"me no big chief …

[continuing from – Hiroshima …

At Hiroshima,
Japan had learnt of America’s destructive powers.
A city with a third of its population had been vapourised,
while another third were injuried, burnt and were soon to die.

One Hiroshima was not going to win a War, if the sole aim of America
was to terrify the people of Japan, they had certainly achieved it.

Then why did they plan to drop further bombs?
Did they really believe that another Hiroshima was necessary?
And another, and another, and another, and another, and another…
till Japan surrendered or till Japan ceased to exist?

For there is documentary evidence that the intentions were
to drop more atomic bombs as soon as other bombs were made ready for use.

AFTER Hiroshima,
warning leaflets had been dropped
on cities in Japan warning civilians about further attacks with the atomic bomb.

These were the words on the leaflets dropped on August 6, 1945
Source: Harry S. Truman Library,
Miscellaneous historical document file, no. 258.

Leaflet No: 1

TO THE JAPANESE PEOPLE:

America asks that you take immediate heed of what we say on this leaflet.

We are in possession of the most destructive explosive ever devised by man. A single one of our newly developed atomic bombs is actually the equivalent in explosive power to what 2000 of our giant B-29s can carry on a single mission. This awful fact is one for you to ponder and we solemnly assure you it is grimly accurate.

We have just begun to use this weapon against your homeland. If you still have any doubt, make inquiry as to what happened to Hiroshima when just one atomic bomb fell on that city.

Before using this bomb to destroy every resource of the military by which they are prolonging this useless war, we ask that you now petition the Emperor to end the war. Our president has outlined for you the thirteen consequences of an honorable surrender. We urge that you accept these consequences and begin the work of building a new, better and peace-loving Japan.

You should take steps now to cease military resistance. Otherwise, we shall resolutely employ this bomb and all our other superior weapons to promptly and forcefully end the war.

EVACUATE YOUR CITIES.

These warnings never reached the people of Hiroshima, it was never intended to,
to cause maximum shock and awe America deliberately killed civilians without warning.

A new form of warfare, the likes of which were never seen before,
was being used to achieving rapid dominance.

Leaflet No: 2

ATTENTION JAPANESE PEOPLE – EVACUATE YOUR CITIES.

Because your military leaders have rejected the thirteen part surrender declaration, two momentous events have occurred in the last few days.

The Soviet Union, because of this rejection on the part of the military has notified your Ambassador Sato that it has declared war on your nation. Thus, all powerful countries of the world are now at war with you.

Also, because of your leaders’ refusal to accept the surrender declaration that would enable Japan to honorably end this useless war, we have employed our atomic bomb.

A single one of our newly developed atomic bombs is actually the equivalent in explosive power to what 2000 of our giant B-29s could have carried on a single mission. Radio Tokyo has told you that with the first use of this weapon of total destruction, Hiroshima was virtually destroyed.

Before we use this bomb again and again to destroy every resource of the military by which they are prolonging this useless war, petition the emperor now to end the war. Our president has outlined for you the thirteen consequences of an honorable surrender. We urge that you accept these consequences and begin the work of building a new, better, and peace-loving Japan.

Act at once or we shall resolutely employ this bomb and all our other superior weapons to promptly and forcefully end the war.

EVACUATE YOUR CITIES.

Operation Downfall,
the allied invasion of Japan wasn’t due till November 1945; yet,
after Hiroshima, the Japanese people had been given only two days
to force their rulers to surrender, or they faced certain death by incineration.

These were innocent civilians, being told of a certain and horrifying death,
if their leaders did not comply with the American wishes.
What was the rush to drop the second bomb?

Other than the military uniforms, where is the difference
between the American’s terrorising actions on Japanese civilians of 1945
and the two fatwas of Mr Bin Laden of 1996 and 1998?

The United States has defined terrorism under the Federal Criminal Code.

Section 2331. Definitions:
As used in this chapter –
(1) the term “international terrorism” means activities that –
(A) involve violent acts or acts dangerous to human life …;
(B) appear to be intended –
(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;
(ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or
(iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and

In 1945, whatever was the desired outcome,
whatever was the justifications for dropping these bombs,
America had terrorised and killed hundreds and thousands of innocent civilians.
America has done it all before.

