Articles 
Early in the morning on March 1, 1954, the hydrogen bomb, code named Bravo, was detonated on the surface of the reef in the northwestern corner of Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The area was illuminated by a huge and expanding flash of blinding light. A raging fireball of intense heat, that measured into the millions of degrees, shot skyward at a rate of 300 miles an hour. Within minutes the monstrous cloud, filled with nuclear debris, shot up more than 20 miles and generated winds hundreds of miles per hour. (1)
Shortly thereafter, it began to snow white ash and the islands water supply became brackish. Children played in the fallout; their mothers watched in horror as night came and they began to show the physical signs of exposure. The people experienced severe vomiting and diarrhea, their hair began to fall out, the island fell into a state of terrified panic.(1)
These bombs killed as many as 140,000 people in Hiroshima and 80,000 in Nagasaki by the end of 1945, roughly half on the days of the bombings. Since then, thousands more have died from injuries or illness attributed to exposure to radiation released by the bombs and atomic test fallout throughout the world.
Although the past history of military atomic use is horrific the future is not looking good. North Korea has become armed, and India and Pakistan have armed themselves with nukes whilst still fighting over Kashmir. Altogether there are now over 15,000 nuclear weapons presently deployed. However each of these nukes on average is 50 times more powerful than the bombs that totally destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Meanwhile the US, Russia, and China are modernizing their nuclear weapons so they are even more deadlier.
Even a small nuclear war with the types of atomic weapons now in use risks plunging the Earth into a nuclear winter destroying life as we know it. Mutually Assured Destruction (M.A.D) is still the order of the day.
Whilst great strides have been made in reducing the world's nuclear stockpile from the 60,000 warheads at the peak of the Cold War in the 1960's, much still needs to be done to remove this madness altogether.
Shortly thereafter, it began to snow white ash and the islands water supply became brackish. Children played in the fallout; their mothers watched in horror as night came and they began to show the physical signs of exposure. The people experienced severe vomiting and diarrhea, their hair began to fall out, the island fell into a state of terrified panic.(1)
These bombs killed as many as 140,000 people in Hiroshima and 80,000 in Nagasaki by the end of 1945, roughly half on the days of the bombings. Since then, thousands more have died from injuries or illness attributed to exposure to radiation released by the bombs and atomic test fallout throughout the world.
Although the past history of military atomic use is horrific the future is not looking good. North Korea has become armed, and India and Pakistan have armed themselves with nukes whilst still fighting over Kashmir. Altogether there are now over 15,000 nuclear weapons presently deployed. However each of these nukes on average is 50 times more powerful than the bombs that totally destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Meanwhile the US, Russia, and China are modernizing their nuclear weapons so they are even more deadlier.
Even a small nuclear war with the types of atomic weapons now in use risks plunging the Earth into a nuclear winter destroying life as we know it. Mutually Assured Destruction (M.A.D) is still the order of the day.
Whilst great strides have been made in reducing the world's nuclear stockpile from the 60,000 warheads at the peak of the Cold War in the 1960's, much still needs to be done to remove this madness altogether.
Andy Bruin,
People For Nuclear Disarmament,
NSW,
Australia.
(1) Niedenthal, Jack. (1998-2000). A Short History of the People of Bikini Atoll
