The 70th Anniversary of the Hiroshima & Nagasaki A-bombings: Contradictions, Dangers and Opportunities - Joseph Gerson, Ph.D.

Excerpted from Dr. Joseph Gerson's address at the World Conference against A and H Bombs in Hiroshima, Japan on August 2, 2015

See the full text: http://www.commondreams.org/views/2015/07/31/our-70th-anniversary-homework-confronting-myths-and-learning-lessons-hiroshima-and

Friends, I am honored to return to the World Conference on this anniversary of the criminal and indiscriminate A-bombings.

With the development and use of nuclear weapons, humankind crossed the threshold in which all life is held hostage to those willing to inflict genocide, possibly omnicide, to protect their power and privilege. Since then, we’ve been more than lucky to survive nuclear blackmail, reckless dependence on deterrence, miscalculations and nuclear accidents.

Hibakusha, who have channeled their excruciating physical and emotional pain into the most powerful force for the abolition of these weapons of mass murder courageously warn us that human beings and nuclear weapons cannot coexist. And the Russell-Einstein Manifesto, like the poet Toge, instructs us to remember our humanity and forget the rest.


The Hibakusha’s influence was demonstrated again when they came to New York for the NPT Review Conference and the Peace and Planet Mobilization. Talks by Yamaguchi-san and Thurlow-san, were transforming events for many who joined us. And who could not be moved by the image of Hibakusha in their wheel chairs, making the trek to Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, where eight million abolition petition signatures were delivered to the Review Conference?

This anniversary is full of contradictions. Together, we have avoided nuclear war for seven decades, and we laid the foundations for 113 governments to sign the Humanitarian Pledge “to stigmatize, prohibit and eliminate nuclear weapons in light of their unacceptable humanitarian consequences and associated risks.” Recall Ambassador Kmentt’s participation in last year’s World Conference, and appreciate the profound impacts it had on him, and thus on the Austrian government and the world. With our work and the Pledge, we have widened the gap between the majority of the world’s nations and the nuclear powers, opening new opportunities to achieve a nuclear-weapons free world.

BUT, even as we support the diplomacy that prevailed in the nuclear deal with Iran, the promised “good faith” negotiations for nuclear weapons abolition have yet to begin. The double standard remains, with Washington and Moscow still having more than 90% of the world’s nearly 16,000 nuclear weapons. The US and Russia are again exchanging nuclear threats, increasing the dangers of miscalculations, echoing those that ignited WWI. We’re faced with a new era of U.S./NATO-Russian Cold War, increasingly militarized U.S./Japanese-Chinese competitive interdependence, Abe’s militarism, and the modernization of the nuclear arsenals and their delivery systems.

As we meet here, Peace and Planet activists are holding commemorative events across the US and internationally. Next will be September’s Peace Wave, led by Unfold Zero, and longer term planning to engage related movements.

Friends, as Daniel Ellsberg reminded us in New York, we are living on borrowed time in which human survival still hangs in the balance. On this anniversary, here in Hiroshima and in the presence of Hibakusha, let us deepen our resolve to do all in our power to ensure Never Again to Anyone, that there are No More Hiroshimas. No More Nagasakis. No More Nuclear Weapons. And No More War.

Domo Arrigato.

Presentation of 7 million signatures to UN Rep. Angela Kane in New York 

April 2015 Peace and Planet Mobilization

photo by Kyle Depew