ee

REVIEWS

Priest and social activist Fr. Jim
Roberts addresses “‘Hands Across the
Border” rally at Peace Arch park, one
of several held across Canada Saturday
to celebrate the liberation struggles in
Central America. “‘Action for social
justice is constitual to the gospel,”
Roberts told the demonstration, organ-
ized by the Central American Support
Committee and the Committee in
Solidarity with the People of El Salva-
dor, both Vancouver groups, as well as
El Salvador support groups from Seat-
tle and Bellingham. Also speaking were
Lutheran Minister Bill Sote, a former
American navy chaplain, Walter Mal-

donado from Vancouver's El Salvador. .

support gorup, and Vancouver alder-
man Harry Rankin, who called on the
crowd to help “‘arouse the conscience
of the whole United States and Can-
ada.”

HOLLY NEAR

Concert for Chile

Topical singer and songwriter
Holly Near appears on stage with the

internatiOnally-acclaimed Chilean’

song group Inti-Illimani on Sept. 23, 8
p.m. at the Orpheum Theatre.

Inti-Illimani, one of the leading
folk ensembles which helped develop
the Chilean New Song Movement
merging Chilean folk music with topi-
cal songwriting for the democratic
movement, was known throughout
Chile during the years of the Allende
government.

Near, whose songs and records
have become standbys in the peace
and international solidarity move-
ments, will be appearing with them in
a concert organized by La Quena cof-
fee house. Tickets, at $10, can be
reserved at 875-0004 or 254-9797.

The shadow of Hiroshima
and the U.S. Gold War

SHADOWS OF HIROSHIMA. By Wilfred
Burchett. Verso Editions, London, 1983.
Distributed by Schocken Books. $10.50.
Available at the People’s Co-op Bookstore.

“T could have had no idea when I entered
Hiroshima just four weeks after the city’s
incineration that this would become a
watershed in my life, decisively influencing
my whole professional career and world
outlook.”

Those words are from Wilfred Burchett’s
final book, Shadows of Hiroshima; it is so
powerful that it would have a similar effect
on readers.

Burchett was the first Western reporter to
arrive at Hiroshima, and he encountered
serious obstacles to getting the story. He
came to realize that the difficulty was due to
deliberate deception and interference by
U.S. authorities. Years later he “was forced
to recognize the existence of an official pol-
icy to suppress accurate reportage of the
terrible after-effects of nuclear war. This
cover-up — which continues today — is
closely related to other attempts to disguise
the reasons why President Truman decided
to drop two atomic bombs on an already
prostrate and defeated Japan.”

He writes: “In my view, it has become
urgent — virtually a matter of life or
death — for people today to understand
what really did happen in Hiroshima 40
years ago.’

This book ‘puts the puzzle together. It
shows the unifying motives that explain all
the events connected with the “first nuclear
war,” as he calls it. The answers he comes
up with are crucial for us now, because he
shows that the genocide in Japan was not
carried out as a solution to a military prob-
lem in Japan, but as an attempt to frighten
the Soviet Union into acquiescing to every
U.S. demand.

The bomb was developed to prevent the
Nazis, who had commenced work on
atomic weapons, from having a usable
atomic bomb before the allies did. By the
time the bomb was ready, the Germans had
been defeated. But the U.S. did not then

10 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, SEPTEMBER 19, 1984

forego using it. The Japanese were also on
the verge of defeat, and had made overtures
for surrender.

Why did the U.S. use the bomb? Because
they now wished to dictate to the Soviet
Union how the world would be after the
war. In order to do this, they felt a need to
demonstrate on human targets the terrible
force of the bomb. With the Germans
removed as targets and the Japanese about
to be removed by their clearly impend..ig
defeat and the imminent entry of the Sovicis
into the war against Japan (scheduled for
Aug. 9), the U.S. rushed ahead with the
atrocious bombing of a civilian population.

