Return to resources for BANG! and Nuclear Fictions.
Last update: 6 August 1997.
History: "a branch of knowledge that records and explains past events." Memory: "a particular act of recall or recollection."
Thoroughness of either definition notwithstanding, it strikes me that these two words represent the essence of the debate about World War II and public history. I would like to make a brief argument for a courageous application of the former.
Those (Americans) who participated in World War II have emotionally charged memories and feel a certain proprietary relationship over how those memories are interpreted by historians. With regard to the Enola Gay, we find airmen who oppose discussions of Japanese body counts and bristle at any suggestion that nuclear weapons might have been overkill. In fact, much of the "dialogue" about these issues seems to involve some form of the assertion: "You weren't there so you could not possibly understand." By this account we can throw the bulk of what we call history into the trash bin.
Memories are vital to understanding the history of World War II, but memories do not encompass the whole history, and alone they provide no analysis and only faulty explanation. If we explain Hiroshima and Nagasaki according to 1945 military strategy, or ask for a rationale for using the bomb from the perspective of a GI, and we stop at that, then we are in effect still fighting the war. We are sacrificing history in the name of memory.
This is a tragedy and a travesty both. A tragedy because the longer we avoid a public dialogue about World War II from a genuinely historical perspective, the easier it is for our society to turn to those emotions and rationales as we confront problems in the future. A travesty because this represents an attempt by a purportedly advanced 20th century culture to justify barbarism.
Peace.
Kent Curtis
University of Kansas
broalex@falcon.cc.ukans.edu
Return to resources for BANG! and Nuclear Fictions.
Last update: 6 August 1997.