Nagasaki

Did not receive any warnings,
Their death sentence had been signed,
62 years ago today, Nagasaki was already
a dead city…..living on borrowed time, borrowed until tomorrow…

AmericaWWIIHistoryAtomic BombHiroshimaWar crime

… continued as – Nagasaki]

[continuation of – today, 62 years ago …

August 4

this building was a prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall.

Till…

August 5:

23:15:17 GMT; (08:15:17 JST, Hiroshima, Japan; August 6.)

A thumb of a man on an aircraft, well and safely hidden behind clouds
pressed on a button that opened a door to drop destruction; like never seen before.

In an instant
that was just 43 seconds,
a city was gone, totally destroyed; and our world had been changed.
The gates of hell had been opened on earth for us, for the rest of our living history.

That aircraft had dropped a bomb, mere 5 tons of weight,
but packing the devastating power of 15 thousand tons of TNT.
It had been intentionally, brutally set to detonate before hitting ground
for maximum effect, so that no one and nothing could escape in hollows or trenches.

It exploded 580 meters
above the dome of the Industrial Promotion Hall of Hiroshima, Japan.

Raising a mushroom cloud, 8 miles high,
visible to the tailgunner of Enola Gay, the fleeing aircraft from 350 miles away.

The building survived, just by being directly below the ‘hypocenter’ of the explosion.
But in that same instant, the rest of the city was reduced to rubble.

The radius of total destruction was about 1.6 km (1 mile),
with resulting fires across 11.4 km² (4.4 square miles).
Approximately 69% of the city’s buildings were completely destroyed,
and 6.6 percent severely damaged.

It was estimated approximately 70,000 people
were instantaniously vapourised and another 70,000 were injured and burnt.

[an estimated 90,000 was dead within two months,
Unborn babies died or were born with deformities.
and more people continued to die from radiation related illnesses.]

August 6

15:15 GMT
President Truman in his address to his nation:

“Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese army base.
That bomb had more power than 20,000 tons of TNT.
… It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe… What has been done is the greatest achievement of organized science in history. . . .”

Only a psychopathic murderer
could call such an act as the greatest achievement in the history of science.

While these were the unspoken thoughts of
J. Robert Oppenheimer, the ‘scientist’ who made the atomic bomb possible,

We knew the world would not be the same. A few people laughed, a few people cried, most people were silent. I remembered the line from the Hindu scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita. Vishnu is trying to persuade the Prince that he should do his duty and to impress him takes on his multi-armed form and says, ‘Now, I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds.‘ I suppose we all thought that one way or another.

After Hiroshima, President Truman promised more,

“If they do not now accept our terms,
they may expect a rain of ruin from the air
the likes of which has never been seen on this earth.”

That was just the “Little Boy“, the “Fat Man” was still waiting.
the $2 billion spent in their development had to be justified,
for President Truman, there had to be more,
Europe had inconveniently ended.
and 70,000 was never enough,
there had to be a Nagasaki…

That barbaric act of destruction of civilians of Hiroshima was accepted as legal,
just because the bomb was dropped from a military aircraft,
and by personnel in military uniforms.
Had it been civilian aircrafts
and by persons in civilian clothes,
it would have been “terrorism”, and not war, regardless of the desired outcome.

62 years ago, today, a new era of combat and warfare had been defined.

It was the birth of pre-emptive strikes on a a distant enemy to force a surrender.
America had to occupy Japan, before the Russians walked in, but were scared to invade.

No longer were wars going to be won by courage, bravery or hardships of
the soldiers living in muddy trenches or crawling through minefields,
or charging out in the face of enemy cannons and rifle fire.

Wars were now for cowards,
who have the money and resources to build
weapons that were capable of destroying masses in instants
and dropping them from the safety of distant missile launchers and stealth bombers.
Who promises to use the same bomb on anyone else who dares to develop their own.

The story ain’t over, there was, and is, more to come...

The Genbaku Dome has been preserved as the Hiroshima War Memorial

AmericaWWIIHistoryAtomic BombHiroshimaWar crime

… continued as – after Hiroshima]

August 4

this building was a prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall.

The story was yet to be written…

… – the following day]

twenty minutes
later the linen finally got changed.
twenty minutes
interrupted by a very helpful assistent,
whose sole intention was to grab it all and make a cosy bed for himself.

this is a one who just hates
being covered over by anything and will
usually fight himself free within two shakes of his tail.

so he was left to enjoy,
his proudly acquired
possessions.

with a sheet
thrown over him
and tucked for good measure,
expecting him to toss it aside
and forgotten in seconds.

