The Bomb

by Howard Zinn

As a World War II combat soldier, Howard Zinn took part in the aerial bombing of Royan, France. Two decades later, he was invited to visit Hiroshima and meet survivors of the atomic attack. In this short and powerful book, Zinn offers his deep personal reflections and political analysis of these events, their consequences, and the profound influence they had in transforming him from an order-taking combat soldier to one of our greatest anti-authoritarian, antiwar historians. This book was finalized just prior to Zinn's passing in January 2010, and is published on the sixty-fifth anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics, War, Japan, Essays, World War II

100 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2010

About the author

Howard Zinn was an American historian, playwright, philosopher, socialist intellectual and World War II veteran. He was chair of the history and social sciences department at Spelman College, and a political science professor at Boston University. Zinn wrote more than 20 books, including his best-selling and influential A People's History of the United States in 1980. In 2007, he published a version of it for younger readers, A Young People's History of the United States.

Zinn described himself as "something of an anarchist, something of a socialist. Maybe a democratic socialist." He wrote extensively about the civil rights movement, the anti-war movement and labor history of the United States. His memoir, You Can't Be Neutral on a Moving Train (Beacon Press, 1994), was also the title of a 2004 documentary about Zinn's life and work. Zinn died of a heart attack in 2010, at the age of 87.

Reviews

[Charity · Rating 5 out of 5]

My grandfather worked on the Manhattan Project.

He had lost a lot of cartilage in his knees playing football in college (we're talking leatherheads here...iron man football) and was, therefore, unable to fight in WWII. He managed to get a government job as a pipefitter down in Oak Ridge, TN and was told he was helping the war effort. He had never heard of Oak Ridge (no one did; it was a secret location then, not on any maps), but he moved my grandmother and two of my uncles down there and began working. They lived in silver government trailers, like everyone else, that my grandmother described as being "horrible tin cans" and had community washing areas for both clothes and selves. The rations were extremely tight and in order to go into Knoxville for supplies, one had to go through a series of checkpoints with armed guards.

My grandfather didn't know what he was building. He knew it was big. He knew it was important. But, he wasn't a scientist, just a laborer, so he was kept in the dark. The government made the announcement to the people at Oak Ridge about what had been built the night before they told the rest of the world.

I don't think my grandfather ever forgave himself. He had repeatedly said that he never would have participated in the building of the bomb, had he known what he was building. I think that was the point.

I've seen my grandparents' memory box from those days. I've looked at their ID badges and ration books. I've read some of their letters and heard their stories. However, nothing can really prepare you for the horrors (and I mean, horrors) of the bomb dropping. Howard Zinn, a former bombardier, really serves it up to you on a skewer of stomach-turning nastiness.

Some of the images relayed in The Bomb feel seared into my brain. I doubt I'll ever be able to hear the words Hiroshima or Nagasaki without those images springing to mind, cold chills running up and down my spine, and a lump forming in my throat. These crimes against humanity make me weep, nay, sob. For such a small book of essays, it packs a wallop of emotion.

I'll never be the same.

(First Reads Win)

[M · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Were Hiroshima and Nagasaki wiped out to make a point? We find it hard to comprehend the Holocaust that Germany committed, which perhaps can only be understood as intended to make a point about racial inferiority. Can we comprehend the killing of 200,000 people to make a point about American power?”

The possession of nuclear weapons is immoral

[Kym Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Bomb is a combination of older essays written by Howard Zinn which looks at the morality of the mass aerial bombings of civilian dense targets. Zinn was himself a bombardier during World War Two and spent most of his Post War life as a strong anti-war voice, both a historian and activist. Inside this brief book he cites as his main examples for the bloody futility of aerial bombing as being the destruction of Hiroshima and the pointless devastation of the French City of Royan both in 1945.

Zinn confronts the confused logic that a great many hold dear which states that nationality or birth determines whether one is guilty in war. And thus a credible target to be executed, so long as it is done under certain conditions. Those conditions being for example the bombing of a city which will kill thousands instantly in such a frightening manner, this is some how considered 'just' whereas the specific gassing of other citizens is unjust. Or that bayoneting a baby is immoral whereas dropping napalm on many children from high above is a necessity of warfare.

Ultimately however it is the victor who determines what is right and wrong as those vanquished are condemned to history, to stand judgement for all the ills of conflict. Zinn however uses quotations from both those critical of such conduct as well as the condemning sociopathic boasts from those in favour of such brutality. Zinn in his brief book condemns all the war makers, both victor and vanquished as both are responsible for the deaths of millions. Yet, the victors never face justice for their conduct and instead glorify it.

