68th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

No more Hiroshimas! No more Nagasakis!

August 6 and August 9 this year marked the 68th anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively. On the morning of August 6, 1945, US military aircraft dropped an atom bomb that exploded above the Japanese city of Hiroshima killing about 140,000 people in the initial blast, and in total more than 237,000.

No more Hiroshimas! No more Nagasakis!

August 6 and August 9 this year marked the 68th anniversary of the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively. On the morning of August 6, 1945, US military aircraft dropped an atom bomb that exploded above the Japanese city of Hiroshima killing about 140,000 people in the initial blast, and in total more than 237,000. Three days after the Hiroshima bombing, they dropped another atomic bomb on the southern Japanese city of Nagasaki which resulted in the deaths of more than 70,000 people. The radiation after effects of the nuclear holocaust has haunted generations of Japanese people, causing early death, diseases like cancer and severe disabilities, to millions of people from generation to generation.

These bombs which caused such immense loss of life were dropped by the US when it was already clear that Japan had lost in World War II and was expected to surrender any day. The war in Europe ended when Nazi Germany signed its instrument of surrender on 8 May, 1945. It had been agreed between the allies that the Soviet Union would enter the war against Japan three months after the defeat of Nazi Germany in Europe, and the Soviet Union did so. Discussions on the terms of surrender of Japan had already begun between the Allied Forces and the Japanese government. What was the message that the US was sending by using these nuclear weapons, and to whom was it being addressed?

The Soviet Union led by Stalin had already emerged as the leading force for liberation and peace in the War, losing more than 20 million of its best sons and daughters in this struggle. The peoples languishing under the jackboots of the German and Japanese fascists had fought heroically for freedom and liberation. In Europe and Asia, the defeat of German and Japanese fascism was giving boost to the anti fascist, anti imperialist, anti colonial liberation struggle of the peoples.

By dropping the nuclear bombs on Japan, US imperialism was sending a warning that it could and would surpass the German and Japanese fascists in terms of carrying out mass slaughter of innocent civilians, in the pursuit of its aims. It was sending a message that fascist Germany, Italy and Japan may be defeated, but fascism would be kept alive. US imperialism had taken over the mantle of fascism from these defeated powers.

The dropping of the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were a direct warning to the Soviet Union, and to all communists, anti fascists, anti imperialists, and fighters for national liberation in Asia, Europe and other continents that US imperialism, assuming the leadership of the camp of imperialism and reaction, would stop at no crime, no barbarism, to prevent the victory of revolution and national liberation anywhere in the world.

In the last 68 years, the US imperialists have launched innumerable wars of aggression, from Korea to Vietnam, from Afghanistan to Iraq. They have toppled scores of governments and set up pliant regimes in countries ranging from Iran to Chile. Today, the imperialists led by the US violate the sovereignty of countries like Pakistan and Somalia with impunity, sending drones to kill at will that result in the deaths of thousands of people. US imperialism has assumed for itself the right to launch “pre-emptive nuclear strikes” against any nation or people as it has threatened to do against Iran and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea), countries which are waging a determined struggle for their right to exist with a social and political system of their own choice.

Sixty eight years after the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the threat of a nuclear holocaust that would annihilate all of humanity remains a grim reality. The US imperialists continue to be the leader in producing, selling and stockpiling nuclear weapons capable of wiping out the entire planet many times over. At the same time, using brazen double standards, it denies certain countries such as Iran and North Korea, which face the brunt of its aggression and blackmail, the right to have their own nuclear weapons for defensive purposes or even develop nuclear energy of any kind. On the other hand, it encourages openly terrorist states like Israel to build up their nuclear stockpile. It threatens and invades some countries under the false pretext that they possess “weapons of mass destruction”, while itself being the biggest possessor and purveyor of weapons of mass destruction.

August 6 and August 9 have now become days to commemorate those who were killed in these horrendous acts of terrorism by the US imperialists and to express the collective determination of the peoples of the world to never again permit such crimes against humanity.

The peoples fighting for a nuclear free world and for peace on the planet must unite and block the aggressive wars that have been and are being launched by US imperialism and its allies on one pretext or another. Imperialism is the source of wars and mass destruction, and it is only by fighting to defeat the imperialists and working to overthrow the capitalist imperialist system that we can ensure lasting peace.

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