Little Boy And Fat Man

A title as funny as they’re made, if you ask me. But the fun stops right here. These are the names of the first and only nuclear weapons to have ever been employed. During the Second World War, Japan was proving to be troublesome for the US of A. Their industry blooming rapidly, a remarkably effective work-force, and uniquely efficient-work ethics; this should actually be a matter of surprise, that the people of the rising sun were targeted even as late as they were. Japan wasn't quite aware of the fact, but they were to soon meet the Little Boy and the Fat Man.
They are a proud people, the Japanese are, even considering how most would have very willingly gutted themselves rather than be humiliated, in a ritual now mercifully obsolete. During what was very soon to be an overture to the conclusion of the Second World War, the Allied Forces met at the Potsdam Conference to decide how to suitably administer the most fitting punishment to Nazi Germany, then having surrendered only recently.
Japan, however, refused to accept the terms and conditions as established at Potsdam, and this was considered political sacrilege by the Allies, so they decided to deliver a lesson to the effect of what might have seemed like tactical international diplomacy.

August 6, 1945 – the citizens of Hiroshima wake up to the white man’s version of a home made apocalypse. An army plane bizarrely named Enola Gay drops a nuclear fission-type bomb, with the blast equivalent to about 13000 metric tons of TNT. Around 12 square kilometres of the city was destroyed, and nearly 80000 people killed immediately. In the years to follow, many more would succumb to their injuries and to the radiation, by 1950 this figure would be totalled at about 200000.
August 9, 1945 – the citizens of Nagasaki have been mourning the losses in Hiroshima as the last nuclear bomb to be ever dropped flies towards their city. The blast is equivalent to about 21000 metric tons of TNT. The city is shielded from the worst of the blast by the hills surrounding the hypocentre, and yet, about 40000 people died immediately. Just as many succumb in the following years, bringing the total nearer to 80000.
September 2, 1945 – Japan surrenders to the Allied Forces. This marks the official end of the second and last World War.

Sixty four years since, and very few have been able to justify the attacks on Japan. Which shouldn’t be any different, no one deserves to justify nuclear war. Soon after the tragedy, a memorial was constructed for the victims and survivors. The words inscribed on one of the sculptures urge the victims to rest in peace, for the mistake shall not be repeated.
Tragically, ever since the incident bombs with quite more than 40 times the capacity have been designed and stocked. Particular nations still expect to be ruling the roost, and all by the potential support of their nuclear arsenals. Treaties have been signed, promises made and broken – but the fear and the excess that comes with nuclear warfare is still alive.
I can only hope, and for the better of a society we have to live in, that the mistake will not be repeated. Much as I regret to say this, but if such a mistake were repeated then absolutely nobody would be left to offer, and maybe thereafter acknowledge, the barest semblance of an apology.


By:
Sarthak Prakash