Last week marked 74 years since the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were devastated by two atomic bombs. The attacks officially brought World War II to a close – at the cost of between 120,000 and 240,000 Japanese lives.
In Japan, the devastation of these attacks is remembered every year. Survivors’ accounts are run in all major newspapers. Speakers at remembrance events exhort listeners to never forget the tragedy, and to strive for peace, lest history eventually repeat itself.
However, as one Japanese foreign exchange student learned, not everyone in the world shares those views.
When 18-year-old Koga Nonoka (古賀野々華) of Fukuoka Prefecture entered Richland High School last year as an exchange student, one thing began to disturb her more and more as the year went on: the school’s logo, which is a picture of a giant letter “R” in front of a mushroom cloud.

Richland is close to the Hanford Nuclear Facility, which is where plutonium was enriched for the bombs that were dropped on the two cities. The town takes such pride in this that Richland High was fashioned almost as a paean to the atomic bomb attack on Japan. The mushroom cloud logo can be found on the school’s exterior, on the floors inside, and even on school jackets. To put an even blunter point on it, the school’s sports teams and students are called “Bombers,” and its domain name is richlandbombers.us. (The only evidence of the mushroom cloud logo on the site that I could find is in the left hand corner of the bottom of the front page.) The school’s YouTube channel is called “AtomicTV,” and its logo is an atomic bomb.
Subtlety, in other words, is lost on Richland High.
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As Asahi Shinbun reported recently, Koga found this logo particularly upsetting given her hometown:
「私にとってキノコ雲は犠牲者と平和を心に刻むもの」。福岡県は原爆の第1目標で、天候不良のため長崎になったことや犠牲者数などを説明し「私がここにいるのは、あの日が曇りだったから」と語った。
“For me, the mushroom cloud is something that reminds me of the victims, and of peace.” Noting that Fukuoka was the initial target for the nuclear attack, but was changed to Nagasaki due to bad weather, and noting the number of victims, Koga says, “I’m here because it was cloudy that day.”
Koga’s ill feelings didn’t go unnoticed by her fellow students. An episode of the school’s AtomicTV broadcast actually gave her a chance to speak her mind on what the mushroom cloud symbol meant for her as a Japanese person:
Atomic Town 5-30-19
Uploaded by AtomicTV on 2019-05-30.
Her opinion also garnered significant local press at the time, including write-ups in the Seattle Times, the local Tri-City Herald, and a number of Internet Web sites.
Despite Koga airing her opinion, however, things seem to remain status quo at Richland. Students interviewed about the logo describe the area’s contribution to the war effort as a point of pride, and find satisfaction in the explanation that the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki “ended the war.”
The View from Japan: “There Were Other Ways to End the War”
I didn’t see much mention of this story a few months ago when it broke in the US. It surfaced for me just a few days ago in Asahi’s piece, which was part of its extensive coverage of the 74th year of remembrance since the attacks.
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Curious as to what others from Japan thought of the logo, I put out a query in Japanese on Twitter. Some respondents, such as user Tadashi Kaneko, were somewhat sanguine about the logo, expressing a kind of shikata ga nai (“it can’t be helped”) world-weariness about it:
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I don’t think much about it. I understand the thinking that their use hastened the end of the war. I don’t think it glorifies it, but instead provides an opportunity to talk about the atrocity of war.
Others, however, weren’t so sanguine. User Claudius (クラウディウス) shot back that the war itself was a result of increasing restrictions that the Allies put on trade with Japan (the so-called “ABCD Encirclement” strategy):
🐟クラウディウス🐟 on X (formerly Twitter): “元々終戦交渉をしていた最中に、ソビエトに対してアッピールするだけの為に人体実験をした事を誇りに思うだなんて、残念に思います。ABCD包囲網がなければ開戦はしなかったんですよ。そこ、理解できていませんね。まだ、原子核軌道をシンボルにするなら良かったのに…。と、思いました! / X”
元々終戦交渉をしていた最中に、ソビエトに対してアッピールするだけの為に人体実験をした事を誇りに思うだなんて、残念に思います。ABCD包囲網がなければ開戦はしなかったんですよ。そこ、理解できていませんね。まだ、原子核軌道をシンボルにするなら良かったのに…。と、思いました!
I think it’s tragic that, in the middle of negotiations to end the war, they used us as human experiments to flex on the Soviets. There wouldn’t even have been a war if not for the ABCD Encirclement. They don’t get that, do they? They could’ve used an electron orbit as their symbol.
And user Kazu, airing her thoughts in both English and Japanese, added:
山本和奈 | Voice Up Japan on X (formerly Twitter): “私は不快に感じます。「戦争を終わらした」と言ったとしても、それを市民に向け、しかも2度も落とす必要性があったのか。I feel like it shows the ignorance of the people towards the survivors and victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs / X”
私は不快に感じます。「戦争を終わらした」と言ったとしても、それを市民に向け、しかも2度も落とす必要性があったのか。I feel like it shows the ignorance of the people towards the survivors and victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs
It’s discomforting to me. They say it was done “to end the war,” but does that mean they needed to target civilians, and to drop a second bomb?
User Kazeguruma no Yashichi (風車の弥七) was even more blunt:
風車の弥七🐾 on X (formerly Twitter): “①原爆の使用は虐殺です。②原爆の使用は新型兵器の市街地への威力と人体への影響のデータをとる為に行われた。③終戦一年前には日本の戦争指導層は敗戦を認識していたが、それが長引いたのは、アメリカが彼らの身柄の取扱を明示しなかった為。(是非はあろうが)他にも戦争終結の方法はあった。 / X”
①原爆の使用は虐殺です。②原爆の使用は新型兵器の市街地への威力と人体への影響のデータをとる為に行われた。③終戦一年前には日本の戦争指導層は敗戦を認識していたが、それが長引いたのは、アメリカが彼らの身柄の取扱を明示しなかった為。(是非はあろうが)他にも戦争終結の方法はあった。
The use of atomic weapons is an atrocity.
The bombs were used to gather data on the power and impact on populated areas from this new type of weapon.
The top brass of the Japanese military admitted a year before this that they were defeated, but what dragged it out was America not specifying how they’d be handled [after the war]. (There’s debate on this, but) there were other ways to end the war.
Finally, adding another element of complexity to the discussion, user Jeria noted that while, for most Japanese, the nuclear attacks are a “clear evil,” other atrocities of war – such as the “Comfort Women,” or the sexual abuse of Korean women during World War II by Japanese soldiers – are seen as a “relative evil” and a “fact of war.” Both sides, however, agree that it was fundamentally evil. Seeing the Richland logo, however, makes Jeria question America’s view of the bombings:
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The biggest surprise I got from reading the article that Unseen Japan shared, and that has the strongest visual impact, is the fact that we [Japan and America] don’t share an awareness that “the atomic bomb is fundamentally evil.”
My personal reaction is much the same as user Claudius. Why does Richland continue to insist on using an image of violence, devastation and death? Why not use a more neutral symbol, such as a picture of an atom? Why revel in the deaths of hundreds of thousands by calling yourselves the “Bombers”?
Maybe, one day, the administration and the parents of of Richland High School will ask themselves what message this is sending, not just to people of Japanese descent, but to their children as well.