No. 23

August 6, 2025

80th Anniversary of Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
August 6 and 9, 1945

One Humanity One Struggle
Make Canada a Zone for Peace

CALENDAR OF EVENTS

• People of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Denounce
U.S. Imperialist Warmongering

• Oppose U.S. Nuclear Blackmail and Threats of Armageddon!

• U.S. Aims in Bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki

• Canada's Involvement in the Bombings

80th Anniversary of Bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki

August 6 and 9, 1945

People of Hiroshima and Nagasaki Denounce U.S. Imperialist Warmongering

Survivors of the U.S. atomic bombing of Hiroshima gather at the city's Peace Memorial Park to denounce Trump's warmongering, June 26, 2025.

To this day, the U.S. imperialists continue to praise the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, recognized as horrendous war crimes by all peoples of conscience across the world. According to the U.S., they were "required" to drop atomic weapons to "end" World War II by forcing Japan's surrender -- even though the Soviet Union had already secured the defeat of Japan in the East. As well, it was "necessary" to establish dominance over the Soviet Union which led the world anti-fascist united front during World War II.

These two acts of state terror were a sinister announcement to the entire world that if the peoples did not submit to U.S. imperialist dictate nuclear destruction was a real possibility.

To this day, the peoples of Canada, the U.S. and worldwide join the people of Japan in condemning these war crimes and crimes against humanity. They join them in supporting the steadfast battle of the survivors and their descendants by reiterating as one humanity the solemn vow to make sure this never takes place again.

Most recently in Japan, widespread anger and opposition was expressed when, on June 25 at the 2025 NATO Summit in The Hague, U.S. President Trump linked the "success" of the U.S./Israeli unprovoked bombing of Iran's nuclear facilities with the "success" of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

"I don't want to use an example of Hiroshima. I don't want to use an example of Nagasaki. But that was essentially the same thing. That ended that war. This ended [this] war," Trump declared.

The Hiroshima City Assembly on June 26 unanimously passed a resolution stating, "As the atomic-bombed city of Hiroshima, we must never overlook or tolerate statements that justify the dropping of the atomic bombs or situations that threaten civil liberties."

The resolution also made reference to the conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine urging "a peaceful resolution of all armed conflicts from a humanitarian standpoint."

Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui told media: "It seems to me that he [Trump] does not fully understand the reality of the atomic bombings, which, if used, take the lives of many innocent citizens, regardless of whether they were friend or foe, and threaten the survival of the human race."

Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki noted that if Trump's remarks "were to justify the dropping of the atomic bombs, it would be extremely regrettable as an atomic-bombed city."

Hiroshima's survivors of the atomic bombing organized a protest against Trump the next day, demanding the U.S. president retract his statement. They pointed out that there is no justification for nuclear weapons, reminding the world that the U.S. bombing of Hiroshima killed about 140,000 people in the initial blast, with total deaths estimated at more than 237,000. The atomic bombing of Nagasaki three days later immediately killed an estimated 70,000 people, with more than 140,000 people dying in total from the initial blast, burns, injuries and radiation sickness. More than 100,000 Koreans who had been drafted to Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the Japanese imperialists for "compulsory labour" and "military service" were among the victims of the atomic bombs which killed at least 50,000 Koreans.

Many people and their descendants are still suffering from the effects. The atomic bomb survivors' group Nihon Hidankyo, which was founded in 1956, won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2024 for its work to abolish nuclear weapons and uphold the non-use of force in political affairs.

August 6 and 9 are now days when peoples worldwide commemorate those who were slaughtered in these horrendous acts of terrorism by the U.S. On these days the peoples of the world say Never Again! to such crimes against humanity and reaffirm the demand to end the use of force to sort out conflicts between countries.

Nuclear disarmament has long been a goal of all peace-loving Canadians, who have fought every attempt of the U.S. to impose nuclear weapons on Canada. According to the U.S. imperialists, the goal of stopping nuclear proliferation involves the U.S. arming itself to the teeth with offensive weapons, including strengthening its nuclear arsenal, while demanding that the peoples it threatens with nuclear annihilation are not permitted even to develop nuclear power for peaceful energy purposes. The U.S. gives itself the right to launch "pre-emptive nuclear strikes" against any nation or people as it has threatened to do against Iran and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) and countries which are waging a determined struggle for their right to be.

Humanity's fight to rid the world of nuclear weapons and defeat the U.S. imperialist dictate requires stepping up the struggle to uphold the sovereignty and independence of all nations, and the elimination of the threat or use of force to settle conflicts. It also necessitates that the Canadian working class and people organize to Make Canada a Zone for Peace that rejects the use of force as a means of settling conflicts between nations and peoples, and withdraws from all aggressive military blocs and treaties such as NATO and NORAD.

