Talk:Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki/Archive 23

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So called "Nagasaki cloud"

This cloud is at a, far-too-low-an-altitude to convince me that it is indeed the cap of the mushroom cloud, that was generated by the detonation of the Fat Man Gadget. As the cloud cap in this photo has massive turbulent-surface-features which do NOT match those seen in the widely circulated film footage of the Nagasaki/fat man explosion. In the more authoritive film footage, at this low an altitude, the fireball/mushroom cloud-cap was completely smooth in comparison to this photo. Now, while the film footage of the cloud does eventually depict the cloud taking on a turbulent cloud-cap, crucially, this occurred at a much much higher altitude than what this "koyagi-jima" photograph depicts. A very strong reference is going to be needed to convince me that this is indeed the "mushroom cloud". I strongly suspect that it is actually; either (A) city fire clouds, given the sheer improbability that the camera-man had actually been sitting there, camera-in-hand, ready to snap the mushroom cloud. OR (B)The photo could also conceivably be of a post Fat Man fire-induced-detonation in one of the supporting, mitsubishi-weapons-factory chemical explosive works. The Japanese used a lot of picric acid instead of TNT in WWII and the former is even more prone to "cook-off"(thermal induced detonation) even when encased in steel shells. Although I can imagine that we should have a crater to point to, as the proverbial smoking gun, if this post-detonation hypothesis at Nagasaki were the case.Boundarylayer (talk) 15:48, 18 December 2016 (UTC)

Per the image information, which is where we always list the source for a photo caption, the image and its caption is from the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum. Now, I understand what you are saying, but under our rules, it is WP:OR, and the onus falls on you to supply a WP:RS backing up your suspicions. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:34, 17 December 2016 (UTC)

There's a photo of a similar view of Hiroshima following the bomb taken from Kure at the Kure Maritime Museum (aka the Yamato Museum). Unfortunately I didn't take a photo of the caption. Nick-D (talk) 22:38, 17 December 2016 (UTC)

Look, it is pretty obvious this photo is incorrectly labelled. Moreover it fails basic logical timing. Are we really going to take it on face value that someone was standing with a 1930-40s camera, ready to snap the mushroom cloud of the Nagasaki bomb, during the brief few seconds it was this low to the ground? Really? I'm incredulous. If the photo were of the mushroom cloud-stem, I wouldn't be so skeptical, but it fairly clearly is of a cloud-cap. In any case, the museums have been corrected numerous times pushing photos that are clearly mis-identified. We've already detailed in the article how the corresponding Hiroshima museum was wrong twice already, when it came to 2 separate photographs. So the museums are not exactly a reliable source when it comes to photograph identification, are they? However I understand wiki-rules and thus I will try and see if I can generate a WP:RS. More on that below.

As although with this photo, I'm not as 100% assured as I was, the 1st time I knew a photo had to be incorrectly titled. With that 1st time being when I naiively emailed author and bomb-researcher, John Coster-Mullen, about another, far more important and particularly vexing photo mis-identification(the specific photograph in question is the same photo that I've recently included in this wikipedia article, a photo dubiously titled "Hiroshima strike", when in reality it is of the firestorm-cloud, not the bomb cloud) and with contacting John in March 2016, he replied by mail that this specific photo had puzzled him for a long time too but that he had never thought to realize it was the firestorm-cloud. Then less than two months went by and quite suddenly there was a NYtimes article featuring John and that quasi-famous cloud in May 2016, an article that appeared after decades-upon-decades of quite prominent mis-identification. Pretty funny "coincidence" that.

I have included that particular NYtimes reference in our article. However if you'll notice, that news article is devoid of any mention to Coster-Mullen getting an email from someone, nor does it contain even a tip-of-the-hat in my direction. In fact if you read the NYtimes article carefully, it curiously doesn't come out and actually say who first correctly identified the photo. It just says it has now been correctly identified. Yet as far as my hours-upon-hours of research could find, I was first to correctly identify the photo and as detailed in our wiki-article here, I also trace the origins of its misidentification back as far as 1955.

