In John Hersey’s Hiroshima
he starts out being very specific to the location and the actions of the six
main characters on the morning of August 6. The story continues with what the
characters experienced the day of the bombings and what they lost after the
bombing. The story “humanizes” the Japanese and gives the reader a sense of sympathy
for what the people endured.
After I read Hiroshima
I did feel bad, briefly for the Japanese and what they went through, but that
subsided quickly when I remembered that they were our enemy and they attacked
the United States first. People can make the argument that the citizens of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were innocent civilians; in war there is no such thing.
If they pay taxes and support the warring government they are directly or
indirectly supporting their nation’s war effort. Carl Von Clausewitz the author
of On War describes how in order to
defeat an enemy you need to break their will to fight. This is ultimately achieved
by bombing cities and destroying infrastructure, while causing mass casualties.
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