Zinn puts on paper in so many words a sincere and eye witness condemnation (his experiences from when he served in the USAAC 8th Air Force based in the UK during the War) of the bombings of citizens. Whether this happens to be with a fleet of bombers, a single nuclear device or as has been used in more recent times with an apparent 'smart' weapon system. He questions and blasts those who so would elect to indiscriminately destroy property and life, simply because it is deemed important to the 'war effort'.

The legitimacy of just how effective such aerial bombings are as far as strategic effectiveness goes is also addressed. The strategic validity of such mass murder is often the sole crux to the mass killers...bombers arguments. The calculations made by politicians and military strategists to justify the destruction of so much private property and savage slaughter of millions is sinister and yet despite the claims empirically it is flawed.

Did murdering millions of civilians in East Asia during both the Korean and Vietnam wars bring victory to the allies? Has the constant bombardment with cruise missiles, aircraft and drones stabilised the Middle East and defeated the insurgencies? Will it ever? Or is it simply the mechanical genocide of other human beings done with gloves on and from a far.

Zinn’s book asks such questions in so few pages because of this it is a very quick read. Too quick in fact as you wish to read more of what Zinn has to say. Not because he lacks depth in his argument, but because he is a talented writer and man who gets to the point with polite savagery. And because unfortunately this is a subject of tremendous magnitude and consequence, it is one that should be simply seen as right and wrong. Yet, many are educated to know better, to know that murdering innocent civilians is allowable so long as ‘we’ do it. Zinn disagrees. So should all of us.

I suggest this book to be read for any one who considers themselves and intelligent person. I say this because obedient considerations on such historical events are so well entrenched with many. And thoughts on such events as the bombings of Hamburg, Dresden or Nagasaki by the 'good guys' are of paramount importance for individuals to consider.

Many grow up with the assumption that the 'Hun' or 'Jap' were no good killers, who deserved a fiery death and it is precisely because of this crude out look that we now find ourselves fighting in so many unwinnable conflicts against concepts or caricatures. All the while real human beings die and suffer. If you hold a simplistic absolute world view that 'goodies' and 'baddies' are simply black and white, a view so determined by what National Government is in control, then you are ultimately on a path to condoning the death of so many innocents past, present and yet to be born.

A good an honest read.

86 %

[City Lights Booksellers & Publishers · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Though the great American historian Howard Zinn is no longer with us, his memory lives on with this excellent personal essay on the subject of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. . . . His book is a shining example of the Constitutionally protected ability to question what we have been told, and should be required reading for all patriotic Americans."
—Black Heart Magazine

"It's my favorite. . . . He wrote the book to remind himself and to remind us that anybody can throw the wrench in the machinery, and we often should." —Bill Moyer

"This is in all likelihood the final original book by long-time VFP member and WWII vet Zinn. It has a publication date of August 2010 to mark the 65th anniversary of America's two atomic bombings of Japan. The much-loved, greatly admired Zinn died in January, 2010 at 88, just a month after completing this volume."
—Will Shapira, Veterans for Peace

"Part history, part memoir, part sermon, The Bomb is meant to wake up citizens, to rouse them to reject 'the abstractions of duty and obedience' and to refuse to heed the call of war."
—Jonah Raskin, The Rag Blog

"Occasioned by the 65th anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, Zinn's final work (completed just before his death in January 2010), combines a discussion of the horrors of atomic warfare with a glimpse at the carnage in Royan, which included the deaths of over 1,000 civilians in one of the first uses of napalm. . . . Zinn's call to reject disproportionate violence in war remains unalloyed and relevant to today's conflicts."
—Brendan Driscoll, Booklist

"The late Howard Zinn’s new book The Bomb is a brilliant little dissection of some of the central myths of our militarized society."
—David Swanson, LA Progressive

"The path that Howard Zinn walked—from bombardier to activist—gives hope that each of us can move from clinical detachment to ardent commitment, from violence to nonviolence.”
—Frida Berrigan, WIN Magazine

"Zinn’s last book is a modest appeal to humanity: War is miserable, and we have to stop it."—Micah Uetricht, In These Times

