AT next year humanity will celebrate the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II, which showed many examples of unprecedented cruelty, when entire cities disappeared from the face of the earth for several days or even hours and hundreds of thousands of people died, including civilians. The most striking example of this is the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the ethical justification of which is questioned by any sane person.

Japan during the final stages of World War II

As is known, Nazi Germany surrendered on the night of May 9, 1945. This meant the end of the war in Europe. And also the fact that the only enemy of the countries of the anti-fascist coalition remained Imperial Japan, which at that time officially declared war on about 6 dozen countries. Already in June 1945, as a result of bloody battles, her troops were forced to leave Indonesia and Indochina. But when on July 26 the United States, along with Great Britain and China, presented an ultimatum to the Japanese command, it was rejected. At the same time, even during the USSR, he undertook to launch a large-scale offensive against Japan in August, for which, after the end of the war, South Sakhalin and the Kuril Islands were to be transferred to him.

Prerequisites for the use of atomic weapons

Long before these events, in the fall of 1944, at a meeting of the leaders of the United States and Great Britain, the question of the possibility of using new super-destructive bombs against Japan was considered. After that, the well-known Manhattan Project, launched a year earlier and aimed at creating nuclear weapons, began to function from new force, and work on the creation of its first samples was completed by the time the hostilities in Europe ended.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki: reasons for the bombing

Thus, by the summer of 1945, the United States became the sole owner atomic weapons in the world and decided to use this advantage to put pressure on their old enemy and at the same time ally in the anti-Hitler coalition - the USSR.

At the same time, despite all the defeats, the morale of Japan was not broken. As evidenced by the fact that every day hundreds of soldiers of her imperial army became kamikaze and kaiten, directing their planes and torpedoes at ships and other military targets american army. This meant that during ground operation on the territory of Japan itself, the allied forces expect huge losses. Exactly last reason today, most often cited by US officials as an argument justifying the need for such a measure as the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. At the same time, they forget that, according to Churchill, three weeks before I. Stalin told him about the Japanese attempts to establish a peaceful dialogue. It is obvious that representatives of this country were going to make similar proposals to both the Americans and the British, since the massive bombing of large cities brought their military industry to the brink of collapse and made surrender inevitable.

Choice of goals

After obtaining agreement in principle to use atomic weapons against Japan, a special committee was formed. Its second meeting was held on May 10-11 and was devoted to the choice of cities that were to be bombed. The main criteria that guided the commission were:

  • obligatory presence around military purpose civil objects;
  • its importance to the Japanese not only from an economic and strategic point of view, but also from a psychological one;
  • a high degree of significance of the object, the destruction of which would cause a resonance throughout the world;
  • the target had to be undamaged by bombing so that the military could appreciate the true power of the new weapon.

Which cities were considered as the target

The "candidates" included:

  • Kyoto, which is the largest industrial and cultural center and ancient capital Japan;
  • Hiroshima as an important military port and a city where army depots were concentrated;
  • Yokohama, which is the center of the military industry;
  • Kokura is the location of the largest military arsenal.

According to the surviving memoirs of the participants in those events, although Kyoto was the most convenient target, the United States Secretary of War G. Stimson insisted on the exclusion of this city from the list, since he was personally acquainted with its sights and represented their value for world culture.

Interestingly, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was not initially planned. More precisely, the city of Kokura was considered as the second goal. This is also evidenced by the fact that before August 9, an air raid was carried out on Nagasaki, which caused concern among residents and forced the majority of schoolchildren to be evacuated to the surrounding villages. A little later, as a result of long discussions, spare targets were chosen in case of unforeseen situations. They became:

  • for the first bombing, if Hiroshima fails to be hit, Niigata;
  • for the second (instead of Kokura) - Nagasaki.

Training

The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki required careful preparation. During the second half of May and June, the 509th Composite Aviation Group was redeployed to the base on Tinian Island, in connection with which exceptional security measures were taken. A month later, on July 26, the “Kid” atomic bomb was delivered to the island, and on the 28th, some of the components for the assembly of the “Fat Man”. On the same day, the then chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, signed an order directing the nuclear bombing to be carried out any time after August 3, when the weather conditions were right.

First atomic strike on Japan

The date of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki cannot be named unambiguously, since nuclear strikes in these cities were made with a difference of 3 days.

The first blow was dealt to Hiroshima. And it happened on June 6, 1945. The "honor" to drop the "Kid" bomb went to the crew of the B-29 aircraft, nicknamed "Enola Gay", commanded by Colonel Tibbets. Moreover, before the flight, the pilots, confident that they were doing a good deed and that their “feat” would be followed by an early end to the war, visited the church and received an ampoule each in case they were captured.

Together with Enola Gay, three reconnaissance aircraft took off into the air, designed to clarify weather conditions, and 2 boards with photographic equipment and devices for studying the parameters of the explosion.

The bombing itself went off without a hitch, as the Japanese military did not notice the objects rushing towards Hiroshima, and the weather was more than favorable. What happened next, you can see by watching the tape "The atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki" - documentary, edited from newsreels made in the Pacific region at the end of World War II.

In particular, it shows which, according to Captain Robert Lewis, who was a member of the Enola Gay crew, was visible even after their plane flew 400 miles from the bomb site.

Bombing of Nagasaki

The operation to drop the Fat Man bomb, carried out on August 9, proceeded in a completely different way. In general, the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the photos of which are associated with famous descriptions Apocalypse, was prepared extremely carefully, and the only thing that could make adjustments to its conduct was the weather. And so it happened when, in the early morning of August 9, a plane took off from the island of Tinian under the command of Major Charles Sweeney and with the Fat Man atomic bomb on board. At 8 hours 10 minutes, the board arrived at the place where it was supposed to meet with the second - B-29, but did not find it. After 40 minutes of waiting, it was decided to bomb without a partner aircraft, but it turned out that 70% cloud cover was already observed over the city of Kokura. Moreover, even before the flight, it was known about the malfunction of the fuel pump, and at the moment when the plane was over Kokura, it became obvious that the only way to drop the Fat Man was to do it during the flight over Nagasaki. Then the B-29 went to this city and made a reset, focusing on the local stadium. Thus, by chance, Kokura was saved, and the whole world learned that the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki had taken place. Fortunately, if such words are at all appropriate in this case, the bomb fell far from its original target, quite far from residential areas, which somewhat reduced the number of victims.

Consequences of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

According to eyewitnesses, within a few minutes, everyone who was within a radius of 800 m from the epicenters of the explosions died. Then the fires began, and in Hiroshima they soon turned into a tornado due to the wind, the speed of which was about 50-60 km / h.

The nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki introduced mankind to such a phenomenon as radiation sickness. The doctors noticed her first. They were surprised that the condition of the survivors first improved, and then they died from an illness whose symptoms resembled diarrhea. In the first days and months after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, few could have imagined that those who survived it would suffer all their lives various diseases and even produce unhealthy children.

Subsequent events

On August 9, immediately after the news of the bombing of Nagasaki and the declaration of war by the USSR, Emperor Hirohito called for immediate surrender, subject to the preservation of his power in the country. And 5 days later, the Japanese media spread his statement on the cessation of hostilities to English language. Moreover, in the text, His Majesty mentioned that one of the reasons for his decision was that the enemy had a “terrible weapon”, the use of which could lead to the destruction of the nation.

Recently, the world celebrated a sad anniversary - the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombings of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. On August 6, 1945, an American Air Force B-29 Enola Gay, under the command of Colonel Tibbets, dropped the Baby bomb on Hiroshima. And three days later, on August 9, 1945, a B-29 Boxcar under the command of Colonel Charles Sweeney dropped a bomb on Nagasaki. Total The death toll in the explosion alone ranged from 90 to 166 thousand people in Hiroshima and from 60 to 80 thousand people in Nagasaki. And that's not all - about 200 thousand people died from radiation sickness.

After the bombing, real hell reigned in Hiroshima. Miraculously surviving witness Akiko Takahura recalls:

“Three colors characterize for me the day the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima: black, red and brown. Black - because the explosion cut off sunlight and plunged the world into darkness. Red was the color of blood flowing from wounded and broken people. It was also the color of the fires that burned everything in the city. Brown was the color of burnt, peeling skin exposed to light from the explosion."

From thermal radiation some Japanese instantly evaporated, leaving shadows on the walls or on the pavement

From thermal radiation, some Japanese instantly evaporated, leaving shadows on the walls or on the pavement. The shock wave swept away buildings and killed thousands of people. In Hiroshima, a real fiery tornado raged, in which thousands of civilians burned alive.

In the name of what was all this horror and why were the peaceful cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombed?

Officially: to hasten the fall of Japan. But she lived out her last days, especially when, on August 8, Soviet troops began to rout the Kwantung Army. And unofficially, these were tests of super-powerful weapons, ultimately directed against the USSR. As US President Truman cynically said, "If this bomb explodes, I'll have a good club against these Russian guys." So forcing the Japanese to peace was far from the most important thing in this action. And the effectiveness of atomic bombings in this regard was small. Not them, but success Soviet troops appeared in Manchuria last push for surrender.

Characteristically, in the "Rescript to Soldiers and Sailors" of the Japanese Emperor Hirohito, issued on August 17, 1945, the significance of the Soviet invasion of Manchuria was noted, but not a word was said about atomic bombings.

According to the Japanese historian Tsuyoshi Hasegawa, it was the declaration of war on the USSR in the interval between the two bombings that caused the capitulation. After the war, Admiral Soemu Toyoda said: "I think the USSR's participation in the war against Japan, and not the atomic bombing, did more to hasten the surrender." Prime Minister Suzuki also stated that the entry of the USSR into the war made it "impossible to continue the war".

Moreover, the absence of the need for atomic bombing was eventually recognized by the Americans themselves.

According to the "Strategic Bombing Efficiency Study" released in 1946 by the US government, atomic bombs were not necessary to win the war. After examining numerous documents and interviewing hundreds of Japanese military and civilian officials, the following conclusion was reached:

“Definitely before December 31, 1945, and most likely before November 1, 1945, Japan would have surrendered, even if the atomic bombs had not been dropped and the USSR would not have entered the war, even if the invasion of Japanese islands not planned or prepared.

Here is the opinion of General, then US President Dwight Eisenhower:

“In 1945, Secretary of War Stimson, while visiting my headquarters in Germany, informed me that our government was preparing to drop an atomic bomb on Japan. I was one of those who believed that there were a number of compelling reasons to question the wisdom of such a decision. During his description... I was overcome with depression and I voiced my deepest doubts to him, first, based on my belief that Japan had already been defeated and that the atomic bombing was completely unnecessary, and second, because I believed that our country should avoid shocking world opinion with the use of weapons, the use of which, in my opinion, was no longer mandatory as a means of saving the lives of American soldiers.

And here is the opinion of Admiral Ch. Nimitz:

“The Japanese have actually asked for peace. From a purely military point of view, the atomic bomb did not play a decisive role in the defeat of Japan.

For those who planned the bombing, the Japanese were something like yellow monkeys, subhuman

The atomic bombings were a great experiment on people who were not even considered people. For those who planned the bombing, the Japanese were something like yellow monkeys, subhuman. So, american soldiers(in particular, marines) were engaged in a very peculiar collection of souvenirs: they dismembered the bodies of Japanese soldiers and civilians in the Pacific Islands, and their skulls, teeth, hands, skin, etc. sent home to their loved ones as gifts. There is no complete certainty that all the dismembered bodies were dead - the Americans did not disdain to pull out gold teeth from still living prisoners of war.

According to the American historian James Weingartner, there is a direct connection between the atomic bombings and the collection of body parts of the enemy: both were the result of the dehumanization of the enemy:

"The widespread image of the Japanese as subhuman created an emotional context that provided yet another justification for decisions that resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths."

But you will be indignant and say: these are rude infantrymen. And the decision was ultimately made by the intelligent Christian Truman. Well, let's give him the floor. On the second day after the bombing of Nagasaki, Truman declared that “the only language they understand is the language of the bombings. When you have to deal with an animal, you have to treat it like an animal. It's very sad, but it's true nonetheless."

Since September 1945 (after the surrender of Japan), American specialists, including doctors, have been working in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. However, they did not treat the unfortunate "hibakusha" - patients with radiation sickness, but with genuine research interest watched how their hair fell out, their skin flaked, then spots appeared on it, bleeding began, as they weakened and died. Not an ounce of compassion. Vae victis (woe to the vanquished). And science above all!

But I already hear indignant voices: “Father deacon, whom do you pity? Were they not the Japanese who treacherously attacked the Americans at Pearl Harbor? Is it not the same Japanese military that committed terrible crimes in China and Korea, killed millions of Chinese, Koreans, Malays, and at times in brutal ways? I answer: most of those killed in Hiroshima and Nagasaki had nothing to do with the military. They were civilians - women, children, old people. With all the crimes of Japan, one cannot fail to recognize the well-known correctness of the official protest of the Japanese government of August 11, 1945:

"Military and civilians, men and women, old and young, were killed indiscriminately atmospheric pressure and the thermal radiation of the explosion... These bombs used by the Americans are far superior in their cruelty and terrifying effects to poison gases or any other weapons whose use is prohibited. Japan is protesting against the US trampling on internationally recognized principles of warfare, violated both by using atomic bomb, and in the earlier incendiary bombardments that killed the elderly.

