Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the Nuclear Age

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Reflections on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the nuclear age gave birth to two publications. The first book, Genbaku no kioku (A-bomb memories), explores the way Tokyo has exploited the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki as a means of inducing postwar Japanese collective identity. The study shows how Japan has been guided in its war memories by the government’s attempts to manipulate A-bomb memories into the country’s victim consciousness rather than to help overcome the past. The second book, Okinawa no kioku (Living memories in Okinawa), examines how the nuclear umbrella was constructed for East Asia over, and against, mainland Japanese and Okinawan reluctance and participation. This study in public diplomacy also explores why the nuclear umbrella metaphor appears to have details that are ambiguous, but productive.