"Throughout his academic career, his popular writings and work as an activist Zinn consistently, and often successfully, threw a wrench in the works of the US war machine. He may be gone, but through his powerful and passionate body of work—of which The Bomb is an excellent introduction—thousands of others will be educated and inspired to work for a more humane and peaceful world."—Ian Sinclair, Morning Star

"Zinn, the people’s historian, leaves us with words that bring together thought, action, and passion. His experience during World War II left him unpersuaded by the arguments of military necessity and the appeals to nationalism. We must refuse 'to be transfixed by the actions of other people, the truths of other times,' he writes in The Bomb. This 'means acting on what we feel and think, here, now, for human flesh and sense, against the abstractions of duty and obedience.'"—Marcus Raskin, Foreign Policy in Focus

“A bomb is highly impersonal. The dropper can kill hundreds, and never see any of them. ‘The Bomb’ is the memoir of Howard Zinn, a bomber in World War II who dropped bombs along the French countryside while campaigning against Germany. After learning of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Zinn now speaks out against the use of bombs and what it can do to warfare. Thoughtful and full of stories of an old soldier who regrets what he has done, ‘The Bomb’ is a fine posthumous release that shares much of the lost wisdom of World War II.”—James A. Cox, The Midwest Book Review

[George Polley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Comprised of two previously published essays on the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the French village of Royan at the end of World War Two plus a new Introduction by the author. Both attacks were justified and defended as necessary in bringing the wars with Germany and Japan to an end. Yet, as Zinn and others have shown, not everyone was in agreement with that. More likely the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were done to show the Soviets that we had the ultimate weapon. On the incendiary carpet bombing of the little village of Royan Zinn writes that "The evidence seems overwhelming that factors of pride, military ambition, glory and honor were powerful motives in producing an unnecessary military operation" that, like the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, because of the lack of viable military targets, were carried out against civilian populations to make a point: Resist us and you shall die.


In Humanity: a Moral History of the Twentieth Century (Yale University Press, September 1, 2001), British ethicist Jonathan Glover writes about "the moral slide" in reference to the decision during World War One to block aid shipments to the German people that caused thousands to die of starvation. From there it was a simple matter to push the envelope a little further and allow the bombing of civilians as a means of crushing an enemy's spirit and defeating him. Civilians, in other words, were now players in a military drama. Once frightened non-combatants, they were now an element military strategic planning, bargaining chips in an endgame that they was chosen for them by people they did not even know.


What Glover did in his masterwork, Howard Zinn did years earlier in his essay on the bombing of Hiroshima. "The strategic argument ... that there was no military necessity to use the bomb, is not enough. We need to confront the moral issue directly: faced with the horrors visited on hundreds of thousands of human beings by the massive bombings of modern warfare, can any military-strategic-political 'necessity' justify that?" (emphasis added). It is a question that each of us needs to ask ... and answer for ourselves.


In the Introduction, written in late 2009, Zinn brings the discussion into the present: "What you see over and over again in the news reports is the words 'suspected terrorist' or 'suspected al Qaeda' -- meaning that 'intelligence' is not sure whom we are bombing, that we are willing to justify the killing of a 'suspect' in Iraq or Afghanistan or Pakistan, something we would not accept from a police operation in New York or San Francisco (emphasis added). This suggests, to our shame, that the lives of people other than Americans are of lesser importance" (page 19).

[Hugo St-Pierre · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5

[Tammam Aloudat · Rating 5 out of 5]

There are historians that are contented to tell history as accurate as they can assimilate it and others that want to disrupt it, dig in it, turn it upside down, and make it tell us what to do and what not to do if we are to avoid repeating the past mistakes and suffering the its perils. Howard Zinn belongs to the second group, and he does what he does brilliantly.

I have enjoyed this book immensely, first because I read it immediately after finishing Hersey's Hiroshima (which Zinn quotes several times in this one) and, second, because it is not only a critical look at the use of the nuclear bomb which Zinn argues both that it wasn't needed strategically and is never needed morally, but also a look at his own time as a bombardier on a B-17 flying fortress during the Second World War. He was part of the bombing of Royan near Bordeaux in the last few weeks of the war in Europe.

Royan was another senseless and unnecessary aerial blanket bombing using another new weapon of WWII, this time napalm which was directed at a "stubborn German garrison" but ended up hitting the city for the second time in so many months. The bombing was shrugged by the military as a necessary evil, but that is hard to sell when scrutinised.