The most sober assessment of the atomic bombings was voiced by the Indian judge Radhabinut Pal. Recalling the rationale given by German Kaiser Wilhelm II for his obligation to end the First World War as soon as possible (“Everything must be given to fire and sword. Men, women and children must be killed, and not a single tree or house should remain undestroyed”), Pal noted :

"This policy mass murder, carried out with the aim of ending the war as soon as possible, was considered a crime. During the war in the Pacific, which we are considering here, if there is anything approaching the letter of the Emperor of Germany considered above, it is the decision of the Allies to use the atomic bomb.

Indeed, we see here a clear continuity between the German racism of the First and Second World Wars and Anglo-Saxon racism.

The creation of atomic weapons, and especially their use, exposed terrible disease European spirit - its hyper-intellectualism, cruelty, will to violence, contempt for man. And contempt for God and His commandments. It is significant that the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki exploded near christian church. Since the 16th century, Nagasaki has been the gateway for Christianity to Japan. And then the Protestant Truman gave the order for its barbaric destruction.

The ancient Greek word ατομον means both an indivisible particle and a person. This is no coincidence. The disintegration of the personality of European man and the disintegration of the atom went hand in hand. And even such godless intellectuals as A. Camus understood this:

“Mechanized civilization has just reached the final stage of barbarism. In the not too distant future, we will have to choose between mass suicide and the prudent use of scientific advances [...] This should not be just a request; this should be an order that will come from the bottom up, from ordinary citizens to governments, an order to make a firm choice between hell and reason.

But, alas, as governments did not listen to reason, they still do not listen.

St. Nicholas (Velimirovich) rightly said:

“Europe is smart to take away, but it doesn’t know how to give. She knows how to kill, but she does not know how to value other people's lives. She knows how to create weapons of destruction, but she does not know how to be humble before God and merciful towards weaker peoples. She is smart to be selfish and everywhere to carry her “creed” of selfishness, but she does not know how to be God-loving and humane.”

These words capture the vast and terrible experience of the Serbs, the experience of the last two centuries. But this is also the experience of the whole world, including Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The definition of Europe as a “white demon” was deeply correct. In many ways, the prophecy of St. Nicholas (Velimirovich) about the nature of the future war came true: “It will be a war that is completely devoid of mercy, honor and nobility [...] For the coming war will have a goal not only victory over the enemy, but also the extermination of the enemy. Complete destruction not only of the belligerents, but of everything that makes up their rear: parents, children, sick, wounded and prisoners, their villages and cities, livestock and pastures, railways and all ways! With the exception of the Soviet Union and the Great Patriotic War, where the Russian soviet soldier nevertheless he tried to show mercy, honor and nobility, the prophecy of St. Nicholas came true.

Why such cruelty? Saint Nicholas sees its cause in militant materialism and the plane of consciousness:

“And Europe once began in the spirit, but now it ends in the flesh, i.e. carnal vision, judgment, desire, and conquest. Like bewitched! Her whole life flows along two paths: in length and in width, i.e. along the plane. It knows neither depth nor height, and that is why it fights for the earth, for space, for the expansion of the plane, and only for this! Hence war after war, horror after horror. For God created man not only so that he would be just a living being, an animal, but also so that he would penetrate the depths of mysteries with his mind, and ascend with his heart to the heights of God. The war for the earth is a war against the truth, against God's and human nature.

But not only the flatness of consciousness led Europe to a military catastrophe, but also carnal lust and a godless mind:

“What is Europe? It is lust and mind. And these properties are embodied in the Pope and Luther. The European pope is the human lust for power. The European Luther is the human daring to explain everything with one's own mind. Pope as the ruler of the world and wise guy as the ruler of the world.

The most important thing is that these properties do not know any external restrictions, they tend to infinity - "the fulfillment of human lust to the limit and the mind to the limit." Such properties, elevated to the absolute, must inevitably give rise to constant conflicts and bloody wars of annihilation: “Because of human lust, every nation and every person seeks power, sweetness and glory, imitating the Pope. Because of the human mind, every people and every person finds that he is smarter than others and more than others. How then can there not be madness, revolutions and wars between people?

Many Christians (and not only Orthodox) were horrified by what happened in Hiroshima. In 1946, a report of the National Council of Churches of the United States was issued, entitled "Atomic Weapons and Christianity", in which, in part, it was said:

“As American Christians, we deeply repent for the irresponsible use of atomic weapons. We all agree that whatever our view of the war as a whole, the surprise bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are morally vulnerable."

Of course, many inventors of atomic weapons and executors of inhuman orders recoiled in horror from their offspring. The inventor of the American atomic bomb, Robert Oppenheimer, after the tests in Alamogorodo, when a terrible flash lit up the sky, remembered the words of an ancient Indian poem:

If the shine of a thousand suns
Together it will flash in the sky,
Man becomes death
A threat to the earth.

Oppenheimer after the war began to fight for the limitation and prohibition of nuclear weapons, for which he was removed from the "Uranium Project". His successor Edward Teller, father hydrogen bomb, was much less scrupulous.

Iserli, a spy plane pilot who reported good weather over Hiroshima, then sent aid to the victims of the bombing and demanded that he be imprisoned as a criminal. His request was fulfilled, however, they put him in ... a psychiatric hospital.

But alas, many were much less scrupulous.

After the war, a very revealing pamphlet was published with documentary memoirs of the crew of the Enola Gay bomber, which delivered the first atomic bomb "Kid" to Hiroshima. How did these twelve people feel when they saw the city below them, reduced to ashes by them?

“STIBORIK: Before, our 509th Composite Aviation Regiment was constantly teased. When the neighbors left for sorties before light, they threw stones at our barracks. But when we dropped the bomb, everyone saw that we were dashing guys.

LUIS: Before the flight, the entire crew was briefed. Tibbets later claimed that he alone was aware of the matter. This is nonsense: everyone knew.

JEPSON: About an hour and a half after takeoff, I went down to the bomb bay. It was pleasantly cool there. Parsons and I had to cock everything and remove the safety catches. I still keep them as souvenirs. Then again it was possible to admire the ocean. Everyone was busy with their own business. Someone was humming “Sentimental Journey,” the most popular song of August 1945.