For decades, many familar with mushroom clouds probably just dismissed that "Hiroshima strike" photo as wrong, or assumed that it was a picture of someplace else entirely. As I've yet to find anyone prior to me in March 2016, pointing out how the photograph clearly is not of the Little Boy mushroom cloud. That's even before we get into the fact that likewise, no one had then put 2-and-2 together and said that; it's not the little boy mushroom cloud "but it's the firestorm-cloud." Not to blow my own horn or anything, if you were as deep in nuclear winter minutia, cloud heights and the timing of the firestorm as me, I bet you would likewise have spotted it as the firestorm-cloud, if you had stumbled across it first, before I did.

Out of naiivety I did not do anything else about this photo but email John about it, as at the time, I thought it conceivable that he might have come across a historical document in his research that did in fact correctly identify the photo. Moreover I also had the desire to know if he had any information on the height of the plane which snapped the photo, which could be used to determine the height of the cloud. Information very important to feed into the nuclear winter debate. - I thought John would definitely have the answer to this latter query, as John famously visits the bomber groups 509th annual reunions. However on both counts, John had nothing. So that was pretty much that, I was satisfied enough that if someone like John agreed with me, then I must be right. Then in October 2016 I only serendipitously discovered the revealing NYtimes article that came out in May 2016, John hadn't told me that there would be an article about the photo. So I again mailed John Coster-Mullen, this time courteously asking him how the NYtimes article had come about, being essentially all of a sudden after decades, gosh over half a century of misidentification. However John quite tellingly, has chosen not to reply to my more recent mails. Is that incriminating? Should I ask the NYtimes direct, about how their article came about?

In any case, I suppose I could contact another well known researcher, if we really do need another WP:RS for this, falsely labelled Nagasaki photo. As the Museums are routinely caught presenting mis-titled pictures that are then correctly identified by people like me and Alex Wellerstein. Someone who already has a few clouds from little Boy correctly identified under-his-belt too. In fact, I think I'll contact him about this photo when I get around to it, he has the ear of a number of journalists, or if anyone else wants to contact Alex first, go right ahead. The only thing I won't be doing is, I most certainly won't be contacting John again! I learned my lesson, that guy pretends I don't even exist now.

Boundarylayer (talk) 12:19, 18 December 2016 (UTC)

I looked for captions for this photo by searching for it in Google image search. The only reliable source which turned up was the Boston Globe captions this photo "A view of the mushroom cloud photographed from the ground of the August 9, 1945 atomic bombing of Nagasaki" here (see photo #9). The photo appears in a vast number of unreliable sources. Nick-D (talk) 07:55, 19 December 2016 (UTC)

Your detective work is greatly appreciated Nick-D. Now I take it from your reply, that you're beginning to see my problem with the "atomic mushroom cloud" caption? From my own research, browsing the Nagasaki museum. They state the photo was taken 15 mins post detonation, photographed at Koyagi jima(that's about 12 km South-West^ of the Nagasaki hypocenter). By cameraman Hiromichi Matsuda. The photo was also prominently displayed by CNN a few months ago with the same description, here. Now, I don't know how familar you are with nuclear detonations, or mushroom clouds, but if you are a bit rusty: For devices of this yield range(~20 kiloton) and under perfectly calm surface wind conditions, the cloud reaches its max height of ~ 8 km in about 5 minutes and then begins to rapidly lose its shape when approaching around the 10 minute mark. After 20 mins it is totally unrecognizable, with the mark-1 eyeball, as ever having been a mushroom cloud. At Nagasaki it wasn't calm, there was a westerly breeze, so the mushroom cloud would've lost its shape even quicker. So this 15 minutes number totally undermines the accuracy of the "atomic mushroom cloud" caption they're pushing. It has just gone and put yet further nails in the coffin of the accuracy of their description, that this picture was the "atomic mushroom cloud".

^the documented westerly breeze over Nagasaki that day blew the remains of the mushroom cloud produced by the bomb, well to the East (which is to the right in Mr.Matsuda's "atomic cloud" photograph) by the time he said he snapped the photo, that is, about "15 minutes" post-detonation. So the actual "atomic cloud", would've been diffuse and well out of frame when he captured the scene over Nagaski. While no firestorm at Nagasaki occurred(unless you're author Lynn Eden) the fires were still pretty intense^^ as city-fires go and the city did burn down over about a day or so. This cloud is likely to be from those conventional fires. To give you an idea of these Nagasaki fires, ^^Yōsuke Yamahata took a number of pictures of the fires in Nagasaki, from within the city itself a day after the bombing, which is fairly indicative of the fires on the actual day.

