No governments innocent in war

The Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary defines “atrocity” thus: “when anybody does anything extremely violent and shocking”. 

Any bombing of a civilian population is an atrocity. In terms of severity, Hiroshima must be pretty high on the list. Nagasaki was totally unnecessary. A leaflet drop over Tokyo saying “You are next” would have done.

The Japanese also committed atrocities during the war, as did the Germans and the British. The 3,000-bomber raids on the civilian population of Bremen in June 1942 did nothing to shorten the war. During the Battle of Britain, Hitler was hitting strategic targets that employed civilians. (The Hawker aircraft factory, which was being attacked the night I was born, was one such target. Fortunately a midwife who had been bombed out of her house was staying with us.) In August 1940 a German plane dropped bombs on London by mistake. British retaliation on Berlin led to the Blitz, a German atrocity.

The 9/11 World Trade Centre attack was a minor atrocity by comparison, and retaliation has cost thousands of lives around the world. One development of George W Bush’s “War on Terror” now coming to the fore is the re-militarisation of Japan.

Richard Bowler