ENDEAVOR

After 25 years, I revisited Hiroshima with my family last weekend, as I thought it would be a valuable experience for them as it has been for me. Hiroshima may be reached from Tokyo or Nagoya via the Shinkansen bullet train in four hours and two hours-plus, respectively, with some delay due to recent snowfall.

In my first visit as a member of a Department of Transportation delegation, upon the invitation of Japan’s Ministry of Transportation, I joined officers of the Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) on a mission to explore possibilities for beefing up their maritime fleet as it became a separate uniformed service after being weaned away from the Philippine Navy.
The starting point of our visit to Hiroshima last weekend was to view the ruins of the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, now commonly called the Genbaku Dome, the Atomic Bomb or A-Bomb Dome. It was the only structure that withstood the bombing. According to historical accounts compiled in Wikipedia:

“The bomb possessed a force equivalent to 15,000 tons of TNT, and effectively obliterated the city. The building's vertical columns were able to resist the nearly vertical downward force of the blast, and parts of the concrete and brick outer walls remained intact. The building's durability can also be attributed to its earthquake-resistant design; it has held up to earthquakes before and since the bombing.”

Hiroshima was chosen as a target as it was a vital port in Honshu and was the headquarters of the 40,000-strong Japanese Second General Army. Here’s a vivid account of what happened at 8:15 a.m., Aug. 6, 1945: “Intended for the Aioi Bridge,  the bomb missed its target by 240 m (790 ft) and exploded directly over the Shima Hospital, which was very near to the Genbaku Dome. The center of the blast occurred 150 m (490 ft) horizontally and 600 m (2,000 ft) vertically from the Dome. Everyone inside the building was killed instantly.” 

From the A-Dome, we walked across the sprawling park toward the Children’s Peace Monument, which provided a good takeoff point for talking with my six year old grandson on why we went to Hiroshima. I told him the idea of building this monument was hatched by classmates of Sadao Sasaki, or Sada-chan, as she was fondly called. She died from a bout with leukemia which afflicted her 10 years after she and her family witnessed and experienced the catastrophe that followed the dropping of the first atomic bomb.

A bell hangs inside the monument and visitors pull a string to ring the bell. Later, while riding the train back to Nagoya, I read the book, The Children’s Peace Monument jointly written by Sada-chan’s sixth-grade friends. It is a poignant story that I hope my grandson will soon be able to read and appreciate.

From the Peace Monument, we walked across a park dotted with structures, relics and artifacts that speak volumes about the significance of what happened in Hiroshima 78 years ago. Then we proceeded to the Peace Museum that contained vivid photos, illustrations, and mementoes of the A-bomb explosion.

I recall that 25 years ago, the centerpiece was a vast, darkened area that occupied almost an entire floor of the Peace Museum’s exhibition hall, where a spotlight was beamed on a scale model of Hiroshima in the aftermath of the bombing. The ruins of the Genbaku Dome stood in mute testimony to the destruction and loss of lives.

Today, an even more vivid representation, or reenactment, of the event at 8:15 a.m. on Aug. 6, 1945, is available to Museum visitors. An actual photograph of the epicenter of the bombing has been reproduced, with sepia toning giving it an archival and vintage look. As visitors gather around the circular exhibit, they view a muted simulation of the explosion, that provides a bird’s eye-view on the extent of the death and destruction that occurred on that fateful day and hour.

One of the poignant artifacts exhibited in the Museum is labeled “Human Shadow Etched in Stone.” The stone is claimed to be part of the steps at the entrance of Sumitomo Bank’s Hiroshima branch located about 260 meters from the hypocenter. According to a 1979 report cited in Peace Seeds, an online newspaper produced by Hiroshima teenagers, “(After the bomb exploded, a huge fireball of about 300,000 degrees was formed. Within three seconds, the temperature of the surface of the ground is thought to have reached 3,000-4,000 degrees. In such conditions, is it possible that human beings could simply vanish?” Eminent Japanese professors have refuted this idea, pointing out that since “the human body is composed of carbon atoms, it can't vanish in high temperatures because ashes are bound to remain.”

According to the Peace Memorial Museum: “The surface of ‘Human Shadow Etched in Stone’ was lightened by the heat except for the” “shadow” part. It is believed that the person sitting on the stone steps and waiting for the bank to open blocked the heat and, as a result, the darker part where his shadow fell left the stone looking blackened.”

Twenty five years after my first visit to Hiroshima, I am still haunted by the question posed by a young official of the host institution: “It was clear that the A-bomb killed tens of thousands instantly, and the devastation of Hiroshima was achieved. Why was it necessary for another bomb to be dropped in Nagasaki three days later, on Aug. 9, 1945?” While an estimated 80 to 150,000 civilians and soldiers were killed in the bombing of Hiroshima, there were 150-plus soldier-casualties, and a lower death toll of 60 to 80,000 civilians killed in Nagasaki.

I recalled asking the same question in the aftermath of the Twin Tower and Pentagon plane-crash bombings on Sept. 11, 2001 and New York and Virginia, USA. Acts of violence are manifestations of strong beliefs held by certain individuals that their causes could be advanced by a demonstration of the lethal power of mass-destruction weapons.
The antidote to war and violence is peace, understanding and compassion for one’s fellow human beings: “Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me.”