It was just announced that John Kerry will be visiting the Memorial to the first Atomic Bomb attack at Hiroshima. Its interesting how many Nuclear related subjects have been in the news lately. From the Nuclear summit last week that Russia decided to not attend, to the China announcing they were going to field a new mobile ICBM, to North Korea actually suggesting they were going to Nuke Washington and Beijing if they didn't get what they wanted. In some ways the comments from Iran's leaders (punctuated with missile launches) are actually tame compared to the rest of the world. Particularly when our president seems to feel climate change is more important then the possible restart of the Cold War, but now with multiple new players.
But to me there is also some irony to Kerry visiting the shrine at Hiroshima. As I now begin working on a revised edition of my book on nuclear weapons I have been asking myself do I need to comment on the various nuclear myths that have become so common in our world. One is the view that the US and Japanese government has been covering up facts about the attack on Hiroshima. I had one reviewer of my first edition state I needed to rewrite the section on the Little Boy bomb and use the destruction numbers put out by another author for a Nagasaki class Flat Man bomb. It seems that according to this other author the death zone at Hiroshima should have been larger for a bomb of 20 kiloton class. Also, where the shrine Kerry will visit is, is also where the crater is supposed to be. Yet the building he will visit was standing at the sight before the attack in August of 1945 and was also there immediately afterwards.
I would explain further, but as I say I am considering do that in the revised edition.
But to me there is also some irony to Kerry visiting the shrine at Hiroshima. As I now begin working on a revised edition of my book on nuclear weapons I have been asking myself do I need to comment on the various nuclear myths that have become so common in our world. One is the view that the US and Japanese government has been covering up facts about the attack on Hiroshima. I had one reviewer of my first edition state I needed to rewrite the section on the Little Boy bomb and use the destruction numbers put out by another author for a Nagasaki class Flat Man bomb. It seems that according to this other author the death zone at Hiroshima should have been larger for a bomb of 20 kiloton class. Also, where the shrine Kerry will visit is, is also where the crater is supposed to be. Yet the building he will visit was standing at the sight before the attack in August of 1945 and was also there immediately afterwards.
I would explain further, but as I say I am considering do that in the revised edition.