Memorial ceremony with lanterns with the Hiroshima Peace Memorial seen in the background. Also known as the A-Bomb Dome, the ruin of the former Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall has been preserved as part of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park.

(With files from TML Archives, Japan Times, Asahi Shimbun, Central Korean News Agency.)

Oppose U.S. Nuclear Blackmail and
Threats of Armageddon!

When the U.S. imperialists deliberately dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945 and Nagasaki on August 9, 1945, these were horrendous crimes against humanity, that intentionally caused mass destruction of human populations. These criminal acts for the narrow self-serving aims of the U.S. -- done on the orders of the president alone -- set the pattern of impunity and use of executive police powers, widely evident today inside and outside of the U.S. To stop the advance of the peoples' struggles for peace, freedom and democracy, the U.S. fashioned the Cold War on the basis of racist, anti-communist and anti-worker ideology. The U.S. developed an Anglo-American crusade against communism, the Soviet Union, People's Democracies and to counter the national liberation movements in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki were not chosen because they had any military significance. Hiroshima was considered a good target because it had not been previously bombed and thus would provide a clear demonstration of the devastating power of the atomic bomb which had never been used before.

The original target for the second bomb was Kokura, but it was clouded over so the secondary target, Nagasaki, was bombed instead. The bombing of Nagasaki three days after Hiroshima was also intended to test the effects of a plutonium bomb as compared to the uranium bomb used at Hiroshima. This partly explains why the U.S. rushed to execute the second horrific crime against humanity only three days after the first -- it wanted to test both types of bombs before a Japanese surrender and establish its military hegemony in the region.

The criminal bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were carried out not to end the war as the U.S. claims, as if this would justify such an act of mass terror, but to threaten the peoples of the world with nuclear annihilation if they did not accept U.S. imperialist dictate and hegemony. In particular, it was aimed at the peoples of the Soviet Union and to serve U.S. plans to establish permanent military bases in Japan and attempt to militarily dominate Asia. The peoples of the Soviet Union played the leading role in the defeat of Nazi fascism, at the cost of some 27 million lives. The Chinese people also suffered terribly at the hands of the Japanese militarists, as did the Korean people and peoples of the regions occupied or annexed by the Empire of Japan until 1945.

In opposition to a world united against fascism and war, the heinous crimes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki left no doubt that U.S. imperialism had taken up the Nazi aim to defeat communism and establish its domination over the whole world.

Aftermath of bombing of Hiroshima

Aftermath of bombing of Nagasaki

Current threats to use pre-emptive nuclear strikes or to retaliate against those declared to be enemies by using nuclear weapons, are part of the outlook that Might Makes Right, and that there is no greater might than the vast arsenal of nuclear weapons in the hands of the nuclear powers. This is the militaristic outlook of the U.S./NATO alliance and its doctrine of "peace through strength" which was also the outlook of the Nazis. All of it is aimed at terrorizing the peoples and block them from seizing the initiative by waging the resistance struggle to advance their own agenda for peace, freedom and democracy.

Far from working to rid the world of nuclear weapons, the U.S. and other big powers, along with NATO members including Canada, are engaged in the militarization of all of life, putting more and more money into the production of the most modern weapons, in an effort to secure military superiority. Their states are being restructured to permit the broader use of military powers even against their own populations in times of peace.

Of great concern at this time is that the imperialist countries have armed Israel with the most lethal weapons of mass destruction in aid of the Zionist entity's continued occupation of Palestine and genocide of the Palestinian people in the occupied territories. Not only the U.S. but France, Germany, Britain and even Norway secretly sold Israel the material and expertise to make nuclear warheads, or turned a blind eye to its theft. The imperialist powers continue to deny that they have armed the Zionists with nuclear weapons, while they threaten Iran and declare it does not have the right to develop nuclear power for peaceful purposes.

Similarly, the U.S. has permanently stationed its troops in south Korea in violation of the armistice agreement reached at the end of the Korean War, and has installed nuclear warheads on the Korean Peninsula aimed at the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK). It carries out annual nuclear war games to threaten the DPRK, including computer-simulated exercises for the invasion of the DPRK. When the DPRK was forced to take measures to deter the U.S. by itself acquiring nuclear weapons, the U.S. engineered further threats and sanctions, unjustly accusing the DPRK of being responsible for the tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

The threat of Armageddon conjures up the day of reckoning in an alleged battle of humankind between good and evil when the world will end with the exception of a few chosen people. All of it is to spread profound fear among the people and get them to give up their striving for peace, freedom and democracy by fighting for their own empowerment and instead reduce their struggle to demands to ban the bomb. This has never succeeded in getting the peoples of the world to give up their resistance struggles which affirm their right to be.

