Hiroshima: The Aftermath (2015) User Reviews

A true glimpse of history - strongly recommended!

[rotweiler · 9/10 · 20 March 2019]

I'm not certain the other reviewer (or at least a person who commented) on this film actually watched the video. The comment so far removed from reality I can only assume this was the rambling of someone who feels ashamed of what the US military did to the people of Hiroshima (and Nagasaki, for that matter).

This is one of the only historically true documentaries on this horrible event that doesn't include images of US bodies washed-up on some island - in an attempt to justify killing all those tens of thousands of civilians in the name of "saving US lives".

This documentary is horrible. The images are disturbing. But this documentary is real - which makes it all the more disturbing.

Definitely food for thought

[deanmh-93983 · 8/10 · 19 October 2019]

I had never heard the term 'Hibakusha' before. I never realized the stigma and discrimination that the survivors of the two atomic bombings faced in Japan. I never knew that no one would hire them, that few people would allow them to marry and tha even their offspring were treated with disdain. I had also never co side red the possibility of our military pushing the use of the bombs as a show of strength and muscle flexing to impress the world and put fear in the hearts of our future possible enemies. Now, after living through the aftermath and discoveries of the lies that lead to the Vietnam War and the Iraq war it does raise a question in my mind. Was it really absolutely necessary to drop those bombs?

My own father-in-law was in the first group of American Army troops to occupy Hiroshima. His entire life he frequently had spots of skin cancer removed from his body. An abnormally large number of men in his battalion died from colon and lung cancer. Upon returning to the United States, their battalion was immediately disbanded. Reparations were sought by the group eventually. And amazingly, all records of that group of American Army soldiers were "destroyed in an unfortunate fire." The only thing that remained of his military record was his induction and discharge records.

I know what I've been told my entire life and now I question it. Did they (Japan) deserve this retribution because of Pearl Harbor and their war atrocities? Would 1 million American's have died in an invasion? Was Japan blockaded and starving? Could we have waited out their surrender? Did we refuse to alter the terms of surrender even with complete capitulation that could have prevented this?

I guess we will never know the answers. And that alone makes a documentary of this sort necessary as a warning to us about ever using that type of bomb ever again. I pray that when America's Greatest Generation and we post war we baby-boomers are gone that the world will not forget.

Thought provoking and heartfelt to civilian victims

[imdb-179-789200 · 10/10 · 4 January 2020]

Provided a different perspective that was thought-provoking and heartfelt, so sad. Anyone complaining this is anti-American propaganda should consider putting their ego aside and have some empathy to real victims from this event, we cannot deny the damage this did. Great documentary.

Not History But a Biased Polemic

[rulesixtytwo · 1/10 · 13 November 2018]

This documentary definitely wasn't put together with objective reporting being the goal. There were many half truths, distortions, and outright lies. The writer and director Lucy van Beek definitely had an agenda that wasn't related to being an unbiased historian. If you are looking for a documentary on Hiroshima that at least attempts to be fair and balanced, bypass this one.

Poorly researched

[ddrennon-5-742052 · 3/10 · 31 January 2020]

I think it is important that we tell the Hiroshima story, and remember the stories of the survivors, lest we forget the horrible consequences of using nuclear weapons.

The images are difficult to watch, but we must see them.

However.

This film seems sketchily researched. The premise that Allied forces dug up barrels of German uranium, shipped it to Hanford for processing and thence to Los Alamos where it kick-started a stalled American Manhattan Project seems...unlikely. Similarly I very much doubt that a doctor in Hiroshima treated Japanese soldiers "returning from the front". The notion that the Japanese government took opinion polls during the war strikes me as pure fantasy.

Draw whatever conclusions you like about the filmmaker and the sources which were used.

Tell the Hiroshima story. Tell the hard truths.

But don't rely on this film for enlightenment.

The Worst Sort Of Propaganda

[chas437 · 1/10 · 10 September 2019]

This is garbage. Its the definition of revisionist history. Its like they went through all the historic documents and picked the ones that fit their anti-American agenda.

