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Hiroshima, ground zero of the first launch of the atomic bomb against civilians

Perhaps some of you have been at the Ground Zero of the Twin Towers in New York. Some people don’t feel anything and others are shocked. If you are one of the former, come to Hiroshima: 150.000 in one hit, plus some thousands more little by little, like a Chinese torture. The ones that the bomb didn’t kill August 6th, 1945 at 08:15 were dying a little bit every day throughout the years as if they had a radioactive dropper on them, not to mention those ones that were physically and emotionally mutilated the same day. In order to be able to develop the atomic bomb it was necessary the effort of hundreds of scientists, each of them contributing with their little grain of sand, enough so that none of them felt like the father, nor responsible of such invention. Among all of them, only a few (maybe six or seven), sent a memorandum to the government to request the cancelation of the launch. They only got their promising scientific careers buried at that very moment.

Among all the tours that we took in Hiroshima, the most shocking was seeing several schools reading a peace declaration, praying, and singing in front of the Children’s Peace Monument (in memory of the children that died that day). The most outrageous, however, was indoors. In the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, built next to ground zero, we could read the secret letters (not secret anymore), that the American commanders exchanged weeks before the launch. They are not much different from the ones we can find nowadays in any marketing department of any company. They talk about primary targets, product tests, analyzing the results correctly, different consequences of the launch, justifying the investment of so many resources if there is no launch, etc. Actually, the only difference is that they are typed and have spelling mistakes. We understand that those beasts had neither liquid paper nor soul. There is a big difference between launching a new ice-cream or melting (literally) thousands of people.

However, it is difficult to point the finger, because there were not one or two, but thousands of people involved. The main excuse they always used, that the “collateral damage” had the purpose of ending the war and avoiding more casualties, is so cynical that it is not even worth it to be discussed. That is why I wonder if we are ruled by a group of people who are moron or we are the moron because we allow these people to rule us. It is not right to think that this is something that happened 60 years ago, that it happened in another country or even that it has nothing to do with us. It’s just not right. Most of our occidental countries supported a war with the one excuse of avoiding future terrorist attacks. In order to contextualize all this, the number of civil casualties in Iraq, so far, is bigger than the number of casualties of all terrorist attacks in the history of Mankind. This is what one of the commanders we were talking about before would call an out of proportion response. Absurd, isn’t it?

As absurd as thinking that we are the good ones and the others are the bad ones. That power has corrupted them, but it would never happen to us. Look around you right now. This one or that one. Or that other one. Anyone would be able to press the red button if it were at hand. Not suddenly. First, it would be like a caress, a small decision that would not affect anybody’s life. But little by little, we would press the button harder, on behalf of the principle of common good and, blinded by power arrogance, we would cross a line with no turning point. The thin line that it is said (and well said), to be red. That’s why we cannot leave any button at anybody’s hand, not even ours; and that’s also why the leadership of countries and politicians is dead. We are tired of flags that embarrass us. We are tired of leaders that use a sack of ballots to impose the tyranny of the majority, because a lot of asses are still a lot of asses together.  The future is on cities’ and citizens’ hands. Yours, mine and our neighbours’. The people we know their faces, their shoe sizes, but not others. We don’t want them to impose anything to us. Let them go to hell but let us live alone and in peace. As the current mayor of Hiroshima said in one of his continuous declarations to claim the elimination of every nuclear weapon:

“Now the city governments are rising, and with them the citizens’ voices, to participate in international politics and end up with its immorality”

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