The two events examined and contrasted by Zinn put a clear view on our collective responsibility towards stopping collective evils of war. He acknowledges that while we might not have a positive guilt of conducting the crimes, we do have a negative guilt of not stopping them according to our means and ability. Throwing a wrench in the machine!

Zinn openly asks all of us to conduct acts of rebellion, and he argues it with a level minded insight that is eye opening.

[Christina · Rating 2 out of 5]

Eh. From the publisher's writeup, I thought this would be more of a personal account of Zinn's experiences as a WWII bombardier, but he hardly reflects upon his own involvement and instead just lectures about why bombs are bad and the history surrounding the atomic bombs dropped in Japan (in a repurposed essay), and then about the history of the bombing he was personally involved with, in Royan, France. Not as interesting as I'd hoped.

[Blackout · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great book and a concise review of the context in which the unnecessary bombings of Hiroshima, Nagasaki occurred. As usual it comes down to hubris, ego, revenge, sadism etc. When everyone is "just following orders" things can, and often do, go terribly wrong. And then you remember that those little bombs were nothing compared to what we have stockpiled all over the place today.

[Spicy T AKA Mr. Tea · Rating 4 out of 5]

I saw Oppenheimer this summer and was struck by his own moral contortions around the creation of the atomic bomb. I was so moved, I started reading the biography that the film is based on. In a high school research paper I wrote on the nuclear bombing of Japan, my recollection was that Oppenheimer was a villain to be despised because he never seemed to stop and consider the implications of his research. And that was my feeling about Oppenheimer until I saw the film this summer.

Anyway, after watching the film and feeling dissonance between those old feelings about a high school paper and the man, I wanted to understand a different perspective on the bomb from one of the greats: Howard Zinn. He was an amazing historian that really added to my perspective of the world by championing the voices from below. Howard also had the dubious honor of being one of the first if not the first of a group of aviators who dropped napalm on a village in France weeks before V-E Day. Howard's own moral contortion and honest appraisal are apparent in the second essay of this book. He acknowledges his role in what happened and provides insight into his decision to become a pacifist and anti-war activist.

The first essay, on the atomic bomb, is similar. Howard offers up recollections of the turmoil and human suffering left behind after the bombings in Japan citing several authors and reports that took oral histories or documented the destructive capacity of the bomb. He lays out with precision the ludicrous path to the decision to drop the bombs. He raises moral questions worth reckoning with; I agree wholeheartedly with doing away with nuclear weapons entirely. He doesn't say much about Oppenheimer other than the fact that he was the lead scientist and rejected a proposal to demonstrate the weapon away from civilian targets. And that is why I read this book. I wanted to understand a critical position on the bomb but also its creators. Howard doesn't really do that which was kind of a let down–but certainly not the point of his book. A good and quick read that lays out some of the reality of one of the worst crimes against humanity perpetrated by the US government.

[Jon Tijerina · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an excellent, slim volume. It comprises two introductions (one by Greg Ruggiero, the other by Zinn), and two of Zinn's essays -- "Hiroshima: Breaking the Silence", and "The Bombing of Royan". The latter also appears in Zinn's essay collection - Howard Zinn on War - a collection which had a huge impact on me, and one I can't recommend enough.

Zinn's first article considers two questions: 1) Did America truly need to detonate the two atom bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August, 1945? And, 2) if not, what can we learn from the documentary record, "to free us from the thinking that leads us to stand by (yes, as the German people stood by, as the Japanese stood by) while atrocities are committed in our name?" The answers to these questions are illuminating and infuriating.

Zinn's second article considers two Allied bombings on the French seaside town of Royan; one in January, the second in April of 1945. Zinn himself participated in the April mission, as a bombardier with the 490th Bomb Group, and his inquiry after the war as to the true purpose of these missions was what prompted him to write the essay. In the summer of 1966, he poured through the documentary evidence, in the rebuilt town library in Royan, and what he found led him to the conclusion, that the missions were largely driven by the desire for a display of military might on the part of the Allies.

I believe these articles should be read and taught in every school in America -- perhaps if they were, many more of us would be vociferous in our opposition to American intervention and imperialism today. I hope those who read this book are able to come away with a different perspective on the "righteousness of war", particularly that "good war", WWII.

[Gregory Jones · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brief, but powerful.

What I like most about Zinn is that he's not afraid to address a topic head on. There's no indirect pedantry here. It's an anti-war book that discusses the cost of war in direct, damning terms.

