World War II ended 71 years ago today with the surrender of Japan. O’Dwyer staffer Sharlene Spingler and actor Steven Seagal took part in a ceremony commemorating the deaths of more than 120,000 in atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
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Hiroshima was bombed Aug. 6, 1945 and Nagasaki three days later. Japan surrendered Aug. 14 but historians record both Aug. 14 and Aug. 15 as end-of-the war days.
Spingler, Associate Publisher and Editor of O’Dwyer’s, has long been a friend of actor Seagal who had lived in Japan a third of his life and married and raised children there.
He brought Spingler to a ceremony in San Francisco July 16, 2005, which was the 60th anniversary of the detonation of the first atomic bomb in Alamogordo, N.M. It was held on the pier next to which was docked the Japanese Tall Ship Nippon Maru.
The ship transported the original atomic flame taken by a monk from the burning embers in Hiroshima and kept alive in a monastery for 60 years. At least 80,000 died instantly in the Aug. 6, 1945 blast while 40,000+ died in the Aug. 9 blast.
Other estimates are that from 90,000 to 146,000 died in Hiroshima and from 39,000 to 80,000 in Nagasaki.
As of 2005 there were 270,000 “hibakusha” or bomb survivors still living in Japan.
Monks Walked 1,600 Miles to Test Site
The monks believed that “good and evil happen in circles,” says an article on the event that appeared under Spingler’s byline in The Day, New London, on July 31, 2005. The monks then walked 1,600-miles from S.F. to the Trinity Test Site where the flame was extinguished. Sponsoring the commemoration was the Global Nuclear Disarmament Fund.
The atomic flame was passed to Japanese Senator Shoukichi Kina who gave it to Seagal who passed it back to the monks so they could begin their walk to the Trinity site.
The atomic flame was also passed from a Hiroshima survivor to Dr. Bruce Blair of the multinational Center for Defense Information, Washington, D.C.
Seagal gave the Fund its first $100,000 in a bid to have Russia disarm its nuclear weapons. He told the ceremony, “It is the responsibility of every global citizen to rid the world of this imminent threat. I have been blessed to know many of the individuals who survived the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It is by their example of spirit and strength that drives my determination to make this world a safer place.”
Says the Spingler article: “They believe that by bringing the flame back to its source, they will close the circle of destruction in a peaceful manner while opening up a new circle of peace.
Spingler’s mother worked during the 1940’s on the Manhattan Project, which created the atomic bomb.
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