atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki — Bunk History

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Oppenheimer movie poster.

The Race to Make Hollywood’s First Atomic Bomb Movie

Before Christopher Nolan’s "Oppenheimer," the world nearly got Ayn Rand’s "Tribute to Free Enterprise."

by Greg Mitchell via Literary Hub on July 17, 2023

Mushroom cloud of nuclear bomb.

Forgetting the Apocalypse

Why our nuclear fears faded – and why that’s dangerous.

by Daniel Immerwahr via The Guardian on May 12, 2022

Gen. Douglas MacArthur and Emperor Hirohito, September, 1945

The Japanese Surrender in 1945 is Still Poorly Understood

Did the United States have no other option but to drop atomic bombs on Japan in order to get them to surrender?

by Jeremy Kuzmarov, Roger Peace via HNN on September 26, 2021

New York City, the Perfect Setting for a Fictional Cold War Strike

On Collier’s 1950 cover story, “Hiroshima, USA: Can Anything Be Done About It?”

by Sara Blair via Literary Hub on June 13, 2018

Our Nukes, Ourselves

Nuclear heritage and nuclear stewardship in a quiet desert town.

by Kelsey D. Atherton via The New Inquiry on March 21, 2018

Comparing Truman's Hiroshima Statement to Trump's North Korea Ultimatum

What to know before equating "fire and fury" to the "rain of ruin."

by Olivia B. Waxman via TIME on August 9, 2017

The Best Intentions

The Manhattan Project scientists tried to advocate for nuclear de-escalation-instead, they unwittingly abetted the Vietnam War.

by Sarah Bridger via Slate on September 4, 2015

The Atomic Bomb and the Nuclear Age

A primary source set and teaching guide created by educators.

by Amy Rudersdorf via Digital Public Library of America on June 15, 2015

Nuclear weapon mushroom cloud

Mythologizing the Bomb

The beauty of the atomic scientists' calculations hid from them the truly Faustian contract they scratched their names to.

by E. L. Doctorow via The Nation on August 14, 1995

Harry Truman and David Dubinsky at a podium with an ABC microphone.

Radio Report to the American People on the Potsdam Conference

Truman’s radio address on August 9, 1945 frames Hiroshima as a “military base” to justify its bombing.

by Harry S. Truman via Truman Library on August 9, 1945

Leslie Groves and J. Robert Oppenheimer at Los Alamos in 1942.

General Groves Invented the Atomic Bomb, Not Oppenheimer

Gen. Leslie Groves promoted Oppenheimer as the atomic bomb's inventor to craft a propaganda narrative, obscuring the true creators and moral implications.

by Peder Anker via Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on July 21, 2025

‘Great Enough to Blow Any City Off the Map’: On Site at the First Nuclear Explosion

The men who set off the nuclear age tell the tale in their own words.

by Garrett M. Graff via Politico Magazine on July 18, 2025

Side by side still-frames progressively depict the first nuclear explosion.

80 Years Ago: The First Atomic Explosion, 16 July 1945

Declassified documents show atomic testing in New Mexico distributed radioactive matter to an extent that the scientists at Los Alamos were ill-prepared for.

by William Burr via National Security Archive on July 16, 2025

Japanese-American man in a military uniform.

He Spent His Life Trying to Prove That He Was a Loyal U.S. Citizen. It Wasn’t Enough.

How Joseph Kurihara lost his faith in America.

by Andrew Aoyama via The Atlantic on July 9, 2025

Collage of Richard Nixon and vintage images of mushroom clouds.

The President’s Weapon

Why does the power to launch nuclear weapons rest with a single American?

by Tom Nichols via The Atlantic on June 26, 2025

Three identical pictures of the explosion of an atomic bomb with different coloring.

How Literature Predicted and Portrayed the Atom Bomb

On Pierrepoint B. Noyes, H.G. Wells, and the “Superweapons” of early science-fiction.

by Dorian Lynskey via Literary Hub on January 28, 2025

A row of nuclear missiles aimed at a cloudy sky.

The Forgotten Epidemic

The bishops once used their influence to encourage nuclear disarmament. Can they do so again now?

by Alexander Stern via Commonweal on December 21, 2024

Hideki Tojo in a courtroom testifying at the Tokyo Trial, guarded by American soldiers.

The Hypocrisies of International Justice

A recent history revisits the Tokyo trial.

by Colin Jones via The Nation on September 18, 2024

Palestinians inspect the ruins of a building destroyed in Israeli airstrikes in Gaza, October 8, 2023.

The Desire to Annihilate Gaza Wasn’t Born on 10/7 — It’s Part of a Long Tradition

A long Euro-American tradition of genocide and ethnic cleansing imagined freeing a barren Palestine from Palestinian barbarity and heathenism.

by Adam Yaghi via Religion Dispatches on June 17, 2024

Margaret Mead and Joe Rogan.

Turn on, Tune in, Write Code

How psychedelics went from counterculture to grind culture.

by Geoff Shullenberger via The New Atlantis on April 12, 2024

The radioactive plume from the bomb dropped on Nagasaki, dropped by a US B-29 superfortress Bockscar.

Slave to the Bomb

We don’t need to imagine a world ravaged by nuclear war – we’re already living in it.

by Erik Baker via The Saturday Evening Post on March 28, 2024

A drawing of a burning ship engaged in battle at sea.

Burnt Offerings

Aaron Bushnell and the age of immolation.

by Erik Baker via n+1 on February 29, 2024

Silhouette of Oppenheimer wearing a fedora.

How Do We Know the Motorman Is Not Insane?

Oppenheimer and the demon heart of power.

by James Robins via The Dreadnought on December 20, 2023

A few people are gathered at the Atoms For Peace bus, a mobile exhibit about nuclear power operated for a time by the Atomic Energy Commission. c. 1947.

‘Atoms for Peace’ Was Never All That Peaceful—And the World Is Still Living With the Consequences

The U.S. sought to rebrand nuclear power as a source of peace, but this message helped mask a violent history.

by Tommy Song via Made By History on December 8, 2023

Operatives using air defense systems.

The Two Chomskys

The US military’s greatest enemy worked in an institution saturated with military funding. How did it shape his thought?

by Chris Knight via Aeon on December 8, 2023

Illustration of an atomic bombing.

Blood on Our Hands

What did Truman and Oppenheimer actually say in that room?

by Bill Black via Contingent on December 7, 2023

The cult-like aesthetic of technocracy, 1942.

Margaret Mead, Technocracy, and the Origins of AI's Ideological Divide

The anthropologist helped popularize both techno-optimism and the concept of existential risk.

by Benjamin Breen via Res Obscura on November 21, 2023

J. Robert Oppenheimer and Leslie Groves

Beyond Tortured Genius: Science and Conscience in Two Rediscovered Oppenheimer Films

"The Day After Trinity" and "The Strangest Dream" evacuate the mythical tropes of the tortured genius biopic that Hollywood loves to rehearse.

by Lauren Carroll Harris via Literary Hub on August 31, 2023

Oppenheimer movie poster.

Fact, Fiction, and the Father of the Bomb

On Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer.”

by Alex Wellerstein via Los Angeles Review of Books on August 30, 2023

Still from the film 'Oppenheimer.'

‘It’s Really First-Class Work’

Watching 'Oppenheimer' with the author of a definitive account of the Manhattan Project.

by Richard Rhodes, Alec Nevala-Lee via The Atlantic on July 27, 2023

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