The unfortunate thing about a book like this is that it doesn't account for what would have happened if the allies didn't drop "the bomb." Further, it doesn't account for the conditions that created German and Japanese versions of fascism. The fascists of those countries needed to be stopped with a force more brutal than the armies that they were wielding.

Zinn imagines a world in which "we" stop the cycle. He imagines disarmament for the sake of peace. I admire such optimism, but it doesn't seem to match the human nature that I have studied throughout my career.

[rndgmoat · Rating 3 out of 5]

Zinn isn't a great prose stylist, so the essay format isn't his strong suit. He's a pamphleteer and a social justice crusader, not a contrarian intellectual like Gore Vidal or Christopher Hitchens. Still, I found the first part of this book a nice distillation of ideas that challenge status quo assumptions about American history and American militarism. The type of people who read these books won't learn anything new, but there is something to be said for a concise sermon that confirms your preconceptions and affirms your moral righteousness. Unfortunately, I found the second part of the book--an attempt to explore the bombing of Royann in an academic fashion--bizarrely tacked on and not that compelling.

[Kevin Wright · Rating 4 out of 5]

These two short essays are ostensibly about bombings in WWII (Hiroshima and Royan, respectively), and the accounts are concise and well-researched, as well as eloquent and moving. But, really, these essays chart the transformation of Zinn's consciousness and the awakening of his moral conviction. A beautiful parting gift before his death and a message that is sadly relevant years later. Still, there is hope. One of my favorite quotes: "Against the claims of a violent 'human nature' there is enormous historical evidence that people, when free of a manufactured nationalist or religious hysteria, are more inclined to be compassionate than cruel."

[Michael Patton · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book should have been controversial. But I guess it's hard to be controversial when you've been marginalized. Consider this bombshell: according to Zinn, the U.S. could have signed a peace treaty with Japan months before the Hiroshima bombing. The sticking point? We demanded they give up their emperor. Yeah, that's right--they've still got an emperor. Also interesting is what he says about the bombing of Nagasaki. And our first "practice runs" with napalm--of which he was a part.

[Joshua · Rating 5 out of 5]

I always wondered about the questions this books asks as a younger man, and this was the best exploration of them I've so far found. It's such a sticky issue in history, such a monumental turning point in the world's thinking that it deserves a closer look, this book does that, and I think, does it well. There's something about Zinn's writing that keeps me captivated, and his perspective that makes me think anew. I would really hope more people read his writing.

[Dennis Robbins · Rating 5 out of 5]

“More and more in our time, the mass production of massive evil requires an enormously complicated division of labor. No one is positively responsible for the horror that ensues.” Howard Zinn reflects on the purpose of mass bombing of civil populations and particularly the destruction of Hiroshima. As bombardier in World War II he joined the war effort to fight fascism. He views are insightful and rarely discussed. How can anyone be fighting for “good” by incinerating children?

[Lucy Garcia · Rating 5 out of 5]

We, Americans, need every word NOW

Does massive bombing ever work for true victories of good over evil? Is war ever a just war? How are people brought into acceptance of war? What is our duty in supporting or stopping war?
READ THIS NOW.

And start the work of unlinking populations from mass murders, and start the work of reuniting us with our own flesh and blood, our own understanding.

[Mashal Buhamad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read Arabic translation of this book. Translated by Dr. Hamad Al-Easa. This book changed my view about the world and the war justification. War, and killing by brain washing about the other side. Making the other side less of human. The world is a nasty place. Never go with the flow think always thing about right and wrong

[Gabriela Svagr · Rating 5 out of 5]

So sad.

[John Murphy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zinn presents us with a touching vignette of nuclear disarmament and peace advocacy. You should certainly read this if you are a fan of Zinn, but the information it presents is fairly well known.

[Geof · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brief two-chapter "pamphlet" about the arguably objectionable decisions to drop atomic bombs on Japan and to drop napalm on Royan, France late in World War II.

[Lin · Rating 4 out of 5]

My interest in the subject was awakened after visiting the National WWII Museum in New Orleans and hearing extensive personal accounts. The museum does not invoke controversy over acts committed but merely states casualties and glorifies the war effort with its exhausted memorabilia. I'm not surprised any of Zinn's work isn't sold in the gift shop. Instead it's adorned with countless Rosie the Riveter souvenirs and some Holocaust survivor artwork on the side. The Hiroshima & Nagasaki section at the museum was quite small to my disappointment. It's obvious what the gift shop tried to sell to me is different than Zinn's sell. Though I feel that the experience juxtaposes nicely with "The Bomb".