Here is one of Mr. Yamahata's photos, taken on Aug 10, depicting a man walking across a bridge while a ~ 4 meter tall fire rages on in the background and the view beyond is totally obscured by smoke.here and a better ref of his photos, with this specific picture likewise, |showing fires on Aug 10, so as is well known, the fires were widespread.

Honestly, it is pretty apparent that the 2 Japanese museums leave a lot to be desired when it comes to honestly conveying the facts, they seem obsessed with not doing a damn bit of research. Which is almost criminal in its sloppiness...and just think, someone is actually getting paid to work there?...Jesus wept.

Boundarylayer (talk) 17:48, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

While I agree with you, under the circumstances I think that our best course of action is simply to remove the image from the article (which I have done). The article has plenty of images - perhaps too many - already, and I don't want to mislead readers. Hawkeye7 (talk) 23:36, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

I can understand why you think that best for now, though I'll still contact Wellerstein at some point and see if he can generate a news article that could become a reliable reference for us. As it is notable that fires and sizable fire clouds likewise formed in Nagasaki. So the picture is valuable and should be re-instated into the article. Perhaps even now we could just simply label the photo with the non contentious info we have on it? Something to the effect of - "Cloud over Nagasaki 15 minutes post-detonation" would be more than acceptable right now.

Boundarylayer (talk) 11:58, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

Leaflets again

Back in the first half of 2014 editors here were battling over the issue of leaflets. Part of the problem was that there were a lot of sources that discussed leaflets, and they didn't agree with each other with regard to dates the leaflets were dropped on which cities and in what numbers. Recently, the CIA's piece, "The Information War in the Pacific, 1945: Paths to Peace" by Josette H. Williams was quoted to provide an exact date of August 1, saying that Leaflet #2106 was delivered to Hiroshima and Nagasaki along with 33 other cities. This contradicts a few other sources, and Williams said it was not in her submitted text.

US Army Sergeant Major Herbert A. Friedman (Ret.) writes about the leaflets over Japan: "OWI Pacific Psyop Six Decades Ago". He posts a scan of a contemporary US serviceman newspaper, Target Saipan, that said this new leaflet was dropped starting July 27, with 60,000 leaflets. He posts a report by OWI that describes three similar leaflet programs, each containing the names of 11 or 12 Japanese cities. The OWI report says, "On 27 July 1945, 60,000 leaflets were dropped on each of 11 cities; on 1 August the same number were dropped on another set of 11; and on 4 August 720,000 leaflets warned a third list of 12 cities. Some leaflets with these lists on them were dropped on other cities, of course, and the warnings were also carried on the radio." Friedman talked to Williams about her CIA piece and she said her article contained errors: "The text of my article was purposefully ambiguous but under a picture of Leaflet 2106 the CIA inserted a line specifically citing Hiroshima and Nagasaki as being among the 35 cities which were warned ahead of being bombed. This is simply not true. The insertion was done after I approved the final copy for the press." Friedman says that Richard Hubert, OWI's Chief of Station on Saipan (and the father of Williams), said "The first leaflet notified eleven cities. The original leaflet contained the names of twelve cities and included Tokyo, but a last minute deletion of the name of this city necessitated the reprinting of the whole issue totaling 886,000 leaflets."

Here are the leaflets naming cities, with various dates and quantities from the various sources:

– July 27, 1945 – 886,000 or 900,000 printed – 60,000 or 700,000 dropped on at least 11 cities – Leaflet names 11: Ujiyamada, Tsu, Kooriyama, Hakodate, Nagaoka, Uwajima, Kurume, Ichinomiya, Oogaki, Nishinomiya and Aomori. A previous version names 12, Tokyo plus the previous 11. The Tokyo-containing leaflet printing run was apparently destroyed.
– July 30, 31 or August 1, 1945 – 600,000 printed – 60,000, 500,000 or 568,000 dropped on at least 11 cities – Leaflet names 12: Nagano, Takaoka, Kurume, Fukuyama, Toyama, Mizuru, Ootsu, Nishinomiya, Maehashi, Kooriyama, Hachioji and Mito.
– August 3, 1945 – 600,000 printed – 720,000 dropped on at least 12 cities – Leaflet names 12: Otaru, Akita, Hachinoe, Fukushima, Urawa, Takayama, Iwakuni, Tottori, Imabari, Miyakonojyo, Yahata and Saga.

