{"id":3781,"date":"2015-08-08T10:21:46","date_gmt":"2015-08-08T10:21:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/really.zonky.org\/?p=3781"},"modified":"2015-08-08T10:21:46","modified_gmt":"2015-08-08T10:21:46","slug":"70-years-after-hiroshima","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/really.zonky.org\/?p=3781","title":{"rendered":"70 Years After Hiroshima"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tIt is approximately 70 years since the first nuclear fission bomb to be dropped was delivered to Hiroshima<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n

\n\t\n<\/p>\n

\n\tWhich is obviously a terrible thing to have occurred. The death toll (approximately 80,000) from a single weapon<\/em> was astronomical, but when you compare it with other incidents where civilians were killed in war (such as the Nanjing Massacre<\/a> when between 40,000-300,000 Chinese were killed) it becomes a little less "special".\n<\/p>\n

\n\tYet those other massacres seem to be less well remembered despite many having a death toll comparable to Hiroshima (or Nagasaki). There is a series of conventions on the conduct of war (the Geneva Conventions<\/a>) that includes provisions for prohibiting attacks on civilians.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tHowever these provisions seem to be optional and widely ignored by military leaders and their political masters whenever it becomes inconvenient.\n<\/p>\n

\n\tRadiation poisoning is one aspect that would seem to make Hiroshima "special" but there are other incidents where civilians continued to die after the initial attack :-\n<\/p>\n