It's a bit unclear to me why you need an organization that advocates against nuclear weapons. I'd argue the “nuclear taboo” is just the product of.. I don't just seeing one nuclear test video? It doesn't take the cataloging of witness testimony to see it's terror (though that may be important in its own right)
I'm not intimately familiar with Japanese self-perceptions - but from the outside it seems like post-WW2 the country really leaned into a view that "nuclear weapons are terrible" to the point of distraction - instead of a more self-reflective "nationalism is terrible" or something along those lines. There seems to be much less anxiety about preventing getting into a similar situations that triggered WW2: neo-colonial military bullying and domination of neighbors, xenaphobic oppression of ethnic groups, sycophantic following of cultural leaders etc. and an intense worry about the more tangeable use of nuclear weapons - which I'd argue is something that even if it were to come to pass would almost certainly never involve the Japanese people.
I wonder how this seeming diversion of public attention is perceived in Japan itself.
As I understand it, the anti-nationalist narrative was repressed due to anti-communist agendas of the occupation forces (ex: freeing of nationalist war criminals)
Would be curious to hear from anyone Japanese on the topic
The general human tendency to focus on single short term events seems to be the main cause.
Let's compare using Wikipedia as a source:
Atomic bombings in Japan:
50,000–246,000 casualties.
Air Raids in Japan:
241,000–900,000 killed,
213,000–1,300,000 wounded,
8,500,000 rendered homeless.
Mass killings of large civilian populations should not happen. I don't personally see nuclear weapons as worse than incendiary bombs or artillery. It's the number of casualties that makes it horrible.
* one early bomb is more or less equivilant to one conventional HE + incendiary raid.
* 2,000+ other bombs have since been detonated, a good number of which were orders of magnitudes more destructive than the early "first gen" bombs used on Japan.
Nuclear war with the larger weapons that followed would be considerably worse than incendiary bombs, in physical destruction, in immediate deaths, and in injuries and following mortalities.
I agree. I've been to the Hiroshima Peace Park or whatever it's called in English numerous times, but I can't say I've been anymore moved by it than any other demonstration of human brutality.
I can't register a difference between a nuclear bomb and, say, a GBU-12 Paveway conventional bomb. They both destroy and kill brutally, the magnitude is irrelevant and it would be great if we never have to use either of them.
I'm Japanese-American, so I can throw two cents in your hat.
Post-war Japan is against nuclear weapons to an absolute, but it must be admitted that the response to nukes in particular is just as much a kneejerk reaction. NHK literally spams the entirety of August with anti-nuclear propaganda every year. Japan's anti-nuclear stance is also hypocritically at odds with relying on the US nuclear umbrella for national security.
More rationally, post-war Japan is against wars of any and all kinds to an absolute. This goes as far as refusing to defend the US in the event of an attack on the US-Japan alliance; this was only changed recently in the last decade or so after strong pressure from the US to reciprocate the US's defense commitments to Japan.
Nationalism is a... complex topic. You will be considered a crazy person if you wave the Japanese flag or put up a flagpole on or around your house, but at the same time loyalty and reverence to the Emperor still remains strong and the country is politically and culturally very conservative/liberal with a very interesting mix of individualism and conformity. Most Japanese ex-pats actually leave Japan because they are more progressive and can't stand the conservative culture.
Japan is actually quite welcoming of foreigners, but there is a hard gentlemen's agreement that if you're in Japan you do as the Japanese do. Those who can adapt are welcomed, those who can't/don't are excluded and ejected sooner or later.
The Hiroshima museum, while advocating for a nuclear free world, has an interesting take on why the US dropped the bomb on them.
According to them, the US dropped the bomb because they wanted to show their strengths against the Soviets. It makes little to no mention of the bloody battles in the Pacific.
> instead of a more self-reflective "nationalism is terrible" or something along those lines.
It used to bother me a lot, until I realized that
- the US purposefully left the Emperor in place with only a slap on the fingers ("you're not a god anymore...except for those who still believe you are")
- all surrounding countries have incentives to to keep distances from Japan (in particular as long as the US are there, Japan and China will never be allies, same for Russia), Taiwan being the exception.
I see no future where Japan nationalism is truly solved, short of these two things also getting solved. And boy is there no end in sight to this.
>the US purposefully left the Emperor in place with only a slap on the fingers
This was a deliberate political decision in an effort to not repeat the grave mistake of how post-WW1 Germany was handled which essentially led to WW2. Denying Japan of their identity and dignity would have risked an eventual WW3, and the US did not want to even entertain the possibility.
It also didn't help that practically all of Japan were not going to see their Emperor deposed or worse; Japan was willing to compromise on literally everything but the Emperor in making peace with the US and the west, and the extended Imperial family along with all the other nobles thereof lost their titles and powers in the post-war occupation and restructuring.
I think we're mostly in agreement. It was a strategic move and it might have helped a lot letting Japan get back on its feet. And it's also the move that left the deep deep nationalism in place and it's still here today.
Perhaps there was no way to have one without the other, but at least I want to look at it as a series of cause and consequences.
Crazy popular anime girl representations of WW2 battleships is the most funniest form of that reality IMHO.
> I'd argue the “nuclear taboo” is just the product of.. I don't just seeing one nuclear test video?
And yet some high ranking military planers were seriously pushing for employing nuclear weapons in Vietnam. Do you think they just haven't seen any nuclear test videos?
> It's a bit unclear to me why you need an organization that advocates against nuclear weapons.
Because humans keep building, and fielding nuclear weapons. Not sure where you live, but chances are good your taxes are used to build, and maintain nuclear weapons and the means to carry them.
I'm not intimately familiar with Japanese self-perceptions - but from the outside it seems like post-WW2 the country really leaned into a view that "nuclear weapons are terrible" to the point of distraction - instead of a more self-reflective "nationalism is terrible" or something along those lines. There seems to be much less anxiety about preventing getting into a similar situations that triggered WW2: neo-colonial military bullying and domination of neighbors, xenaphobic oppression of ethnic groups, sycophantic following of cultural leaders etc. and an intense worry about the more tangeable use of nuclear weapons - which I'd argue is something that even if it were to come to pass would almost certainly never involve the Japanese people.
I wonder how this seeming diversion of public attention is perceived in Japan itself.
As I understand it, the anti-nationalist narrative was repressed due to anti-communist agendas of the occupation forces (ex: freeing of nationalist war criminals)
Would be curious to hear from anyone Japanese on the topic