The following speech was read by Dave Webb (Leeds CND) on 9th August 2025, to commemorate the lives lost in the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Leeds is one of the 8,509 cities in Mayors for Peace, these and thousands more towns and cities around the world are remembering the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
80 years ago today, the last atomic bomb was dropped in combat. Let’s hope it was the last.
As this plaque by the tree planted by the Mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 2003 says, we also commemorate all those killed in armed conflicts since 1945, including those being fought now in the Middle East, Ukraine, Africa and all the others that we hear little about.
80 years after two American atomic bombs caused death, destruction and injury on a scale not seen before, we have never been closer to the possibility of a nuclear apocalypse. Today’s nuclear weapons are vastly more powerful and could end civilization and devastate the climate.
Despite international agreements to disarm, nuclear powers continue to modernize their arsenals. The UK is spending hundreds of billions of pounds building and maintaining new nuclear-armed submarines and we are once again hosting US nuclear bombs at Lakenheath.
In addition, more nations are expressing interest in nuclear arms, and nuclear threats are surfacing in ongoing conflicts.
World leaders seem to have forgotten, or are ignoring, the lessons of 80 years ago.
They have also ignored the advice of 70 years ago. In 1955, when, one year after the United States tested a hydrogen bomb 1,000 times more powerful than the bomb used on Hiroshima, an international group of scientists warned that “H-bombs might quite possibly put an end to the human race.”
At that time, much like today, a Cold War was escalating rapidly and scientists, led by Betrand Russell and Albert Einstein urged world leaders to avoid war at any cost. and called for direct, open dialogue between scientists and policy makers from around the world. They posed the question: “Shall we put an end to the human race; or shall mankind renounce war?” and urged leaders to: “Remember your humanity and forget the rest.”
The Russell-Einstein Manifesto prompted the beginning of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, which, together with physicist Joseph Rotblat, received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1995 for laying the groundwork for numerous nuclear weapons agreements, including the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty.
As we have heard, the Hibakusha, the survivors of the two atomic bombs dropped on Japan, cannot forget their experiences and have not stayed silent. In 1956, along with Pacific nuclear test victims, they formed the Japan Confederation of A- and H-Bomb Sufferers Organisations, known as Nihon Hidankyo and dedicated their lives to preventing nuclear war.
Around 650,000 people survived the bombings but, only around 99,130 now remain in Japan, with more in Korea and elsewhere. Their testimony has been vital and has not gone unheeded.
In 1957 the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) was formed following an article in the New Statesman titled “Britain and the nuclear bombs” by J.B. Priestley. It followed the first hydrogen bomb test by Britain on Christmas Island and called for unilateral nuclear disarmament.
More recently, Hidankyo inspired the younger generation and helped launch the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) in 2007. ICAN combined youth energy with veteran campaigners to emphasize the humanitarian consequences of nuclear war. They hosted global conferences in Norway, Mexico, and Austria, and in 2014, Austria led a pledge to ban nuclear weapons—supported by 128 nations.
Their work was also endorsed by Pope Francis who delivered a 40-minute-long impassioned plea to the United Nations in September 2015, calling for an end to nuclear weapons and urging nations to protect unborn children.
The UN General Assembly eventually voted to negotiate a treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons. Despite a boycott by the nuclear weapons states, 122 countries adopted the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) in 2017.
That December ICAN received the Nobel Peace Prize for “drawing attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons.” Accepting the prize were Beatrice Fihn, ICAN’s Executive Director, and Setsuko Thurlow, a Hibakusha and survivor of the Hiroshima bombing.
Setsuko was 13 when she was pinned under a collapsed building after the blast.
“Suddenly,” she said, “I felt hands touching my left shoulder and heard a man saying: “Don’t give up! Keep pushing! I am trying to free you. See the light coming through that opening? Crawl towards it as quickly as you can.” As I crawled out, the ruins were on fire. Most of my classmates in that building were burned to death alive. I saw all around me utter, unimaginable devastation.”
The TPNW became law in 2021 and 94 (of 193) member states have now signed. The UK could become the first nuclear weapons state to sign.
As Setsuko Thurlow said: “All responsible leaders will sign this treaty. And history will judge harshly those who reject it.”
Beatrice Fihn echoed that, saying “the only rational course of action is to cease living under the conditions where our mutual destruction is only one impulsive tantrum away.”
Last year Nihon Hidankyo also received the Nobel Peace Prize in recognition of “its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again.”
The Nobel Committee praised their use of personal stories to mobilize public opposition, saying the Hibakusha help us “grasp the incomprehensible pain and suffering caused by nuclear weapons.”
And at the end of last year, UN secretary-general António Guterres set up a panel to study the physical and societal consequences of a nuclear war, and to publish a report by 2026.
So, it is important for people like us to be at places like this today, to remember the events of 80 years ago and the stories of the survivors and to commit to the Hibakusha’s vision.
As American anthropologist Margaret Mead said:
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
Like Setsuko Thurlow, we have to keep moving, keep pushing and, even in the darkest of times, keep sharing the light — so that this precious Earth may survive.
Photos provided by Neil Terry & peace groups all over Yorkshire.
