Pictured above, at the top, is the mushroom cloud arising from the atomic bomb dropped at Hiroshima, Japan on August 6, 1945.
Below it, is a picture of what was left of Nagasaki after the second bomb was dropped on Nagasaki three days later.
President Truman believed that the bombs needed to be dropped in order to force Imperial Japan to surrender, avoiding the death of tens of thousands of Americans and others. I've always believed he was right.
But it cannot be easily dismissed that at least 129,000 died as a result of the bombings. It was the worst humanly-produced conflagration in history.
That fact made the current president's statement earlier today regarding North Korea's apparent development of miniature nuclear weapons that can be projected via ICBMs. He promised that if North Korea didn't back down from its nuclear weapons program, it "will be met with fire, fury and frankly power the likes of which this world has never seen before."
Never been seen before? Does that anticipate a use of force that is bigger than Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
North Korea's regime needs to be dealt with and restricted. But I pray that doing so won't require anything like Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
[Blogger Mark Daniels is pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]
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