LUIS: The commander was dozing. Sometimes I also left my chair. The autopilot kept the car on course. Our main target was Hiroshima, alternates were Kokura and Nagasaki.

VAN KIRK: The weather would have to decide which of these cities we were to choose for the bombing.

CARON: The radio operator was waiting for a signal from the three "superfortresses" flying in front for weather reconnaissance. And from the tail section I could see two B-29s escorting us from behind. One of them was supposed to take photographs, and the other to deliver measuring equipment to the explosion site.

FERIBI: We are very successful, from the first call, we reached the target. I saw her from afar, so my task was simple.

NELSON: As soon as the bomb came off, the plane turned 160 degrees and went down hard to gain speed. All put on sunglasses.

JEPSON: This waiting was the most unsettling moment of the flight. I knew the bomb would fall for 47 seconds and started counting in my head, but when I got to 47 nothing happened. Then I remembered that the shock wave would still take time to catch up with us, and just then it came.

TIBBETS: The plane was suddenly thrown down, it rattled like an iron roof. The tail gunner saw the shockwave approaching us like a radiance. He didn't know what it was. He warned us about the approach of the wave with a signal. The plane failed even more, and it seemed to me that a anti-aircraft projectile.

CARON: I took pictures. It was a breathtaking sight. An ash gray smoke mushroom with a red core. It was evident that everything inside was on fire. I was ordered to count the fires. Damn it, I immediately realized that this was unthinkable! A swirling, boiling mist, like lava, covered the city and spread outward to the foothills.

SHUMARD: Everything in that cloud was death. Along with the smoke, some black fragments flew up. One of us said: "These are the souls of the Japanese ascending to heaven."

BESER: Yes, in the city everything that could burn was on fire. “Guys, you just dropped the first atomic bomb in history!” came the voice of Colonel Tibbets through the headsets. I recorded everything on tape, but then someone put all these tapes under lock and key.

CARON: On the way back, the commander asked me what I thought about flying. “It's worse than driving your backside down a mountain in Coney Island Park for a quarter of a dollar,” I joked. “Then I’ll collect a quarter from you when we sit down!” laughed the colonel. “Have to wait until payday!” we answered in unison.

VAN KIRK: the main idea was, of course, about herself: to get out of all this as soon as possible and return whole.

FERIBI: Captain First Class Parsons and I were to draw up a report to send to the President via Guam.

TIBBETS: None of the conventions that had been agreed upon were suitable, and we decided to transmit the telegram in clear text. I don’t remember it verbatim, but it said that the results of the bombing exceeded all expectations.”

On August 6, 2015, the anniversary of the bombings, President Truman's grandson Clifton Truman Daniel stated that "my grandfather believed for the rest of his life that the decision to drop the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was the right one, and the United States will never ask for forgiveness for it."

It seems that everything is clear here: ordinary fascism, even more terrible in its vulgarity.

Let us now look at what the first eyewitnesses saw from the ground. Here is a report by Birt Bratchet, who visited Hiroshima in September 1945. On the morning of September 3, Burchett stepped off the train in Hiroshima, becoming the first foreign correspondent to see the city after the atomic explosion. Together with the Japanese journalist Nakamura from the Kyodo news agency Tsushin Burchett walked around the endless reddish ashes, visited the street first aid stations. And there, among the ruins and groans, he tapped out his report on a typewriter, entitled: "I am writing about this to warn the world ...":

“Almost a month after the first atomic bomb destroyed Hiroshima, people continue to die in the city - mysteriously and horribly. The townspeople, who were not injured on the day of the catastrophe, are dying from an unknown disease, which I cannot call otherwise than the atomic plague. For no apparent reason, their health begins to deteriorate. Their hair falls out, spots appear on the body, bleeding from the ears, nose and mouth begins. Hiroshima, Burchett wrote, does not look like a city that has suffered from a conventional bombing. The impression is as if a giant skating rink passed along the street, crushing all living things. On this first living test site, where the power of the atomic bomb was tested, I saw a nightmarish devastation unspeakable in words, such as I have not seen anywhere in the four years of the war.

And that is not all. Let us remember the tragedy of the irradiated and their children. The poignant story of a girl from Hiroshima, Sadako Sasaki, who died in 1955 from leukemia, one of the consequences of radiation, spread around the world. Already in the hospital, Sadako learned about the legend, according to which a person who folded a thousand paper cranes can make a wish that will surely come true. Wanting to get well, Sadako began to fold cranes from any pieces of paper that fell into her hands, but managed to fold only 644 cranes. There was a song about her:

Returning from Japan, having traveled many miles,
A friend brought me a paper crane.
A story is connected with him, a story is one -
About a girl who was irradiated.

Chorus:
I will spread paper wings for you,
Fly, don't disturb this world, this world
Crane, crane, Japanese crane,
You are a forever living souvenir.

"When will I see the sun?" asked the doctor
(And life burned thinly, like a candle in the wind).
And the doctor answered the girl: “When the winter will pass
And you will make a thousand cranes yourself.”

But the girl did not survive and soon died,
And she did not make a thousand cranes.
The last crane fell from dead hands -
And the girl did not survive, like thousands around.

Note that all this would have awaited you and me if it were not for the Soviet uranium project, which began in 1943, accelerated after 1945 and completed in 1949. Of course, the crimes committed under Stalin are terrible. And above all, the persecution of the Church, the exile and execution of clergy and laity, the destruction and desecration of churches, collectivization, the All-Russian (and not only Ukrainian) famine of 1933, which broke folk life finally the repression of 1937. However, let's not forget that now we are living the fruits of that same industrialization. And if now the Russian state is independent and so far invulnerable to external aggression, if the tragedies of Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya and Syria are not repeated in our open spaces, then this is largely due to the military-industrial complex and the nuclear missile shield laid down under Stalin.

Meanwhile, there were enough people who wanted to burn us. Here is at least one - the emigrant poet Georgy Ivanov:

Russia has been living in prison for thirty years.
On Solovki or Kolyma.
And only in Kolyma and Solovki
Russia is the one that will live for centuries.

Everything else is a planetary hell:
Damned Kremlin, crazy Stalingrad.
They deserve only one
The fire that consumes him.

These are poems written in 1949 by Georgy Ivanov, a “remarkable Russian patriot,” according to a publicist who called himself a “church Vlasovite.” Professor Aleksey Svetozarsky aptly spoke about these verses: “What can we expect from this glorious son Silver Age? Cardboard swords and blood for them, especially someone else’s, is “cranberry juice”, including the one that flowed near Stalingrad. Well, the fact that both the Kremlin and Stalingrad are worthy of a “withering” fire, then in this the “patriot”, who himself successfully sat out both the war and the occupation in a quiet French outback, was, alas, not alone in his desire. About the "cleansing" fire nuclear war said in the Easter message of 1948 of the Synod of Bishops of the Russian Orthodox Church Abroad".

