Japan and America: Different Perspectives to the Same End

With the dropping of the atomic bombs on Japan, the war seemed to be at an end. Soon after, the Japanese government signed a peace treaty and surrendered to the United States. America then took up the task of rebuilding Japan, beginning with setting up a new, democratic government that would allowJapan to grow and flourish into a peaceful state. But this is not the whole story. Americans like to see ourselves as the overall victors. We were the ones who picked everyone up and got the world going again after the bloody conflict. The problem is that as we did this, we also forget our role in the eyes of the Japanese, especially to the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that were either vaporized, dying of radiation poisoning, or were trying to rebuild themselves with little to no outside help. This goes to show that between America and within Japan itself, the story of the final days of the war and the years after were different. I want to look first at the first-hand accounts of the events of the bombings and then how people and the governments of both countries try to keep this bit of history alive in the minds of the present, even if they sometimes choose what is to be shown or not shown.

With events like the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, first-hand accounts are very important for getting a sense of what really was happening.  By using A Doctor’s Diary of Hiroshima, Fifty Years Later by John W. Dower, which is based on Hiroshima Diary by Hachiya Michihiko, we see the bombing through the eyes of a citizen of Japan who also tries to save lives after the disaster. Dower writes his section of Michihiko, author of the original book,  a survivor of the blast, and doctor in the hospital to treat the wounded and the sick. Dower uses both the American and Mushihiko’s experience of the bombing as a way of understanding both sides of the story. Simply,  America sees the bombing as good,  that it ended the war quickly and efficiently. The doctor writes his story or history as a survivor account much like many other writers of this time through World War 2.  He starts out stating what he and visitors have seen, followed by the actions that were taken to help the living. He also talks about the emperor choosing to surrender, almost questioning this decision due to his indoctrinated in the ways of believing in the god-like emperor.  Later, this belief becomes contempt for the Japanese leadership as time goes by and Japan must pick itself up from its defeated position. Funny thing is, this contempt did not extend to America. The Doctor even said, “I felt we had nothing to worry about because westerners were a cultured people, not given to pilfering and marauding (pg.169).” The doctor even goes as far as calling them “citizens of a great country.” This difference in opinion even spreads down further into politics later in the twentieth century. In America, the Smithsonian tried to show the terror of the Japanese and their suffering by showing an exhibit with the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped both atomic bombs on the Japanese mainland and providing pictures and information on the bomb’s effects. However, the American government chose to make the museum show that they brought the war to a “merciful” end rather than the devastation that was required to end it (pg.164). This was the way the government felt that not only the plane but the people involved should be remembered, as heroes and not slaughters. Thanks to the help of Dr. Hachiy’s and many others accounts, history was able to prove Japan did suffer from the bombs and that this win for America was both “merciful and merciless” due to their moral ambiguity (pg.164), making this idea more available to the public.

On the other side of the debate,  Japan also had to wrestle with the idea of the bombs and their aftermath on the country’s growth after the war. Through David Serlin’sReconstructing the Hiroshima Maidens, we hear the stories of how Japan faced this past and used it as a way to engage with the world. One story Sterlin uses is Japanese American Isamu Noguchi, a sculptor who decorated bridges and made statues to honor the dead of Hiroshima. In one attempt, he proposed to make a new cenotaph in the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park stating,”[The centaph] was to be the place of solace to the bereaved-suggestive still further of the womb of generations still unborn who would replace the dead” (pg.57). But the heads of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park would not let an American put up a monument to Hiroshima destruction (pg.58), or so Noguchi thought. Another story, the main story of this article, was of  Revered Kiyoshi Tanimoto who wanted to bring a group of women who were disfigured by the blast to America for Platic surgery (pg.59). Unlike Noguchi, Tanimoto’s plans were approved and they all received the surgeries, the last of which was in 1956 After their recovery, they were free to return to their lives and live with their families (pg.60). So, how are these stories connected? Well, both used different strategies that were devised by citizens of Japan and the US to memorialize and ultimately repair the physical and psychic damage done to Hiroshima and its citizens by the atomic bomb (pg.60). In the end, all of these quests and ideas to be approved by the Japanese and American governments. They controlled what the country could see and feel from the public works, such as Tanimoto’s cenotaph so that everyone had similar experiences. For example, the reason the cenotaph was not placed in the park, even though the monument would have been a great addition, is because it did not give off the right idea that country wanted to portray to the world. Japan’s culture was to seek meaning in the aftermath of trauma (pg.60). In other words, the maidens were approved because the symbolized an idea of getting over our scares and taking the future back, while the cenotaph would have immortalized the dead for the hopes of the living, but was also a symbol of what happened and not what was going to happen. The forward facing idea was to help Japan pick itself up without overly worrying about the past. It was their way to move on, even though this also meant trying to forget what was happened in the past.

With both of these examples, we see the ideas that both the United States and Japan wanted to portray to the world. As historians and citizens of the world, we also deserve more of full story to what happened to the people directly affected and how the countries used this as their way of bouncing back after years of war. As Americans, we must remember that even though America found a quick solution to the end of World War 2, that solution brought suffering and death to many people. This also goes with Japan in that they cannot forget the past by just looking at the future. They must also remember what was done to their country and move on. So, even though the world wants to forget the suffering and just remember the victory, we must also remember the sacrifices that came with it.