as an acceptable means by which to prosecute the war. This was part of the total war perspective, which tied civilian workforces to the military-industrial effort, making them legitimate targets. Whatever went into the decision, what is crystal clear is the cost and consequences of dropping the bomb: hundreds of thousands died in the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, six days later. Certainly, as the world began to gain a greater understanding of the awesome capabilities of these weapons, a strong taboo against their use, backed by the implementation of nuclear non-proliferation treaties and strict international policing of these new ethical and legal norms, has emerged in the years since the Second World War. But it was only after the terrible destruction wrought by the initial use of nuclear weapons in Hiroshima was revealed did societal views change. Even with the benefit of 80 years of hindsight, the debate surrounding the actual events and motivations informing the decisions to use the first atomic weapons is as hotly contested as ever—let alone the morality of using them. If we want to learn from Hiroshima, we must, with humility, endeavour to honestly understand what went into their use, rejecting narratives that either mythologize or totally condemn. History is far more complicated than either of those stances allows for. As we commemorate the losses that led to this point, we should not leave the lessons of history in the past. They have real considerations for events today. Debates about acceptable levels of civilian casualties are once again filling the front pages as the war in Gaza continues. And just as the development of atomic weapons was a technological revolution that forever changed the world, we are going through another upheaval of a similar scale with the development of AI and autonomous weapon systems that are completely transforming warfare once again. Hopefully, with the legacy of Hiroshima fresh on our minds, we can take a clear-eyed look at this technology and how it will be used, this time before it wreaks catastrophe on our world.