News

by Kyosuke Mizukawa, Senior Staff Writer

On January 31, 1995, the Hiroshima City government received a message by fax from the U.S. Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, located in Washington, D.C. The message contained the information that, the previous day, the museum had made the decision to cancel the planned exhibition of A-bombed materials it had requested from Hiroshima City, rendering the requested loan of items no longer necessary.

Hiroshi Harada, 55 at the time, director of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum who is now 85 and a resident of Hiroshima’s Asaminami Ward, experienced the atomic bombing at the age of six. “We should start by recognizing how horrific the experience of the atomic bombing was, yet here we were 50 years later,” said Mr. Harada, in his realization of how persistent the arguments had become for justifying the atomic bombings.

On April 5, 1993, Martin Harwit, director of the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum, visited Hiroshima City and made an official request for the loan of A-bombing materials from the city. The U.S. museum, planning an exhibition related to the atomic bombings in 1995 to mark 50 years since the bombings, intended to display the materials alongside the front fuselage of the Enola Gay, the B-29 bomber that had dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, with the aim of conveying the suffering experienced by the city.

The city government postponed its response, citing “the possibility that the exhibition might be seen as a demonstration of the power of the atomic bombs and as justification for their use.” In the United States, the argument prevailed that justified the dropping of the bombs on the grounds that it had hastened the end of the war and saved many lives.

Mr. Harwit attends Peace Memorial Ceremony

The Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum expressed interest in the personal items left behind by A-bomb victims. However, Mr. Harada recalled, “I honestly doubted whether the museum could truly display the items appropriately.” Following Mr. Harada’s plea “to visit Hiroshima in August and gain an understanding of the feelings held by the people of Hiroshima,” Mr. Harwit, together with his family, attended the Peace Memorial Ceremony and paid a visit to the Atomic Bomb Memorial Mound.

In consideration of the fact that the Air and Space Museum had expressed willingness to accept opinions and advice from the A-bombed city with respect to the exhibition, Hiroshima City announced in November 1993 that it would loan the materials to the museum as a “shared legacy of all humanity,” words communicated by then-Hiroshima City Mayor Takashi Hiraoka.

However, some bereaved family members were left feeling helpless. Among the 12 items that the U.S. museum requested was a charred lunchbox belonging to Shigeru Orimen, who had been mobilized for building-demolition work and died in the atomic bombing at the age of 13. His mother, Shigeko, who had donated the item and died in 1996 at the age of 88, reportedly called the museum by telephone and said, “I still cannot forgive the United States. Please give up any idea of making a spectacle of my son Shigeru in the country of our former enemy.”

Turning into controversy

Mr. Harada said, “I so painfully understood her feelings.” He considered loaning a different lunchbox to the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum instead. Meanwhile, in the United States, as the plan for the exhibition took shape, strong opposition erupted from war veterans groups and some members of Congress. Those groups claimed that the exhibition would tarnish the honor of the Enola Gay and that the atrocities committed by the former Imperial Japanese military would be ignored. On the other hand, academics and others who had argued that dropping the atomic bombs had been unnecessary opposed any changes to the plan, all of which turned the issue into a major controversy.

In September 1994, the U.S. Senate adopted a resolution stating that the Enola Gay had helped bring about a merciful end to World War II, saving the lives of both Americans and Japanese citizens. The resolution also described the plan for the exhibition as insulting to the many soldiers who had served in the war. The decision to halt the display of the A-bombing materials came four months later. Starting in June 1995, a portion of the plane fuselage and accompanying explanatory materials were put on display.

Hiroshima City continued to communicate its message to the United States and the rest of the world to ensure that the tragedy of the atomic bombings would not be obscured as a result of the idea that “history is written by the victors.” In July 1995, the city assisted when American University, in Washington, D.C., held its own A-bombing exhibition. And on August 6 that year, the city placed an opinion advertisement in the Washington Post newspaper, calling on people around the world to learn about what had actually happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and about the cruelty of nuclear weapons.

Hiroshima City and Nagasaki City also joined to present their call from the A-bombed cities to the first “world tribunal” investigating issues concerning the use and threat of use of nuclear weapons.

(Originally published on May 16, 2025)