A video extract from this event is now available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOHFxsfvYcE
The arguments today about Hiroshima and Nagasaki miss the most important facts about Allied decision-making in mid-1945. Britain's wartime leader, Winston Churchill, believed - in mid-1945 - that the Second World War could be ended without the use of the atomic bomb. At the urging of US and British military commanders, Churchill lobbied the US president, Harry Truman, to try other methods which he thought could end the Pacific War.
The nuclear terror attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not a last resort, and they were not needed to avoid a costly land invasion of Japan – that was the opinion of Churchill, British and US military leaders, and almost all senior US government officials. Truman rejected their advice in order to have the opportunity to demonstrate the power of the ultimate weapon, in US hands.
Milan Rai, Peace News editor and author of Chomsky's Politics (Verso, 1995)
Join this online Zoom event at 7pm (UK) on 1 August to explore these little-known facts with PN editor Milan Rai.
Registration: www.tinyurl.com/peacenews4039