Humanity's fight to rid the world of nuclear weapons and defeat the U.S. imperialist dictate requires stepping up the struggle to uphold the sovereignty and independence of all nations, and the elimination of the threat or use of force to settle conflicts. It also necessitates that the Canadian working class and people organize to Make Canada a Zone for Peace, and demand the government reject the use of force as a means of settling conflicts between nations and peoples, and withdraw from all aggressive military blocs and treaties such as NATO and NORAD.

On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the nuclear bombings, all peace- and justice-loving Canadians pay their deepest respects to the Japanese victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to the Palestinian people and all peoples the world over who have suffered and continue to suffer as a result of imperialist dictate.

The criminal Anglo-American imperialist system can and will be ended by the peoples' resistance and unity in action of all the fighting peoples of the world to establish a new world based on peace, justice, and dignity for all nations and peoples.

No More Hiroshimas and Nagasakis!

No to the Use of Force to Settle Conflicts between Nations!

Dismantle NATO and NORAD!

All Out to Organize an Anti-War Government and
Make Canada a Zone for Peace!

(Photos: TML, Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum, Y. Yamahata)

U.S. Aims in Bombing Hiroshima and Nagasaki

In 2020, on the occasion of the 75th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, historians Gar Alperovitz, Martin Sherwin, Kai Bird, and Peter Kuznick recognized as international experts addressed a webinar at which they discussed the documentary evidence that challenged the "official explanation" repeated by the U.S. that the use of the atom bombs was necessary to "end the Second World War" and "save a million lives."

In their presentations, the historians shared the view that the use of the atom bomb by the U.S. in Hiroshima and Nagasaki had nothing to do with "ending the war" and "saving a million lives" as the Truman administration and many of its top military personnel and diplomats had claimed.

Rather, the aim of the U.S. in deploying the nuclear bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was to pre-empt the Soviet Union, which had been decisive in defeating Nazi Germany, from having any significant influence on the outcome of the war against Japan and therefore, from any role in shaping post-war geopolitics in East Asia.

The webinar underscored that as early as April and May 1945, months before the dropping of the bombs, the U.S. had intercepted diplomatic cables from Japan that indicated that Japan was ready to surrender, the only condition being that Japanese Emperor Hirohito would not be held responsible and that he would retain his titular role, but with no power. Such an arrangement, it was noted, was agreeable to many of the U.S. military brass and even some in the U.S. administration who felt that keeping the Emperor in place would be useful in keeping the Japanese people in line under U.S. occupation. It was also emphasized that at this stage there was very little fighting going on as plans were being made to carry out a large-scale invasion of the Japanese mainland in November 1945. Therefore, the presenters noted, the war could have been ended without dropping those nuclear bombs on defenceless civilians.

Professor Gar Alperovitz, in particular, observed that in the wake of the criticism that emerged after the bombing, that there "was a well-organized and orchestrated campaign" between the Truman administration, military leaders and some of the scientists of the Manhattan Project, which had built the bombs, to justify this crime. This disinformation campaign was intensified after members of the U.S. military began to criticize the use of these weapons in the wake of broader public opinion within the U.S. and around the world expressing horror at the devastation and mass slaughter of the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Professor Alperovitz cited two of these top military leaders during the webinar. One was General Curtis LeMay who was head of the Twenty-First Bomber Command which carried out the fire-bombing of Tokyo and other cities in Japan in early 1945 in which more than 300,000 people were killed and some 400,000 injured. Two weeks after the end of the Second World War, LeMay told the press: "The atomic bomb had nothing to do with the end of the war. The war would have ended in two weeks without the atomic bomb or the Russian entry."

Admiral William Leahy, who was President Truman's Chief of Staff was quoted as saying: "The use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender. In being the first to use it, we adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages. I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars cannot be won by destroying women and children."

In terms of U.S. imperialist plans of dominating the Soviet Union and justifying the Cold War, Professor Alperovitz quoted U.S. Secretary of State James Byrne: "If we could end the war before the Red Army got to Manchuria and then Japan, we could dominate the situation in Japan and probably Manchuria." Secretary of War Henry L. Stimson was also quoted justifying the use of nuclear weapons: "It [the atom bomb] was the master card of diplomacy over the Russians."