With no military justification, the U.S.
annihilated the Japanese civilians as the first
act of the U.S.-instigated Cold War. The
destructiveness of atomic weapons would of
course be known to the Soviets, but the U.S.
tried to hide from its own citizens the extent
of the damage to people in Hiroshima, so as
to minimize protest against their intended
course of action. The Japanese were the
“test population” on which the Hitlerian
genocide experiements were performed.

This book exposes the “‘lies which Tru-
man and his top political and military aides
used to justify the extermination of
hundreds of thousands of Japanese civilians
in order to geopolitically project the might
of the American nuclear monopoly.”

Burchett also deals with the revolt of the
scientists involved, and the government per-
secution of the pilot of the Hiroshima plane
who later devoted himself to exposing the
horror of atomic war. He also goes into
detail surrounding American attempts to
provoke the Soviet Union into actions that
would provide a ‘“‘cover’’ for the U.S. to
unleash nuclear war.

If anybody had any illusions about why
the bomb was dropped or why the Cold
War came about, or about what the U.S.
would consider doing then or now in its
drive for control of the world, this book
should help dispel them.

Ronald Proschan
People’s World

Renowned
scientists
headline —
PSR meet

Former U.S. navy admiral Eugene Car
roll and Dr. Michael Pentz of Britain’s Open)
University are two of the several interna
tionally ‘renowned experts scheduled to
address the conference “Nuclear War: The
Search for Solutions” set for the Universi
of B.C. next month.

The conference, which is open to the As
lic as well as practising physicians, is jointly
sponsored by Physicians for Social Respot
sibility, the UBC Centre for Continuing
Education, the Canadian and B.C. Teachers
federations as well as Science for Peace, lt
will run for three days, Oct. 19, 20 and 21. |

The three-day conference will cover sevell
sessions: The Impact of Nuclear War, The
Growing Threat, The Human Dimension)
East-West Relations, Techical Aspects 0!
Arms Control, Charting the Course and#
final workshop session on action that vat
ious groups can take for disarmament. __

A number of international experts from _
this country, the U.S., Britain and the Sovie!
Union will be leading the conferen
workshops.

In addition to Carroll and Pentz, bothdl
whom will be lecturing on nuclear weapon)
and the arms race, the participants includ
Dr. Jane Sharp, a professor peace studies it
New York (on nego-
tiating with the
Soviet Union); Anatol
Rapoport, also a
professor of peace
studies (on exposing
the war game); Dr.
John Polanyi, Tor-
‘onto professor of
chemistry (on banning
weapons in space);
retired Canadian ad-
miral Robert Falls
(“NATO policy; to-
wards a policy of
pledge of no first
use”); Dr. Joanna
Santa Barbera, child
and family psychia-
trist (on the effects of
continual fear); Dr.
Ian Carr, president
of Physicians for :
Social Responsibility; i
and others. A prom- EUGENE CARROL
inent Soviet physician is expected to lectur’
on the impact of nuclear war during Ei
day’s session.

Chairpersons for the various sessions
include Dr. William Webber, dean of medi
cine, UBC; Dr. Judith Hail, director of clit)
ical genetics at Grace Hospital; and Dr.
John Ruedy, chief physician at St. Paul’s.

The final day of the conference compris
action-oriented workshops, each designed
for various groups, including educators,
scientists, lawyers, journalists and others. —

Conference organizers also plan a special
lecture for oct. 20 at 8 p.m. by Dr. Howatd
Hiatt, dean of the Harvard School of Public
Health on “Misplaced Priorities; The.
Human Costs of the Arms Race.” ‘As with)
the other conference sessions, it will be at the
UBC Instructional Resources Centre.

Registration for the three-day conferenct,
is $60 for the general public, $30 for students,
seniors and unemployed and $90 for practis-
ing physicians, if applications are in before
Sept. 28. Fees rise to $75, $35: and sy
respectively after that date.

Further information is available from!
Physicians for Social Responsibility, B.C.
Chapter, Box 35426, Station E, Vancouver,
B.C. V6M 4G8.

Registration, including the appropriate
fee, should be sent to UBC Centre for Con
tinuing Education, 5997 Iona Dr., Van
couver, V6T 2A4. ; 7

|
|