By the way, it is worth reading it carefully. Here is what Metropolitan Anastassy (Gribanovsky) wrote in 1948:

“Our time has invented its own special means of exterminating people and all life on earth: they have such destructive power that in an instant they can turn large spaces into a continuous desert. Everything is ready to incinerate this hellish fire, caused by man himself from the abyss, and we again hear the prophet’s complaint addressed to God: “As long as the earth weeps and all the grass of the countryside withers from the malice of those who live on it” (Jeremiah 12, 4). But this terrible devastating fire has not only a destructive, but also a cleansing effect: for it burns those who ignite it, and with it all the vices, crimes and passions with which they defile the earth. [...] Atomic bombs and all other destructive means invented by modern technology are truly less dangerous for our Fatherland than the moral decay that the highest representatives of civil and ecclesiastical power bring into the Russian soul by their example. The decomposition of the atom brings with it only physical devastation and destruction, and the corruption of the mind, heart and will entails the spiritual death of an entire people, after which there is no resurrection” (“Holy Russia”, Stuttgart, 1948).

In other words, not only Stalin, Zhukov, Voroshilov were doomed to burning, but also His Holiness Patriarch Alexy I, Metropolitan Grigory (Chukov), Metropolitan Joseph (Chernov), Saint Luke (Voyno-Yasenetsky) were then “the highest representatives of church authority.” And millions of our compatriots, including millions of believing Orthodox Christians, who suffered both persecution and the Great Patriotic War. Only Metropolitan Anastassy chastely keeps silent about the moral decay and example that the highest representatives of Western civil and ecclesiastical authorities showed. And I forgot the great gospel words: "With what measure you measure, it will be measured to you."

The novel by A. Solzhenitsyn "In the First Circle" also goes back to a similar ideology. It sings of the traitor Innokenty Volodin, who tried to give the Americans the Russian intelligence officer Yuri Koval, who was hunting for atomic secrets. It also calls for dropping an atomic bomb on the USSR, "so that people do not suffer." No matter how much they "suffered", we can see in the example of Sadako Sasaki and tens of thousands like her.

And therefore, deep gratitude not only to our great scientists, workers and soldiers who created the Soviet atomic bomb, which was never launched, but stopped the cannibalistic plans of American generals and politicians, but also to those of our soldiers who, after the Great Patriotic War guarded the Russian sky and did not allow B-29s with nuclear bombs on board to break into it. Among them is the now living Hero of the Soviet Union, Major General Sergei Kramarenko, known to readers of the site. Sergei Makarovich fought in Korea and personally shot down 15 American aircraft. Here is how he describes the significance of the activities of Soviet pilots in Korea:

“I consider our most important achievement that the pilots of the division inflicted significant damage strategic aviation United States, armed with heavy bombers B-29 "Superfortress" ("Superfortress"). Our division managed to shoot down over 20 of them. As a result, the B-29, which carried out large groups carpet (areal) bombing, stopped flying in the afternoon north of the Pyongyang-Genzan line, that is, over most of the territory North Korea. Thus, millions of Korean residents were saved - mostly women, children and the elderly. But even at night the B-29 was carried big losses. In total, during the three years of the war in Korea, about a hundred B-29 bombers were shot down. Even more important was the fact that it became clear that in the event of a war with Soviet Union carrying atomic bombs "Superfortress" will not reach large industrial centers and cities of the USSR, for they will be shot down. This played a huge role in the fact that the Third World War never started.

During World War II, on August 6, 1945, at 8:15 am, a US B-29 Enola Gay bomber dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Approximately 140,000 people died in the explosion and died over the following months. Three days later, when the United States dropped another atomic bomb on Nagasaki, about 80,000 people were killed.

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On August 15, Japan capitulated, thus ending World War II. Until now, this bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki remains the only case of the use of nuclear weapons in the history of mankind.

The US government decided to drop the bombs, believing that this would hasten the end of the war and there would be no need for prolonged bloody fighting on the main island of Japan. Japan was strenuously trying to control the two islands, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, as the Allies closed in.

This wrist watch, found among the ruins, stopped at 8.15 am on August 6, 1945 - during the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima.


The flying fortress "Enola Gay" comes in for landing on August 6, 1945 at the base on the island of Tinian after the bombing of Hiroshima.


This photograph, released in 1960 by the US government, shows the Little Boy atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. The size of the bomb is 73 cm in diameter, 3.2 m in length. It weighed 4 tons, and the explosion power reached 20,000 tons of TNT.


This image provided by the US Air Force shows the main crew of the B-29 Enola Gay bomber that dropped the Baby nuclear bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. Pilot Colonel Paul W. Tibbets stands center. The photo was taken in the Mariana Islands. This was the first time in the history of mankind that nuclear weapons were used during military operations.

20,000 feet of smoke rises over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 after an atomic bomb was dropped on it during the war.


This photograph, taken on August 6, 1945, from the city of Yoshiura, across the mountains north of Hiroshima, shows smoke rising from the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. The picture was taken by an Australian engineer from Kure, Japan. The spots left on the negative by radiation almost destroyed the picture.


Survivors of the explosion of the atomic bomb, first used during the hostilities on August 6, 1945, await medical care in Hiroshima, Japan. As a result of the explosion, 60,000 people died at the same moment, tens of thousands died later due to exposure.


August 6, 1945. In the photo: the surviving residents of Hiroshima are given first aid by military doctors shortly after the atomic bomb was dropped on Japan, used in military operations for the first time in history.


After the explosion of the atomic bomb on August 6, 1945, only ruins remained in Hiroshima. Nuclear weapons were used to hasten the surrender of Japan and end World War II, for which US President Harry Truman ordered the use of nuclear weapons with a capacity of 20,000 tons of TNT. Japan surrendered on August 14, 1945.


August 7, 1945, the day after the explosion of the atomic bomb, smoke billows over the ruins of Hiroshima, Japan.


President Harry Truman (pictured left) at his desk in the White House next to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson after returning from the Potsdam Conference. They discuss the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.



Survivors of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki among the ruins, against the backdrop of a raging fire in the background, on August 9, 1945.