Painting by Hideo Kimura, who at 12 years of age survived the atomic bombing of Hiroshima,
August 6, 1945

Professor Peter Kuznick highlighted the refusal of the U.S. to own up to its responsibility for the war crimes against the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He noted that in 1946, Hollywood made a film called The Beginning or the End, the first movie made after the dropping of the bombs. The film, Professor Kuznick said, was "full of myths, inaccuracies and outright lies." He pointed out, for example, that the film repeated the disinformation that the U.S. had leafleted Japan for 10 days, warning that if Japan did not surrender, the bombs would be dropped.

He denounced current U.S. politicians such as Susan Rice, former Ambassador of the U.S. to the United Nations, and former President Barrack Obama who continued to repeat the lie that the U.S. had no choice but to use the atom bomb to save humanity. In particular, Kuznick condemned the speech that President Obama gave in Hiroshima in May 2016 where in the first sentence he said that "death fell from the skies in Hiroshima and Nagasaki" as though the U.S. had not bombed both cities to ashes. Obama stated, among other things: "World War Two reached its brutal end with Hiroshima and Nagasaki." Professor Kuznick noted this "not only justifies the atomic bombing, but makes it look as though it was a benevolent act."

To this day, the U.S. has yet to apologize for the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It uses its large nuclear weapons arsenal to threaten and blackmail countries, particularly those who stand up to its bullying including Iran, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Cuba and others as well as Russia and any country which does not submit to U.S. dictate.

Aerial photo from August 2025 shows results of ongoing criminal U.S./Israeli bombing in Gaza today

(With files from Abolition 2000, Japan Times. Photo: Palestine Online)

Canada's Involvement in the Bombings

Port Radium on Great Bear Lake, Northwest Territories, site of the El Dorado Mine (left) where uranium was mined then shipped out, first to Port Hope, Ontario for refining, before ending up in the U.S. for the Manhattan Project.

Canada played a little-known but key role in the U.S. nuclear weapons program at its inception. Canada provided uranium for the bomb used against Hiroshima, and Canadian scientists working in a secret lab in Montreal contributed to the research for the plutonium bomb used against Nagasaki.

The Canadian Council for Nuclear Responsibility (CCNR) informs that U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt and British Prime Minister Winston Churchill signed a secret agreement in Quebec City on August 19, 1943 that stipulated that the atomic bomb would not be used "against each other," or "against third parties without each other's consent." It also established a Combined Policy Committee of six to deal with the bomb, made up of three U.S. officials, two British officials and C.D. Howe, Liberal cabinet minister in the Mackenzie King government.

Howe was therefore not surprised at the bombing of Hiroshima and had prepared a statement for the press in advance. Howe said of the unprecedented war crime and crime against humanity, "It is a distinct pleasure for me to announce that Canadian scientists have played an intimate part, and have been associated in an effective way with this great scientific development."

The CCNR points out:

"In 1940, the British figured out how to make an atomic bomb by enriching natural uranium -- a slow, difficult, expensive process. In utmost secrecy, they asked the Americans for cooperation, and the Canadians for uranium.

"Following Pearl Harbor, the Americans took over. Uranium for the world's first A-Bombs was refined at Port Hope for the U.S. Army. At first, it came from Great Bear Lake; later, from the Congo. Some of the uranium was enriched for the Hiroshima bomb; the rest was irradiated in the world's first nuclear reactors to produce plutonium for the Nagasaki bomb.

"In 1942, the British moved their own plutonium-production research team to Montreal -- away from the Luftwaffe, closer to the Americans. Canada paid all expenses, and Canadian scientists joined the team.

"The Montreal Lab focused on the best ways to produce plutonium for Bombs. [...]

"The decision to build Canada's first heavy water reactors at Chalk River was taken in April 1944 by the Combined Policy Committee, meeting in the office of the American Secretary of War. It was a top-secret military decision.

"According to the inscription on a large bronze plaque at Chalk River:

"'A nuclear chain reaction was first initiated in Canada on September 5, 1945, when the ZEEP reactor went into operation here at Chalk River. Originally part of an effort to produce plutonium for nuclear weapons, the reactor was designed by a team of Canadian, British, and French scientists and engineers assembled in Montreal and in Ottawa in 1942-43.'"

The CCNR also notes that "For twenty years after Hiroshima, Canada sold plutonium produced in Chalk River reactors to the American military to help defray the cost of nuclear research. And when Canada gave India a clone of the NRX reactor, India used it to produce plutonium for its first A-Bomb test in 1974."

(CCNR, TML Archives. Photos: LAC)

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