"The Bomb" is easy to follow along and thought provoking.. definitely recommend.

[Amanda · Rating 5 out of 5]

A devastating must-read.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

City Lights Open Media Series has done the U.S. people a service in publishing historian Howard Zinn’s The Bomb, a two-part pamphlet that is a contribution to critical thinking about war, and about one of its modern manifestations, that of high-altitude bombing.

Part 1 is Zinn’s essay on the atomic bombings of Japan and part 2 is about his own wartime participation in and later retrieval of the history of the Allied napalm-bombing of a French town, Royan. Both essays could be read in less than a couple of hours but it will take a lifetime to integrate their implications in our personal and collective lives.

In his first essay, Zinn reminds fellow citizens of the enormity of unnecessary damage and destruction done by the two U.S. atomic bombings of Japanese civilians. Statistics point to some 200,000 killed immediately by the two bombs. But Zinn stresses that “we need personal testimonies, not statistics to free us from our numbness: Only with those scenes in our minds can we judge the distressingly cold arguments that go on now, sixty-five years later, about whether it was right to send those planes out those two mornings in August of 1945. That this is arguable is a devastating commentary on our moral culture” (26).

For example, in the immediate aftermath of the bombing, a Japanese man said to a filmmaker: “I ordered the driver to stop, with the funeral pyres still burning in the city, and turned to the American soldiers: ‘Look there. That blue light is women burning. It is babies burning. Is it wonderful to see the babies burning?’” (52).

Zinn’s second essay is based on research he did in the mid-1960s about the French town of Royan, which he had helped bomb in the spring of 1945. The official line was that it was a military necessity to bomb the German soldiers garrisoned in the vicinity of Royan, even though the end of the war was clearly in sight. The task for Zinn and his fellow pilots: “…to bomb pockets of German troops remaining in and around Royan, and that in our bomb bays were thirty 100-pound bombs containing “jellied gasoline,” a new substance (now known as napalm)” (66).

After the town was bombed for three days, the German soldiers surrendered. Practically all the buildings of the town had been destroyed. Zinn notes that “[t]he evidence seems overwhelming that factors of pride, military ambition, glory, and honor were powerful motives in producing an unnecessary military operation” (80).

After his participation in the European theater of the war, Zinn had a leave for some weeks before he was to join the effort in the Pacific. Reunited with his wife, he noted that one day in August they read the headlines about Hiroshima: “I remember our reaction: we were happy. We didn’t know what an atom bomb was, but clearly it was huge and important and it foretold an end to the war against Japan and if so I wouldn’t be going to the Pacific, and might soon be coming home for good” (19). Thus, he was like countless Americans who were jubilant or relieved that the bombs ended the war.

About the bombing of Royan, Zinn recalls, “From our great height, I remember distinctly seeing the bombs explode in the town, flaring like matches struck in fog. I was completely unaware of the human chaos below” (67). Earlier in the book, he writes more specifically that being such a pilot means “seeing no human beings, hearing no screams, seeing no blood, totally unaware that down below there might be children dying, rendered blind, with arms or legs severed”(18).

Over the decades, Zinn went from being this thoughtless and just-war bombardier to a critical citizen and historian: By the period of U.S. B-52 carpet bombing in Indochina in the 1960s-1970s, Zinn had become experienced in questioning authority, refusing obedience to the war machine, and facing the victims of U.S. violence.

Zinn was able to break through the nationalist propaganda that conditions us to avert our gaze from or minimize U.S. belligerence. He offers us a simple, though demanding task: “We can reject the belief that the lives of others are worth less than the lives of Americans, that a Japanese child, or an Iraqi child, or an Afghani child is worth less than an American child” (63).

[Brian Napoletano · Rating 4 out of 5]

Zinn's personal experiences as an Air Force pilot in the second World War seemed to give him unique insight into the forces that compel people to tolerate something as savage and murderous as modern warfare. His account of the devastation the atom bomb visited on the countless innocent victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the way the media cooperated with the government to keep this reality silent in the US for 65 years now makes a compelling case for never again entrusting politicians with the power to wage war, regardless of the excuses that their intellectuals and their media may offer.