B-29 bomber crew members The Great Artiste, who dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, surrounded Major Charles W. Sweeney in North Quincy, Massachusetts. All crew members participated in the historic bombing. Left to right: Sgt. R. Gallagher, Chicago; Staff Sergeant A. M. Spitzer, Bronx, New York; Captain S. D. Albury, Miami, Florida; Captain J.F. Van Pelt Jr., Oak Hill, WV; Lt. F. J. Olivy, Chicago; staff sergeant E.K. Buckley, Lisbon, Ohio; Sgt. A. T. Degart, Plainview, Texas; and Staff Sgt. J. D. Kucharek, Columbus, Nebraska.


This photograph of the atomic bomb that exploded over Nagasaki, Japan during World War II was released by the Commission on nuclear power and the US Department of Defense in Washington on December 6, 1960. The Fat Man bomb was 3.25 m long and 1.54 m in diameter, and weighed 4.6 tons. The power of the explosion reached about 20 kilotons of TNT.


A huge column of smoke rises into the air after the explosion of the second atomic bomb in the port city of Nagasaki on August 9, 1945. A US Army Air Force B-29 Bockscar bomber killed more than 70,000 people immediately, and tens of thousands more died later as a result of exposure.

A huge nuclear mushroom cloud over Nagasaki, Japan, on August 9, 1945, after a US bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the city. The nuclear explosion over Nagasaki occurred three days after the US dropped the first ever atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.

A boy carries his burnt brother on his back on August 10, 1945 in Nagasaki, Japan. Such photos were not made public by the Japanese side, but after the end of the war they were shown to the world media by UN staff.


The arrow was installed at the site of the fall of the atomic bomb in Nagasaki on August 10, 1945. Most of the affected area is empty to this day, the trees remained charred and mutilated, and almost no reconstruction was carried out.


Japanese workers clean up rubble in the affected area in Nagasaki, an industrial city in southwest Kyushu, after an atomic bomb was dropped on it on August 9. Visible in the background chimney and a lonely building, in the front - ruins. The picture is taken from the archives of the Japanese news agency Domei.


As seen in this photo taken on September 5, 1945, several concrete and steel buildings and bridges remained intact after the US dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima during World War II.


A month after the first atomic bomb exploded on August 6, 1945, a journalist inspects the ruins of Hiroshima, Japan.

Victim of the explosion of the first atomic bomb in the department of the first military hospital in Ujina in September 1945. The thermal radiation generated by the explosion burned the pattern from the kimono fabric on the woman's back.


Most of the territory of Hiroshima was razed to the ground by the explosion of the atomic bomb. This is the first aerial photograph after the explosion, taken on September 1, 1945.


The area around the Sanyo-Shorai-Kan (Trade Promotion Center) in Hiroshima was reduced to rubble by an atomic bomb 100 meters away in 1945.


A correspondent stands among the ruins in front of the shell of a building that was the city theater in Hiroshima on September 8, 1945, a month after the first atomic bomb was dropped by the United States to hasten the surrender of Japan.


The ruins and lone frame of a building after the atomic bomb exploded over Hiroshima. The photo was taken on September 8, 1945.


Very few buildings remain in the devastated Hiroshima, a Japanese city that was razed to the ground by an atomic bomb, as seen in this photograph taken on September 8, 1945. (AP Photo)


September 8, 1945. People walk along a cleared road among the ruins left by the first atomic bomb in Hiroshima on August 6 of the same year.


A Japanese man finds the wreckage of a children's tricycle among the ruins in Nagasaki, September 17, 1945. The nuclear bomb dropped on the city on August 9 wiped out almost everything within a radius of 6 kilometers from the face of the earth and took the lives of thousands of civilians.


This photo, courtesy of the Japan Association of the Photographers of the Atomic (Bomb) Destruction of Hiroshima, shows a victim of the atomic explosion. A man is in quarantine on the island of Ninoshima in Hiroshima, Japan, 9 kilometers from the epicenter of the explosion, a day after the US dropped an atomic bomb on the city.

A tram (top center) and its dead passengers after the bombing of Nagasaki on August 9. The photo was taken on September 1, 1945.


People pass a tram lying on the tracks at the Kamiyashō junction in Hiroshima some time after the atomic bomb was dropped on the city.


In this photo courtesy of the Japan Association of the Photographers of the Atomic (Bomb) Destruction of Hiroshima, victims of the atomic explosion are seen at the Hiroshima 2nd Military Hospital's tent care center on the waterfront. Ota River, 1150 meters from the epicenter of the explosion, August 7, 1945. The photo was taken the day after the United States dropped the first ever atomic bomb on the city.


A view of Hachobori Street in Hiroshima shortly after the Japanese city was bombed.


The Urakami Catholic Cathedral in Nagasaki, photographed on September 13, 1945, was destroyed by an atomic bomb.


A Japanese soldier wanders among the ruins in search of recyclable materials in Nagasaki on September 13, 1945, just over a month after the atomic bomb exploded over the city.


A man with a loaded bicycle on a road cleared of debris in Nagasaki on September 13, 1945, a month after the atomic bomb was detonated.


On September 14, 1945, the Japanese try to drive through a ruined street on the outskirts of the city of Nagasaki, over which a nuclear bomb exploded.


This area of ​​Nagasaki was once lined with industrial buildings and small residential buildings. In the background are the ruins of the Mitsubishi factory and the concrete school building at the foot of the hill.

The top picture shows the bustling city of Nagasaki before the explosion, while the bottom picture shows the wasteland after the atomic bomb. The circles measure the distance from the explosion point.


A Japanese family eats rice in a hut built from the rubble of what was once their home in Nagasaki on September 14, 1945.


These huts, photographed on September 14, 1945, were built from the wreckage of buildings that were destroyed as a result of the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki.


In the Ginza district of the city of Nagasaki, which was the analogue of New York's Fifth Avenue, the owners of shops destroyed by the explosion nuclear bomb, selling their goods on the sidewalks, September 30, 1945.


Sacred Torii gate at the entrance to the completely destroyed Shinto shrine in Nagasaki in October 1945.


A service at the Nagarekawa Protestant Church after the atomic bomb destroyed the church in Hiroshima, 1945.


A young man injured after the explosion of the second atomic bomb in the city of Nagasaki.


Major Thomas Fereby, left, from Moscowville, and Captain Kermit Beahan, right, from Houston, talking in a hotel in Washington, February 6, 1946. Ferebi is the man who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, and his interlocutor dropped the bomb on Nagasaki.




Ikimi Kikkawa shows off his keloid scars after being treated for burns sustained in the atomic bombing of Hiroshima at the end of World War II. The photo was taken at the Red Cross Hospital on June 5, 1947.

Akira Yamaguchi shows off his scars from being treated for burns from the Hiroshima nuclear bomb.

