This Hiroshima Day, we are closer than ever to nuclear war
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Adding to this, The atrocity not only killed hundreds of thousands instantly and condemned many more to painful, lingering deaths. It took the world into the atomic age: one in which wars, already hugely more destructive than in previous eras thanks to industrialisation, could plausibly spell the end of human civilisation itself.
Meanwhile, Three days after Hiroshima the US dropped a second atom bomb on Nagasaki.
Notably, That remains the last time a nuclear weapon was used in conflict. Decades of testing followed, many of which would claim their own victims through radiation poisoning and the resulting cancers, in some cases over multiple generations. But the horror of nuclear war that grew from the radioactive ruins of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has proved strong enough to prevent a repeat performance — so far.
As per the latest buzz, That situation is changing. There is no room for complacency — the Doomsday Clock, standing at its closest ever, 85 seconds, to midnight, accurately reflects a world in which nuclear weapons are closer to being used than at any time since 1945.
In further updates, Even avoiding nuclear war to date has been a chancier thing than most accounts recognise. When rival camps are armed to the teeth, suspicion and misinterpretation can be the path to catastrophe.
On top of that, World War III was avoided during the Cuban Missile Crisis not just because the Soviet and US governments agreed an off-ramp, but because a Soviet submarine officer, Vasili Arkhipov , defied the vessel’s captain and political officer, who believed depth charges dropped on it by US warships signalled the outbreak of war, and refused permission to launch a nuclear torpedo in retaliation.
Two decades later, the caution of another Soviet officer, Stanislav Petrov, again prevented war when the country’s early warning system malfunctioned, indicating incoming US missiles that could have prompted retaliatory strikes.