The approach to Hiroshima yields a beautiful city at the head of a large natural bay.  There were commercial fish farms surrounding islands in the bay.  It is painful to contemplate that this beautiful city was the first military target of a nuclear weapon in history, which occurred on August 6, 1945.  Most of Hiroshima was destroyed, with 90,000 poor souls dying instantly.  Another 50,000 had died within a year as a result of the residual effects of the blast. 

The Hiroshima Peace Memorial, (a UNESCO World Heritage Site) serves as a memorial of the bombing.  The G-7 world leaders, including President Biden, met in Hiroshima this past May of 2023.  The Peace Memorial should be a required destination for all national leaders to learn the details of the tragic devastation of the Hiroshima blast. The sad truth is that modern nuclear bombs are many times more powerful than the Hiroshima blast that instantly killed 90,000 people in this relatively small Japanese city. 

It is indeed sobering to visit Hiroshima just as the world is at war in Ukraine and Gaza.  One rightwing Israeli politician actually proposed that Israel drop a nuclear weapon on Gaza.  Probably a million people would die instantly, while the radiation effects and fallout would reach far beyond the borders of Gaza.  Russia under Putin is withdrawing from the International Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.  Current events are spiraling toward ever greater catastrophes.  Let’s hope that reason prevails over the dangerous international power struggles.