On 9 August (tomorrow) 2015, it will be 70 years since the US dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, killing 39,000–80,000 people.
3 days previously, they had dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima killing 90,000–166,000 people.
Most people, mainly civilians, died on the the days of the bombings, but many died in the following days, months and years from burns, radiations sickness and malnutrition.
These actions were taken in order to avoid a ground invasion that, no doubt, would have cost many more lives and prolonged that dreadful war.
On 16th August 1945 Japan surrendered to the allies. On 2nd September they signed the 'instrument of surrender' bringing World War 2 to an end.
This is a moment to recall the vast loss of life that war brings. Let's thank God for the peace that we enjoy and pray, where war-torn regions come to time, pray for peace and an end to suffering.
Here are some words from the book 'unbroken' about this period,
'From the top of Japan
to the bottom, trains packed with POWs snaked toward Yokohama. Men pressed
their faces to the windows to catch their first glimpse of what all of those
B-29s had done. Once-grand cities were now flat, black stains, their only
recognizable feature a gridwork of burned roads, passing nothing, leading
nowhere. At the first sight of the destruction of their enemy, the POWs
cheered. But after the first city there was another, then another, city after
city razed, the survivors drifting about like specters, picking through the
rubble. The cheering died away. On Louie’s train, the silence came as they
passed through Tokyo. A week after Louie had left Omori, sixteen square miles
of Tokyo, and tens of thousands of souls, had been immolated by B-29s. A few of
the trains slipped past Hiroshima. Virtually every POW believed that the
destruction of this city had saved them from execution. John Falconer, a
survivor of the Bataan Death March, looked out as Hiroshima neared. “First
there were trees,” he told historian Donald Knox. “Then the leaves were
missing. As you got closer, branches were missing. Closer still, the trunks
were gone and then, as you got in the middle, there was nothing. Nothing! It
was beautiful. I realized this was what had ended the war. It meant we didn’t
have to go hungry any longer, or go without medical treatment. I was so
insensitive to anyone else’s human needs and suffering. I know it’s not right
to say it was beautiful, because it really wasn’t. But I believed the end probably
justified the means.”
It's not my place to comment on whether or not the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are 'beautiful'; but I wholly concur with anyone that feels that peace is a beautiful thing.
World War 2 was ended with superior and awesome power; our peace with God is achieved by a truly 'beautiful' power- the power of the death of the Son of God. As we get closer in to the cross; contemplate the cost; I am in awe that God would suffer like this for us.
I can think of no better poetry that that of Isaac Watts. I pray that we may all be deeply wounded and deeply healed by the cross,
- When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride. - Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood. - See from His head, His hands, His feet,
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,
Or thorns compose so rich a crown? - Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small;
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.