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ysabetwordsmithThis poem came out of the March 2, 2021 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired and sponsored by Anthony Barrette.
Warning for WWII historic atrocities, particularly the atomic bombing of Japan.
"The Names That Never Went Down in Infamy"
The arguments raged
through the night, but
in the end it was decided
that the war was already won
so there was no justification
to kill thousands of civilians
by bombing Japanese cities.
No Little Boy and Fat Man
became infamous, and
Colonel Paul W. Tibbets
Major Charles W. Sweeney
did not commit war crimes.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
never became horrors that
raised shivers like ghosts
passing over a grave.
The war went out with
a whimper instead of a bang.
Humanity heaved a sigh
of collective relief, feeling
that all of them had dodged
something worse than a bullet.
How much harder would it
have been if they'd had
to rebuild in the shadow
of monstrous destruction,
always wondering when
the next bomb could fall?
Civilization could have been
crushed under the weight
of strange new weapons.
Who knew what horrors
they might have unleashed
on an unsuspecting world,
even after the dust settled?
No, it was better that those
in command had learned from
the terrible, costly lessons
during World War I and
the ghastly hazards of gas.
Humanity had enough challenges
without building more of its own.
* * *
Notes:
The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have raised much debate. For various reasons, many people consider them unjustified war crimes. A war crime is any act that violates the law of war, such as purposely targeting civilians. The argument over whether to bomb Japan was fraught, and could easily have gone another way.
Warning for WWII historic atrocities, particularly the atomic bombing of Japan.
"The Names That Never Went Down in Infamy"
The arguments raged
through the night, but
in the end it was decided
that the war was already won
so there was no justification
to kill thousands of civilians
by bombing Japanese cities.
No Little Boy and Fat Man
became infamous, and
Colonel Paul W. Tibbets
Major Charles W. Sweeney
did not commit war crimes.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
never became horrors that
raised shivers like ghosts
passing over a grave.
The war went out with
a whimper instead of a bang.
Humanity heaved a sigh
of collective relief, feeling
that all of them had dodged
something worse than a bullet.
How much harder would it
have been if they'd had
to rebuild in the shadow
of monstrous destruction,
always wondering when
the next bomb could fall?
Civilization could have been
crushed under the weight
of strange new weapons.
Who knew what horrors
they might have unleashed
on an unsuspecting world,
even after the dust settled?
No, it was better that those
in command had learned from
the terrible, costly lessons
during World War I and
the ghastly hazards of gas.
Humanity had enough challenges
without building more of its own.
* * *
Notes:
The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have raised much debate. For various reasons, many people consider them unjustified war crimes. A war crime is any act that violates the law of war, such as purposely targeting civilians. The argument over whether to bomb Japan was fraught, and could easily have gone another way.
(no subject)
Date: 2021-03-08 12:56 am (UTC)The Marshall Plan was L-America's answer to that post-WWII.
We've just been through a war - three years of what the Brits would call "Phoney War" and then one that did involve violence - bullets, tear gas, tanks, the National Guard, etc...
My question to the Powers that Be is how do we wage peace?
They are at least trying to bring a few of the miscreants to justice, and they're stomping rather hard on the non-human enemy all of us face... but the reason Germany is the leader of the free world right now, and Japan is doing as well as it is, is because America helped. Companies like Sony, Siemens, Honda, and T-Mobile are world leaders because of Marshall. We need to do what we did back in the late '40's: Help the victims, Greenie and Trumpist alike, recover from their trauma, and make sure the leaders of the fascists are brought to justice, preferably a few of'em with heads on pikes. (Neither my partner - who is Jewish - nor I believes in capital punishment in L-America under the current circumstances for ordinary crimes. But when you have men who have committed half a million murders with pen and ink, and you have the goods on them?
Swing'em. Pour encourager les autres.
(no subject)
Date: 2021-03-08 07:37 am (UTC)Well ...
Date: 2021-03-08 08:02 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2021-03-08 08:03 am (UTC)There are large areas in France that are *still* barren and uninhabitable from weapons used in WWI. Some of it is unexploded ordnance, but mostly its chemical and heavy metal contamination.
And I do mean *barren*. Little plant life pretty much *no* animal life. and without major efforts it'll be centuries before they are livable again.
Compare that with Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Chernobyl. The first two were re-occupied quickly (perhaps a bit too quickly, but...). Chernobyl has a thriving ecosystem and most of it is safe to visit, though not yet for long term occupation.
Thoughts
Date: 2021-03-08 08:15 am (UTC)Fascinating. I've heard of some contamination, but I've also seen areas where the trenches and shell craters -- most of which remain -- have turned into rumpled greens dotted with little ponds.
Another serious issue is depleted uranium, which in ammunition form explodes into dust that is effectively impossible to clean up.
>>Compare that with Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Chernobyl. The first two were re-occupied quickly (perhaps a bit too quickly, but...). Chernobyl has a thriving ecosystem and most of it is safe to visit, though not yet for long term occupation.<<
Yeah, that was surprising. Most worlds, atomic sites are a lot more blighted.
On the bright side, it turns out that ecosystems can rebound astoundingly well and quickly if you just remove all the humans.
Re: Thoughts
Date: 2021-03-08 08:40 am (UTC)https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/zones-rouges
As for nuclear stuff, what most folks seem to forget (and various authors *never* seem to get right) is that the "high level" stuff is *by definition* short lived.
You have to think of radioactivity in terms of "counts per minute" (I forget the scientific term). IE how many decay events you get per second.
Just made a guess.... the units turn out to be the Curie and the Becquerel.
decay rate is inversely proportional to half-life. The shorter the half-life the more decays per second.
Long half-life stuff is only dangerous if it gets inside the body and *stays* there. Uranium oxide is pretty benign that way as it's pretty insoluble and non-reactive. Inhaling it as dust would be the major risk.
Anyway all those SF stories with areas still dangerous after centuries (or radioactive waste dumps being hazards after that long) are pure fantasy.
Pity, as a few of them had interesting settings (like the Big Burn in some of Norton's stories).
Chemical residues on the other hand have a half-life of infinity unless there's some simple path to neutralization *in nature*. Which is the problem in France. Too many sheltered spots where sunlight can't get at things, and pretty much no bacteria/fungi/etc that can metabolize them and can survive in the concentrations found.