“The flash of light. The flash of light was like nothing I had ever seen before. Or since.” - Survivor of Hiroshima, July 2005

August 6 and August 9 are the 60th anniversaries of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the first and so far only nuclear catastrophes ever visited upon humankind. As with other anniversaries it is now time for reflection, in the cases of Hiroshima and Nagasaki especially so, as these two bombings and their aftermath, though with enormously devastating possible consequences for the entire world, seem to be fading from our collective memory, will, and consciousness.

On the one hand, the past century has seen a great deal of human introspection and understanding. Our biological, social, and human sciences- from genetics to developmental psychology and from narrative to cross cultural studies- have allowed us to construct an understanding of ourselves, from the inner particles of a molecule to the outer edges of our universe.

We can alter genetic material to constitute new life structures, and we can construct communicative forms from novels to films to musical scores that can be reconstituted, sent around the world at lightning speed, and valued by others. Through an image of Earth as seen from the moon to planetary satellites, global communication, and economic interdependencies, and through organizations like the United Nations and our Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we have a greater sense of the interconnectedness of the world’s people and places.

On the other hand, this past century has been a time of unprecedented death and misery, a century of human destruction and environmental degradation unparalleled in scope in human history. Through two world wars, and continuing ethnic, religious, and sociopolitical conflicts, a hundred million noncombatants, including millions and millions of children, have been murdered in the last hundred years. Add to these innocent dead the millions of combatants who died or were grievously wounded in body or soul.

And what of the hundreds of millions who died of poverty and preventable disease years before their natural passing time? Many thousands die yearly from violence in our own local cities and neighborhoods and we are increasingly distancing ourselves from each other. In our own backyards and streets as we build various walls of separation through fear and intolerance. We must acknowledge that the Earth has been a global killing field.

These are difficult days, indeed, perhaps especially so for Americans. An increasing concern regarding the war in Iraq, the war on terror, environmental destruction, greed and materialism are rampant. What are we to do?

Many of us are shaken by the world we have created or have allowed to be created for ourselves and our children and their future. Today too often we feel threatened and vulnerable. None of us is immune to violence and the threat of violence. We have allowed locally and globally an ethos of human violence that either we do not have the collective will to stop or we do not know how to stop. After the intentional and systematic destruction of innocent people beginning with Guernica, Auschwitz, Rwanda, New York on 9-11, and most recently school children in Russia and babies in Darfur and Iraq, the very idea of human extinction makes all of us, whether we have children or not, parents of the next generation. This generation holds the power and the choice in the post-Nagasaki age regarding annihilation. Each subsequent generation is thereby indebted to the past generation for having allowed them to exist.

We need to invoke a healing image and call to active citizenship for this post-Nagasaki age. Following Jonathan Schell, we can advocate the concept of “universal parenthood,” the idea that all of us are responsible for our fellow humans. What better way to respond to these crushing burdens than to recognize and act upon the appeal of every living Nobel Peace Prize Laureate and the United Nations General Assembly, who declared the period 2001-2010 as “The decade to create a culture of peace and nonviolence for the children of the world,” asking that all nations and communities teach conflict resolution, peace-making, nonviolence, and active citizenship in their schools, neighborhoods and workplaces.

These Nobel Laureates and the UN General Assembly called for us to work purposefully, individually and collaboratively, to overcome apathy, indifference, and even opposition toward initiating and sustaining such an effort. Where better to start in 2005 than with a reflection on these first Ground Zeroes? On the occasions of the 50th commemoration of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, ending World War II, an eyewitness noted, “At Hiroshima, there was much bitterness… it was very political…the symbol could be a fist raised in anger. At Nagasaki, there was sadness, but also tranquility, reflection. It was not political. We prayed. We do not blame the United States; rather we wept over the sin of war, and more particularly, nuclear war. The symbol: hands joined in prayer.”

We too must join hands today, not only in informing the world of the horrors of weapons of mass destruction, but also in solving the human problems greatly threatening world peace; the lack of fundamental human rights and freedoms, environmental destruction, poverty and the preventable deaths of young children. It is the right thing to do.

An unprecedented opportunity is developing slowly across the planet which provides hope for the future. It is a call to us to build a world based on tolerance, justice, and respect for all members of the human family, including those global extremists who wish our demise. We need to do all the good we can for all the people we can in all the ways we can, for as Mahatma Gandhi understood: “If we (humans) are to reach real peace in this world, and if we (adults) are to carry on a real war against war, we (adults) shall have to begin with the children.”

Walter Enloe is a teacher of graduate education at Hamline University in St. Paul. He lived in Japan from the age of 12 and from 1980 to 1988 he was headmaster of Hiroshima International School. David B. Willis teaches cultural studies at Soai University in Osaka, Japan, where he has lived and worked for 27 years, and is active in peace and justice movements in Japan, India, and the United States.

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