Friday, April 8, 2016

Journal 8 Omar Shehadeh

The thing that struck me as the most meaningful from the concluding two chapters of Hiroshima was the sheer amount of devastation that the Atomic bomb inflicted onto the people of Hiroshima and the toll WW2 has on the Japanese people. While Dr. Sasaki was able to prosper after the war he is a sharp contrast with the rest of the five survivors in our book. they each lost everything. But due to their different circumstances. Hershey put it eloquently in a quote from Dr. Sasaki's favorite lecture. "Our life is short, we don't live twice; the whirlwind will pick up the leaves and spin them, but then it will drop them and they will form a pile." While Dr. Sasaki's grew, everyone's own pile seemed to be permanently destroyed. One thing I think is really sad is the condition which the survivors were treated with. "Among his many other complaints, he had syphilis, which he had apparently caught from transfusions in one of his hospital stays; it was cured eventually." Conditions were so horrendous that Father Kleinsorge actually acquired syphilis from blood transfusion treatments meant to reduce his radiation sickness. So now he had to deal with a new disease on top of his destroyed immune system. This alone could have killed him, yet he clung to life and fought on. The thing I want to take away from this book and never forget is the determination and strength that these Hiroshima survivors had. Even after having a bomb dropped on top of them and everything they ever owned completely obliterated from the Earth, they continued to fight with everything they had to live, and the majority of them tried to help people along the way as much as they could. 



The League of Nations meeting in Geneva during 1936.
As I begun my research, I found out that the League of Nations was actually first proposed following the devastation that Europe had just went through at the conclusion of WW1 by Woodrow Wilson in a speech to congress on January 8, 1918. It was the conclusion of fourteen points that Wilson had for congress which "called for a “general association of nations…formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike.” Even though he proposed the idea, the United States never actually entered into the League of Nations which was one of the big reasons that it never was able to reach its full potential.  Wilson, along with many other politicians across the ocean and at home as well called for the formation of this League to ensure peace and the security of its members. Wilson actually attended the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, becoming the first president of the united states to travel overseas in an official capacity.  He argued with great fervor the formation of the league and eventually was able to push for its charter to become a part of the treaty of Versailles. The belief of Wilson was that the League would be able to ensure peace after the war and establish security and recognition of every power within it. The League would consist of five major chairs with four of those revolving, an international court of justice, an assembly for each of its members, and most importantly to Wilson, it would guarantee the territorial integrity and political independence of member states. Republicans believed that this would be an un-neccesary expensive and reduce the security of our nation so they lobbied heavily to block it from passing through congress. In congress, the treaty of Versailles was rejected with a 49-35 senate vote and later Warren Harding was elected as President with a strong campaign opposing the league. 




Source: https://history.state.gov/milestones/1914-1920/league

1 comment:

  1. Wilson is one of the most overlooked former Presidents in my opinion. He really had grand visions for the US and the world, and he probably dreamed too big, but I think leaders should dream big. Nice work, Omar!

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