“fustle rustle rustle rustle rustle”
( “it will not be so easy”) muttered he to himself…

fifteen minutes later
he was found enjoying a siesta!!

dogspetsfriendslifeRuff

On a September,
way back in the when
Three college friends and I,
on an impulsively adventurous mood
decided to walk in the mighty Himalayas,
breathe in the free fresh mountain breeze,
see the breathtaking views, do all those sort of wildy things.

This was from way back,
before trekking became ‘cool’.
Were we prepared? Of course we weren’t.
And did we care, no we didn’t. We were young,
the world was waiting; to boldy go, to seek, to explore.
We borrowed kits and garb that would make any museum proud,
and one morning with our vintage rucksacks slung across our back, we were off,
secure with a hand drawn map, an interpretation of someone’s travel log from years ago.

Out of breath, sweaty, thirsty, stiff with pain,
cursing ourselves for self inflicted torture, we soon lost our way.
There was no one to ask; to backtrack would have been back breaking
We plodded on and ended up miles away from where we should have been.
We were rewarded for our ‘misguided’ efforts with an amazing circular rainbow.
Was near day’s end, we ended up beside a lake, a lake like we had never seen before.

The water was dark, serenely quiet, unrippled and clearer than crystal.
It was almost completely hidden from view by a forest of mature trees.
There were no other soul around, the silence was palpable with fingertips.
There was a tiny wooden hut, about twenty yards from the nearest bank,
with couple of tree trunks laid across the marshy edge to gingerly walk across.

We had heard about the lake from the local people at the start of the journey.

Khecheopalri Lake:

aka Khechiperi Lake (the wishing lake);
West Sikkim district of the Indian state of Sikkim.
It is situated amidst an untouched forest at an altitude of approx. 5600ft. It is a holy lake to both the Buddhists and the Hindus of the region and beyond. It was said that wish made at the monastery on the lake side, would have it come true.

The clear lake water is used for rites and rituals only, and the water is kept clean around the year by the waterbirds, that pick up any leaves that falls into the lake. A fair at Khecheopalri lake takes place during the month of March every year, when a large number of local pilgrims visit the lake and the monastery, “Butter Lamp Festival” involves floating of butter lamps on the lake.

That tiny little hut was the gumpha! a buddhist monastery.
On a tiny pedestal sat an even tinier image of Buddha, peaceful in his loneliness.
A dhoop was burning; someone had left a few dhoops with a packet of matchsticks.
We lit a dhoop and made our wishes; (I try to remember, what could I have wished for?)
We stayed there for a while, lost in our thoughts, reluctant to disturb the silence
before moving on to find a place to camp for the night.

At some point during that trip I had fallen in love with the Himalayas,
returning to her, whenever I had time (and money that could only buy shoestrings)
but I have been to some amazing beautiful places, where very few people had ever been.
I had to leave behind my beautiful Himalayas, and came away with just the memories
of the places I loved to visit for peace, to escape from the city.

I read today,

ENVIS Centre Sikkim on Eco-tourism
The influx of tourists (to the Khecheopalri Lake) is high with visible impact of disturbance on the lake and its watershed. Beside visitors, there are 72 households and 440 people are now living near it and exploit the natural resources of the lake watershed by extraction of fuel, fodder and timber and by livestock grazing.

National Geographic
You can do both (eat and stay) at the Khecheopalri Trekkers Hut, Located 656 feet (200 meters) from Khecheopalri Lake. Which has cheap dorm beds and private rooms (with communal bathrooms) that are clean and comfortable.
The owners are helpful, and meals are available. A few simple snack stalls line the lake itself.

The tiny gumpha and its rickety walkway is gone, we now have
a majestic monastery, with prayerflags and wheels and a ‘boardwalk’!
a Trekker’s hut only a stone’s throwaway, snack stalls lining the lake’s shores.

Probably that ethereal peace that we had experienced is also gone; lost forever.

It is said, time heals everything, but Time also destroys.
It is destroying the Himalayas as I once knew, scarring her forever.
Tourism has touched all my favourite places, and changed them beyond recognition.
Organised treks have made the inaccessable easy to trample upon, to dig, tear or burn.

I consider myself lucky to have seen the Himalayas beautiful in an untouched desolation.

HimalayasSikkimIndiamemoriestourismenvironment