Nuclear Bodies

The Global Hibakusha

By: Robert A. Jacobs

Write A Review

eBook | 1 March 2022

At a Glance

Format
ePUB

eBook

RRP $50.84

$43.99

13%OFF

or 4 interest-free payments of $11.00 with

or

Instant Digital Delivery to your Kobo Reader App

The Cold War reconsidered as a limited nuclear war

“[A] grimly important analysis of the cold war.”—Andrew Robinson, Nature

“Inexorable clarity and care for his fellow humans mark Robert Jacobs's guide to the Cold War as a limited nuclear war, whose harms disfigure any possible future.”—Norma Field, author of In the Realm of a Dying Emperor: Japan at Century’s End

In the fall of 1961, President Kennedy somberly warned Americans about deadly radioactive fallout clouds extending hundreds of miles from H?bomb detonations, yet he approved ninety?six US nuclear weapon tests for 1962. Cold War nuclear testing, production, and disasters like Chernobyl and Fukushima have exposed millions to dangerous radioactive particles; these millions are the global hibakusha. Many communities continue to be plagued with dire legacies and ongoing risks: sickness and early mortality, forced displacement, uncertainty and anxiety, dislocation from ancestors and traditional lifestyles, and contamination of food sources and ecosystems.

Robert A. Jacobs re?envisions the history of the Cold War as a slow nuclear war, fought on remote battlegrounds against populations powerless to prevent the contamination of their lands and bodies. His comprehensive account necessitates a profound rethinking of the meaning, costs, and legacies of our embrace of nuclear weapons and technologies.

About the Author

Robert A. Jacobs is a professor at the Hiroshima Peace Institute of Hiroshima City University. He is the co-founder of the Global Hibakusha Project, conducting field research on radiation-affected communities in more than twenty countries.