Almost 71 years after the United States dropped the world’s first atomic bomb, President Barack Obama made an unprecedented journey here to offer a solemn tribute to the tens of thousands of victims and to amplify his quest for a world without nuclear weapons.
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Obama will not apologize or second-guess Truman’s decision.
“Why did we come to this place, to Hiroshima?”
Standing in Hiroshima’s Peace Memorial Park, Obama said, “We stand here in the middle of this city and force ourselves to imagine the moment the bomb fell”.
He participatedbin his final G-7 Summit in Ise-Shima, Japan, before becoming the first USA president to visit Hiroshima, the site of the world’s first atomic bombing. Two days later a second nuclear bomb was dropped on Nagasaki, killing another 74,000.
He praised the US-Japan alliance as “one of the strongest in the world”, with his visit “a testament to how even the most painful divides can be bridged – how our two nations, former adversaries, cannot just become partners, but become the best of friends and the strongest of allies”.
“The president of the United states is now facing the reality of the damage of the atomic bombing and renewing his commitment toward a world without nuclear weapons”.
There are American former POWs who want the president to fault Japan for starting the war in the Pacific. On Aug. 15, 1945, less than a week after the Nagasaki attack, Japan surrendered.
Obama, walking alongside Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, spoke to a pair of bombing survivors, Sunao Tsuboi, who heads an organization for victims, and Shigeaki Mori, who created a memorial for American World War II prisoners of war killed in Hiroshima. Prime Minister Abe told reporters he has no immediate plans to visit Hawaii this year for the 75th anniversary of the Pearl Harbor attack.
President Barack Obama may have faced the legacy of Hiroshima most directly with his embrace of a man who survived the devastating atomic blast. Obama on Friday became the first sitting USA president to visit the site of the world’s first atomic bomb attack, bringing global attention both to survivors and to his unfulfilled vision of a world without nuclear weapons.
Obama then went on to give an emotional hug to Mori, a survivor who worked to gain official recognition of 12 Americans killed in the atomic bombing. “I know Mr. Obama has an important job and great responsibility, but I hope he absorbs what he sees and hears as a single human being and not as a powerful politician”, she said.
In a speech that reviewed humanity’s history of war, Mr. Obama expressed his desire to reduce the danger of nuclear weapons.
For non-survivors, the reaction to president’s visit and speech was mostly positive. But large and seemingly supportive crowds began gathering outside the grounds early in the day. “That is a future we can choose”, he said.
In a visit heavy on symbolism, the street in front of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum was lined with Japanese and American flags, flying side by side. “That is what I told him really, really fast”, he said.
“I hope that he will present in Hiroshima what is good for the happiness of humankind”. Opinion polls show that the majority of people welcome this visit and most, it seems, do not mind either about the absence of an apology.
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But Japan did attack us, and the war did happen, and we won it. We defeated evil. More than 1,000 Americans died in Japanese camps during World War II, often under appalling conditions. U.S. Ambassador to Japan, Caroline Kennedy, also joined the president. But the White House later said that no such invitation had been extended.