Any responsible WW2 historian should be dismayed. The truth was that the bombs was the only option, and it ultimately served the purpose of showing the world how futile nuclear warfare was. As a result, there hasn't been a major was since.

This is a filthy lie.

Misleading

[Skalborg · 1/10 · 26 April 2019]

Claims to be "The Real History" and then proceeds to consider no other viewpoint but their own. This would have been better framed as "another side of the story."

Good Film to watch

[oliverdearlove · 1/10 · 22 July 2022]

I join the many reviewers who say this film is garbage. This film has driven me to attempt a review - so few of mine are published. One reviewer rejects the idea of the German atomic project helping the American one. He is right it didnt. Good review of the Nazi nuclear project by David Irving 1967 The Virus House. ( The later neo-Fascist).

I recommend this film as the data presented is good and some fresh. The way it is turned into information is not suspect, it is wrong. See above.

It is instructive for someone interested and with background knowledge to see how the data is distorted.

There are only two photographs of Hiroshima, immediately after. They identified and interviewed him. Then they failed to stress his photos were the only ones as the scientific plane 'failed'. This would have been a good entry for the lost neutron flux measurements. The neutron meter was lost for 50 y. It was later found in someone's garage and they assessed it as little better than a watering or jerry can. 'Lost' because they knew the data generated was useless.

Memories of what happened today are different to those memories of things that happened 50 y ago. This seemed very obvious when listening to the eye witnesses.

Contemporaries I agree, said " Dont go to Hiroshima, there's nothing there", unlike the ruins of Berlin or London. However, most of the concrete buildings survived upright, and so the massive spaces in between were burnt out wooden stock. These had been cleared by the time the Americans landed in Sep 1945. ( dumped in the river) So the timing of the photographs are vital. There were a few of the 'lost photographs'. A Japanese photographer went out within minutes and photographed the chaos and then regretted photographing so many who were dead or would die. However they show the scene after the bomb and before the firestorm.

A secret monitoring committee has identified the special purpose of Enola Gay and its group - and gathered information and passed it on. Nothing happened. Enola Gay was identified in flight but not shot down, inexplicably. No, the explanation was that Japan had no air defence by that time.

The standard view is "All communication with Hiroshima ceased at 0815". This was due to the unknown Electro Magnetic Pulse. They decided to send someone to see, but it would take 3 days to get down there owing to American bombing. A secret committee knew the secret but told no one, is less credible

The account of the Cabinet meeting where the Emperor breaks the dead lock is completely wrong. Other things happend.

Worst 'revisionist' view of an historical FACT !

[Elisabetha49 · 1/10 · 5 August 2022]

Where the HELL did they FIND that the German-Nazis where researching Atomic Bomb Manufacture + that they WERE stockpiling URANIUM (ore) in vats ... while concentrating their 'imports' on "" Heavy Water "" from (occupied) Norway ... ? !

Lucy Vanbeek is a pathetic 'spreader' of far-out U. S. theories ... NO HISTORY here : where is (the) ATLANTIS again ... with the DINOSAURS we expect , just before the (?) FLOOD, right ? ...

Revisionist Garbage

[jaigurudavid · 1/10 · 24 September 2019]

This so-called documentary is a completely biased, revisionist account of the decision and mission to use the first atomic weapon on Japan. The narrative implies that Japan was going to surrender anyway but the Americans ignored their peace feelers to that the bomb could be used in action. What rubbish. If they were going to surrender, then they should have surrendered before the bomb could be dropped.

What particularly galls me are the scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project and have since spoken out against the use of the bomb. They were completely happy eating their government-issued roast beef and lamb and ice cream at Los Alamos, and they took their paychecks for working on the bomb from the U.S. government with pleasure, and now they have the nerve to play holier than thou? The old scientist in the film that hinted he should have sabotaged the bomb should be charged with treason.

Don't watch this film, unless you want to be either angered or entertained by the anti-American, ham-fisted, bleeding-heart propaganda.

P.S. Spoiler alert. The Japanese started the war, and the U.S. won it, in part thanks to the bomb.