How ironic then, Niebuhr observed, that a nation that asserted its innocence so emphatically developed and deployed the atomic bomb: “Thus an ‘innocent’ nation finally arrives at the ironic climax of its history. It finds itself the custodian of the ultimate weapon which perfectly embodies and symbolizes the ambiguity of physical warfare” (492). The “shining city upon a hill” ushered in the age of nuclear warfare.
