These images of the explosion of Hiroshima that were not

Photo of the bombardment of the city of Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945. GEORGE R. CARON/AP On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb with enriched uranium is drop

TheEditor
TheEditor
31 December 2020 Thursday 20:39
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These images of the explosion of Hiroshima that were not
Photo of the bombardment of the city of Hiroshima, Japan, on August 6, 1945. GEORGE R. CARON/AP

On August 6, 1945, an atomic bomb with enriched uranium is dropped by the american army on the city of Hiroshima, in western Japan, making a total of 140 000 dead. Three days later, the city of Nagasaki is razed to the ground by a second nuclear bomb, the plutonium this time. More than 70 000 people lose their lives in an immense cloud, its mushroom shape engraved in the minds of all. A spectacular image that there are still many mysteries, sixty-five years later.

According to a survey by the radio-television public German Deutsche Welle, the famous video footage of the bombing of Hiroshima, which has been used for decades in the media and documentaries from around the world, shows in fact the bombing of Nagasaki. It was while he was doing research for a story on the anniversary of 75 years of the nuclear attack that the journalist Amien Pellet explains, having discovered that the photo agency Getty included two photographs identical, indicating that it was for the premiere of the bombing of Hiroshima, and for the second, that of Nagasaki.

digging further, Mr. Pellet noted that many videos and articles, published for example by CNN or their own media, Deutsche Welle, used the same images to illustrate the two bombings. The World is no exception, matching for example in this video the explosion generated by Little Boy, the bomb dropped on Hiroshima, with images actually showing the explosion of Fat Man, dropped on Nagasaki. Amien Pellet has so wanted to go back to the source.

A roll of film unique

A group very few people were aware of the attacks before they take place, there are a few images from the archives of the time. Amien Pellet was recovered three photographs of the atomic cloud overlooking Hiroshima taken by u.s. military and an anonymous. They reveal a cloud of smoke, smaller, and separated from his column.

Bernard Waldman, a physicist from the us who was on board an observation aircraft, was in charge of filming the explosion of Hiroshima. But because of the humidity, his film could never be developed. According to Deutsche Welle, it is in fact the sequence filmed by another scientist, Harold M. Agnew, who is today the single reel of film, known showing the bombing of Hiroshima. Preserved by the Hoover Institution, in the United States, it reveals images that are little known and trembling from a cloud less impressive than the famous mushroom cloud of Nagasaki.

On its website, the Hoover Institution explains that if Harold M. Agnew had filmed him-even the explosion of Hiroshima, he had given cameras to soldiers so that they film Nagasaki from the sky. This could explain why there are more images showing the second explosion, from different angles.

A confusion deliberate ?

another video sequence intended to show the bombing of Hiroshima, and published, in particular by the BBC, PBS and Russia Today, appeared even more suspect to Amien Pellet. Filmed from far away, it shows an atomic cloud, which seems much more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb. It would be in reality the test to the u.s. of a hydrogen bomb in 1956, eleven years later, in the Bikini atoll (Marshall islands, Pacific ocean). However, this sequence was used in a film by British Pathé 1964 entitled Flashback to the Hiroshima Atom Drop and continue to be distributed by some agencies.

The first false use of the sequence of Nagasaki that Mr. Pellet had been able to find, it is in the u.s. national archives under the heading " E-6 10 SEC (Inside The Enola Gay) ", dated 1945, according to the Associated Press.

The u.s. government would have used the video of the nuclear mushroom cloud of Nagasaki, more impressive, for propaganda purposes ? The plutonium bomb was much more powerful, " says Paul Ham, author of the book Hiroshima Nagasaki : the real story of the atomic bombings and their consequences (Doubleday, 2012, in English), in an interview to the Deutsche Welle :

" The United States of america were certainly very determined to show the immense power of this weapon, to force the Japanese to surrender. "

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Updated: 31.12.2020 20:39