The introduction, with its powerful and profound call for an end to war, makes for a fitting farewell note to the world from a man who has given so much of his life to the struggle for justice and a better world. Seamlessly blending the scholarly aptitude and ruthless integrity of a universally respected historian with the warmth and passion of a humanitarian, both his revelatory account of the unconscionable decision to use an atomic weapon on the population of Hiroshima and his autobiographical account of the bombing of Royan vividly reinforces the message of the introduction---that it is the innocent, and most importantly our children, who suffer more than anyone the ravages of war. Both accounts also dispel the lies behind phrases such as "surgical strike" and "smart bomb" that the media and politicians use in their efforts to convince Americans that modern air-based warfare is something other than the savage and relentless destruction of entire communities by people whose sole concern is the economic and political dominance of the American Empire.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

A critical look at the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by author and historian Howard Zinn who served as a bombardier in Europe during WWII. The short book is comprised of two essays, one focused on Japan, the other his own experience with napalming the French town of Royan. Be sure to read the preface by Greg Ruggiero and the introduction by Zinn, completed shortly before his death.

"Howard loved small acts of rebellion. He loved them because it's through small acts that all big change begins, and shifting historical focus from the wealthy and powerful to the ordinary person was perhaps his greatest act of rebellion and incitement. For Howard, to refuse to comply with injustice is to participate in the making of the people's history, and to stand up, speak out, argue against official narratives, form oppositional networks, take to the streets and disobey are among our non-negotiable rights and the more people we connect with while we rebel, the greater the joy."

But it's the last three paragraphs of the book with their alarming prescience and disturbing relevance that make this book a haunting and essential read.

[Jesse Houle · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can't remember the last time I finished a book in one day. This was a quick read indeed.

As usual, he does a very good job backing up his point of view with a combination of facts, personal accounts of his own and others, and some basic moral/philosophical stuff. He did a great job of showing that Hiroshima and Nagasaki as well as many bombings around Europe, most especially a raid in which he participated upon Royan, were unnecessary and brutal massive acts based on vengeance and disturbingly contrary to the idea of 'the good war.'

Using these as a foundation for a general total anti-war stance is where he ends up as he has in anything else of his I've read. I think it's important to recognize flaws and hypocrisy and to question violence at all times. In general I'm fundamentally opposed to violence. But when it comes to WWII it's hard to think that the Nazis would have ever been stopped from murdering and assimilating as much of the globe as Hitler desired if they were combated with Gandhian or MLK-esque tactics. The notion of a 'good war' is asinine, I will agree, as war is inherently disgusting and the product of evil. And carpet bombings, napalm and nuclear strikes are appallingly, unacceptably revolting. At the same time, as much as I would like to, I can't subscribe to the notion that staying out of WWII entirely would have been the better choice.

[Ollie · Rating 3 out of 5]

What on earth could justify the use of an atomic bomb or the devastation of thousands of innocent lives?

In The Bomb, Zinn considers the consequences of using the atomic bomb in WWII. Short and to the point, Zinn argues that there was little justification for using the bomb considering that Japan was about to surrender, that the damage caused by it was unusually cruel, and that using it basically contradicts any claim that we were using to prove our moral superiority.

The second half of the book is also a bit unique where Zinn analyses the bombing of Royan (in which he was involved as a bomber pilot), and concludes, as can be expected, that its bombing was completely unnecessary considering how little strategic value Royan had and how many innocents lost their lives. Zinn also claims there was a bit of a cover up and admittance by higher officials that the bombing of Royan, in the context of the current state of the war, was a mistake. Maybe the whole point of bombing Noyan was to try out a new weapon Napalm.

This being one of the last books (maybe THE last book?) Zinn worked on before his death, it's more obvious than ever that the world is a worse place now that he's gone.

[Andy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A simple book with great meaning. A return to the Open Media Pamphlet Series that I haven't read from in some time. The Bomb starts with a discussion about the use of the atomic weapons on Hiroshima and Nagasaki and how, even known at the time, they were not necessary to win the war. The Japanese, in fact (but whose facts are we looking at? Maybe Zinn's reading of history/events is a bit off.), were on the verge of surrender and that, possibly, the bombs were used on the Japanese but the target was the Soviets - to let them know what we had for them should they try to come after the US. Another reminder of the lies politicians and military leaders will tell and the lengths to which they will go to test new weapons and add more glory to their resumes. Not every war should be avoided and some must be fought and, of course, there will be innocents hurt and killed but to continue with the slaughter when both sides know the outcome and one side is on the verge of surrender is unspeakable barbarism.