The body of Jinpe Terawama, the survivor of the first ever atomic bomb, was left with numerous burn scars, Hiroshima, June 1947.

Pilot Colonel Paul W. Tibbets waves from the cockpit of his bomber at Tinian Island on August 6, 1945, before taking off to drop the first ever atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. The day before, Tibbets had named the B-29 flying fortress "Enola Gay" after his mother.

I suggest you watch the harsh footage from the time of the explosions of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The pictures that you will see in the sequel are really not for the faint of heart and show the whole reality that happened during those unpleasant times.

Nagasaki. The photo was taken on August 10, in the area of ​​the Mitsubishi steel plant. This is about 1 kilometer south of the epicenter of the explosion. Elderly woman seems to have lost orientation and vision. Also, her appearance also suggests the loss of any sense of reality.

Nagasaki. 10 a.m. August 10. Last sip. People died quickly after receiving mortal wounds


Hiroshima. Still a living person with deep burns all over his body. There were hundreds of them. They lay motionless in the streets and waited for their death.


Hiroshima. One second after death


Hiroshima

Nagasaki. An elderly woman received an average dose of radiation, but enough to kill her in a week.

Nagasaki. An exposed woman with a baby is waiting for a doctor's appointment.

Hiroshima. An attempt to cure the legs of a schoolboy. It will not be possible to save the legs, as well as the life of a schoolboy.


Nagasaki. The child is put on a gauze bandage. Part of the child's tissue was burned. Burns of the bones of the hands of the left hand


Nagasaki. Doctors treat the skull burn of an elderly Japanese man

Nagasaki. 230 meters south of the epicenter.

Hiroshima. Mother and her child.

Exhumation of graves in Hiroshima. When the explosion occurred, there were so many victims that they were buried quickly and in mass graves. Later they decided to re-burial.


Nagasaki - 600 meters south of the epicenter

Nagasaki. Shadow.

Hiroshima. 2.3 km. from the epicenter. The concrete parapet of the bridge collapsed.


Hiroshima - wounds 900 meters from the epicenter


Hiroshima. A 21-year-old soldier was exposed to an explosion at a distance of 1 kilometer. Doctors monitored his condition because they were unfamiliar with the effects of radiation. Starting August 18, they note that their hair has begun to fall out. Gradually other symptoms appeared. His gums are bleeding and his body is covered in purple spots due to hypodermal bleeding. His throat swells, which makes it difficult for him to breathe and swallow. Bleeding from the mouth and ulcers of the body. He eventually collapses and dies on 2 September.


Hiroshima. Leg burns


The epicenter of the explosion in Hiroshima


Hiroshima

Hiroshima. The city center has been wiped off the face of the earth. Only a few buildings survived.



Hiroshima. light shadow...

During World War II, on August 6, 1945, at 8:15 am, a US B-29 Enola Gay bomber dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. Approximately 140,000 people died in the explosion and died over the following months. Three days later, when the United States dropped another atomic bomb on Nagasaki, about 80,000 people were killed. On August 15, Japan capitulated, thus ending World War II. Until now, this bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki remains the only case of the use of nuclear weapons in the history of mankind. The US government decided to drop the bombs, believing that this would hasten the end of the war and there would be no need for prolonged bloody fighting on the main island of Japan. Japan was strenuously trying to control the two islands, Iwo Jima and Okinawa, as the Allies closed in.

1. This wrist watch, found among the ruins, stopped at 8.15 am on August 6, 1945 - during the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima.

2. The flying fortress "Enola Gay" comes in for landing on August 6, 1945 at the base on the island of Tinian after the bombing of Hiroshima.

3. This photo, released in 1960 by the US government, shows the Little Boy atomic bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. The size of the bomb is 73 cm in diameter, 3.2 m in length. It weighed 4 tons, and the explosion power reached 20,000 tons of TNT.

4. In this image provided by the US Air Force, the main crew of the B-29 Enola Gay bomber, from which the Baby nuclear bomb was dropped on Hiroshima, on August 6, 1945. Pilot Colonel Paul W. Tibbets stands center. The photo was taken in the Mariana Islands. This was the first time in the history of mankind that nuclear weapons were used during military operations.

5. Smoke 20,000 feet high rises over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 after an atomic bomb was dropped on it during the hostilities.

6. This photograph, taken on August 6, 1945, from the city of Yoshiura, located on the other side of the mountains north of Hiroshima, shows smoke rising from the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima. The picture was taken by an Australian engineer from Kure, Japan. The spots left on the negative by radiation almost destroyed the picture.

7. Survivors of the atomic bomb explosion, first used during hostilities on August 6, 1945, await medical attention in Hiroshima, Japan. As a result of the explosion, 60,000 people died at the same moment, tens of thousands died later due to exposure.

8. August 6, 1945. In the photo: the surviving residents of Hiroshima are given first aid by military doctors shortly after the atomic bomb was dropped on Japan, used in military operations for the first time in history.

9. After the explosion of the atomic bomb on August 6, 1945, only ruins remained in Hiroshima. Nuclear weapons were used to hasten the surrender of Japan and end World War II, for which US President Harry Truman ordered the use of nuclear weapons with a capacity of 20,000 tons of TNT. Japan surrendered on August 14, 1945.

10. August 7, 1945, the day after the explosion of the atomic bomb, smoke spreads over the ruins of Hiroshima, Japan.

11. President Harry Truman (pictured left) at his desk in the White House next to Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson after returning from the Potsdam Conference. They discuss the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan.

13. The survivors of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki people among the ruins, against the backdrop of a raging fire in the background, August 9, 1945.

14. Crew members of the B-29 "The Great Artiste" bomber, which dropped the atomic bomb on Nagasaki, surrounded Major Charles W. Sweeney in North Quincy, Massachusetts. All crew members participated in the historic bombing. Left to right: Sgt. R. Gallagher, Chicago; Staff Sergeant A. M. Spitzer, Bronx, New York; Captain S. D. Albury, Miami, Florida; Captain J.F. Van Pelt Jr., Oak Hill, WV; Lt. F. J. Olivy, Chicago; staff sergeant E.K. Buckley, Lisbon, Ohio; Sgt. A. T. Degart, Plainview, Texas; and Staff Sgt. J. D. Kucharek, Columbus, Nebraska.

15. This photograph of the atomic bomb that exploded over Nagasaki, Japan during World War II was released by the Atomic Energy Commission and the US Department of Defense in Washington on December 6, 1960. The Fat Man bomb was 3.25 m long and 1.54 m in diameter, and weighed 4.6 tons. The power of the explosion reached about 20 kilotons of TNT.

