Fewer Than 10 American Veterans Who Saw Hiroshima and Nagasaki Are Still Alive. Their Stories Are Di

[Marlin]

Fewer Than 10 American Veterans Who Saw Hiroshima and Nagasaki Are Still Alive. Their Stories Are Disappearing.

https://www.military.com/fewer-than-10-american-veterans-who-saw-hiroshima-and-nagasaki-are-still-alive-their-stories-are-disappearing

[Core Content]

Fewer than 10 American service members who entered Hiroshima and Nagasaki as occupation troops in 1945 remain alive. These aging veterans are the last direct witnesses to the immediate human and structural devastation caused by the first wartime use of atomic weapons.

For decades, government secrecy orders prevented these personnel from discussing their radiation exposure and observations. Preserving their firsthand accounts provides valuable historical documentation regarding the long-term health effects of radiation on military personnel and the realities of nuclear warfare.

American occupation troops witnessed Hiroshima and Nagasaki weeks after the atomic bombs. Fewer than 10 are believed to remain alive.

Less than 10 American veterans who saw the Japanese cities after 1945 bombings are alive to tell the tale.

When Marine Archie Moczygemba entered Nagasaki in September 1945, the atomic bomb had been dropped little more than a month earlier. Eighty-one years later, he can still remember what he encountered inside a hospital.

"We walked through a hospital shortly after we arrived," Moczygemba told the "All the metal beds were just crumpled against one wall. The sheer power of the bomb was unthinkable."

Read the full article at Military.com:
https://www.military.com/fewer-than-10-american-veterans-who-saw-hiroshima-and-nagasaki-are-still-alive-their-stories-are-disappearing