In total, 33 cities were named, with 3 duplications across the leaflet versions.

Atomic bomb target cities Hiroshima, Kokura and Nagasaki were never named in these leaflets. The USAAF never ordered its pilots to drop leaflets on atomic bomb target cities, though some may have been dropped by accident. The target cities were intended to be bombed with no warning, so that the atomic bomb damage could be better evaluated.

I don't think it is a good idea to rely so heavily on the CIA photo caption. Binksternet (talk) 23:07, 4 December 2016 (UTC)

A bit more information] has come to light:

The short version: leaflets specifically warning about atomic bombs were created… but they weren’t dropped on either Hiroshima or Nagasaki before they were atomic bombed. The first Truman Library document was the first draft, that was never dropped. The second one was the second draft, and was dropped, but only after the bombs were used.[1]

Hawkeye7 (talk) 00:29, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Very interesting. Thanks for the link. Binksternet (talk) 00:54, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Naturally we should tread lightly here, I was not aware of the CIA duplicity and perhaps considered them as a reliable source too hastily. However numerous survivors at Hiroshima recount picking up leaflets before the bombing. I think they're our best bet to know for certain if they received the city firebombing warnings. Moreover it would be great to know if the people in the other cities actually evacuated en-masse after they received the warning of the Hiroshima bombing that started landing circa Aug 9-10. I don't think these other cities did. Though as you can imagine, such information would be very insightful to know in the hypothetical if scenario: had Hiroshima and Nagasaki received a special warning, would they have taken it seriously? So we should find out and say in the article: "the cities that received the "special" warning did not(or did) evacuate.[ref]

Also the radio broadcasts were previously not mentioned in the article, I corrected that omission. In many ways this radio warning is more assured of having reached all the city dwelling Japanese, as I don't know the literacy rates in 1945 but I have no doubt everyone in Japan could understand the spoken word.

Boundarylayer (talk) 22:51, 6 December 2016 (UTC)

As noted in the article, the Japanese government had already instituted a policy of evacuating civilians to rural areas. This included Hiroshima, where about one-quarter of the civilian population had departed by August 1945. There were no mass evacuations of all civilians, but rather of the target industries. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:34, 17 December 2016 (UTC)

I think you may have missed the point I was making. You bring up the pre-nuclear warfare evacuation, I on the other hand was talking about: If there was a further evacuation of major cities after nuclear-warfare had begun? I haven't done much reading on it, but I've never read that all of a sudden everyone started fleeing cities. For example, Nagasaki had been informed by radio of the destruction of Hiroshima, but Prime Minister Suzuki/Radio Japan told the public "we'll soldier on" etc. So I think readers would very much like to know if the Japanese began evacuating out of cities at a greater rate after Hiroshima, or indeed, after the Nagasaki bombing.

Such information would be very informative from a historical point of view for a number of reasons. If mass evacuations occurred after Nagasaki, then clearly that would've influenced Emperor Hirohito in moving to surrender.

Do you follow me?

Boundarylayer (talk) 12:52, 18 December 2016 (UTC)

There was no increase in the mass evacuations after Hiroshima or Nagasaki. Hawkeye7 (talk) 21:34, 21 December 2016 (UTC)

I had expected as much, do you have a reference to state that fact?

Boundarylayer (talk) 00:02, 22 December 2016 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 March 2017

This edit request to Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki has been answered. Set the |answered= or |ans= parameter to no to reactivate your request.

Italicize the word Hibakusha in the section's heading, like it is in the rest of the article/section. Himeroid21 (talk) 19:39, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

Done Ⓩⓟⓟⓘⓧ _Talk 19:46, 2 March 2017 (UTC)