16. A huge column of smoke rises into the air after the explosion of the second atomic bomb in the port city of Nagasaki on August 9, 1945. A US Army Air Force B-29 Bockscar bomber killed more than 70,000 people immediately, and tens of thousands more died later as a result of exposure.

17. A huge nuclear mushroom over Nagasaki, Japan, August 9, 1945, after a US bomber dropped an atomic bomb on the city. The nuclear explosion over Nagasaki occurred three days after the US dropped the first ever atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.

18. A boy carries his burnt brother on his back on August 10, 1945 in Nagasaki, Japan. Such photos were not made public by the Japanese side, but after the end of the war they were shown to the world media by UN staff.

19. The arrow was installed at the site of the fall of the atomic bomb in Nagasaki on August 10, 1945. Most of the affected area is empty to this day, the trees remained charred and mutilated, and almost no reconstruction was carried out.

20. Japanese workers dismantle the rubble in the affected area in Nagasaki, an industrial city located in the southwest of Kyushu, after an atomic bomb was dropped on it on August 9. A chimney and a lone building can be seen in the background, ruins in the foreground. The picture is taken from the archives of the Japanese news agency Domei.

22. As can be seen in this photo, which was taken on September 5, 1945, several concrete and steel buildings and bridges remained intact after the US dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima during World War II.

23. A month after the first atomic bomb exploded on August 6, 1945, a journalist inspects the ruins in Hiroshima, Japan.

24. Victim of the explosion of the first atomic bomb in the department of the first military hospital in Ujina in September 1945. The thermal radiation generated by the explosion burned the pattern from the kimono fabric on the woman's back.

25. Most of the territory of Hiroshima was wiped off the face of the earth by the explosion of the atomic bomb. This is the first aerial photograph after the explosion, taken on September 1, 1945.

26. The area around the Sanyo-Shorai-Kan (Trade Promotion Center) in Hiroshima was left in ruins after the atomic bomb exploded 100 meters away in 1945.

27. A correspondent stands among the ruins in front of the skeleton of the building that was the city theater in Hiroshima on September 8, 1945, a month after the first atomic bomb was dropped by the United States to hasten the surrender of Japan.

28. The ruins and lone frame of the building after the explosion of the atomic bomb over Hiroshima. The photo was taken on September 8, 1945.

29. Very few buildings remain in the devastated Hiroshima, a Japanese city that was razed to the ground by an atomic bomb, as seen in this photograph taken on September 8, 1945. (AP Photo)

30. September 8, 1945. People walk along a cleared road among the ruins left by the first atomic bomb in Hiroshima on August 6 of the same year.

31. The Japanese found among the ruins of the wreckage of a children's tricycle in Nagasaki, September 17, 1945. The nuclear bomb dropped on the city on August 9 wiped out almost everything within a radius of 6 kilometers from the face of the earth and took the lives of thousands of civilians.

32. This photo, courtesy of the Association of the Photographers of the Atomic (Bomb) Destruction of Hiroshima, is a victim of the atomic explosion. A man is in quarantine on the island of Ninoshima in Hiroshima, Japan, 9 kilometers from the epicenter of the explosion, a day after the US dropped an atomic bomb on the city.

33. Tram (top center) and its dead passengers after the bombing of Nagasaki on August 9. The photo was taken on September 1, 1945.

34. People pass a tram lying on the tracks at the Kamiyasho intersection in Hiroshima some time after the atomic bomb was dropped on the city.

35. In this photograph provided by the Japan Association of the Photographers of the Atomic (Bomb) Destruction of Hiroshima, victims of the atomic explosion are in the tent care center of the 2nd Military Hospital of Hiroshima, located on the banks of the Ota River, 1150 meters from the epicenter of the explosion, August 7, 1945. The photo was taken the day after the United States dropped the first ever atomic bomb on the city.

36. View of Hachobori Street in Hiroshima shortly after a bomb was dropped on the Japanese city.

37. The Urakami Catholic Cathedral in Nagasaki, photographed on September 13, 1945, was destroyed by an atomic bomb.

38. A Japanese soldier wanders among the ruins in search of recyclable materials in Nagasaki on September 13, 1945, just over a month after the atomic bomb exploded over the city.

39. A man with a loaded bicycle on a road cleared of ruins in Nagasaki on September 13, 1945, a month after the atomic bomb exploded.

40. September 14, 1945, the Japanese are trying to drive through a ruined street on the outskirts of the city of Nagasaki, over which a nuclear bomb exploded.

41. This area of ​​Nagasaki was once built up with industrial buildings and small residential buildings. In the background are the ruins of the Mitsubishi factory and the concrete school building at the foot of the hill.

42. The top picture shows the bustling city of Nagasaki before the explosion, and the bottom picture shows the wasteland after the atomic bomb. The circles measure the distance from the explosion point.

43. A Japanese family eats rice in a hut built from the rubble left on the site where their home once stood in Nagasaki, September 14, 1945.

44. These huts, photographed on September 14, 1945, were built from the wreckage of buildings that were destroyed as a result of the explosion of the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki.

45. In the Ginza district of Nagasaki, which was an analogue of New York's Fifth Avenue, the owners of shops destroyed by a nuclear bomb sell their goods on the sidewalks, September 30, 1945.

46. ​​Sacred Torii gate at the entrance to the completely destroyed Shinto shrine in Nagasaki in October 1945.

47. Service at the Nagarekawa Protestant Church after the atomic bomb destroyed the church in Hiroshima, 1945.

48. A young man injured after the explosion of the second atomic bomb in the city of Nagasaki.

49. Major Thomas Fereby, left, from Moscowville and Captain Kermit Beahan, right, from Houston, talking in a hotel in Washington, February 6, 1946. Ferebi is the man who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, and his interlocutor dropped the bomb on Nagasaki.

52. Ikimi Kikkawa shows his keloid scars left after the treatment of burns received during the explosion of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima at the end of World War II. The photo was taken at the Red Cross Hospital on June 5, 1947.

53. Akira Yamaguchi shows his scars left after the treatment of burns received during the explosion of a nuclear bomb in Hiroshima.

54. On the body of Jinpe Terawama, the survivor of the explosion of the first atomic bomb in history, there were numerous burn scars, Hiroshima, June 1947.

55. Pilot Colonel Paul W. Taibbets waves from the cockpit of his bomber at a base located on the island of Tinian, August 6, 1945, before taking off, the purpose of which was to drop the first ever atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. The day before, Tibbets had named the B-29 flying fortress "Enola Gay" after his mother.