HIROSHIMA PEACE MEMORIAL MUSEUM

If there is one museum in Japan that you should not miss, along with the Edo Museum in Tōkyō, it is the Peace Memorial (or "A-Bomb Museum"). It not only recalls the circumstances in which the American army used the atomic bomb for the first time in order to annihilate the strategic military zone that Hiroshima constituted at the time, but it also resituates the events of May 6, 1945 via a broader issue, that of the appropriateness of the use of nuclear weapons and its consequences on the human, ecological and ethical levels. Thus, one part of the exhibition attempts to explain to what extent the control of atomic weapons was a priority for the American government and how, in just a few years, it managed to exploit nuclear fission before reaching a political agreement with the Allied States with a view to sealing the fate of Japan (we learn, in particular, that the first nuclear test was carried out, in Mexico, only one month before the bombing of Hiroshima.) Another room is devoted to the issue of nuclear testing, showing how the international community managed to prohibit it under international law. The rest of the museum traces, in detail, the devastating consequences of the A-bomb. The city was almost flattened by the explosion, which took place about 600 metres above ground. The last part of the tour may offend some people's sensibilities. Photographs show the singular atrocity of the heat burns and the subsequent after-effects of the radiation and the "black rain" (from the atomic cloud). Also on display are various objects preserved after the explosion, such as pieces of rock deformed by the heat, which bear witness to the immeasurable power of this weapon of mass destruction. The museum collects and preserves objects that were kept by the survivors, their bereaved families and others to convey the reality of the disaster. Donations are made regularly. Video documentaries, featuring testimonies of survivors (the Hibakusha), can be viewed on screens at the exit of the last room. Particularly poignant, they highlight the heroism shown by many of the survivors. It is advisable to spend at least two hours watching them.