Rain of Ruin: Tokyo, Hiroshima, and the Surrender of Japan

Monday, March 17 // 3:00–4:30 pm (ET)

In the closing months of the Second World War hundreds of thousands of Japanese, mostly civilians, died in a final outburst of violence from the air. American planes were beginning to run low on plausible targets when it was decided to use two atomic weapons in a final, terrible flourish to try to end the war.

Richard Overy’s remarkable new book rethinks how we should regard this last stage of the war and the role of the bombing. This book explores the way in which the willingness to kill civilians and destroy cities became normalized in the course of a horrific war as moral concerns were blunted and scientists, airmen, and politicians followed a strategy of mass destruction they would never have endorsed before the war began. But it also engages with the new scholarship that shows how complex the effort to end the war was in Japan, where ‘surrender’ was entirely foreign to Japanese culture.

Additional UPcoming Events

Who Will Rescue Us?: The Story of the Jewish Children Who Fled to France and America During the Holocaust

Monday, March 24 // 4–5:30 pm (ET)

At the eve of the Second World War, an estimated 1.6 million Jewish children lived in Nazi-occupied Europe. While 10,000 of them escaped to Britain in the Kindertransport, only some 500 found a new home in France. Here they attempted to begin again—but their refuge would all too soon become a trap.

For the first time, Laura Hobson Faure brings to life the experiences of these children, and the Jewish and non-Jewish organizations who helped them. Drawing on survivors’ testimonies as well as children’s diaries, letters, drawings, songs, and poems, Who Will Rescue Us? re-creates their complex journeys, including how some of them eventually found safety in America.

Film Screening: The Shark Fin Hunters

Wednesday, March 26 // 12–1:30 pm (ET)

Every year more than 70 million sharks are harvested for their fins. They are considered a delicacy in Asia and used in shark fin soup. The shark fin trade is threatening a species vital to the health of the world’s oceans. Peru has emerged as a leading exporter with illegal shipments coming across the porous border with Ecuador.

This documentary follows Evelyn LaMadrid, an environmental prosecutor in northern Peru, who is fighting back against the illegal trade of shark fins. Her office granted Aljazeera’s Fault Lines reporters exclusive access to embed with her team as she investigated traffickers moving the product through the country.

After the film, director Jeremy Young and reporter Josh Rushing (Aljazeera English), Sharon Guynup (National Geographic Explorer) and Ben Freitas (WWF) will discuss the making of the film and broader solutions to this illegal wildlife trade. They will take audience questions as well.

The Future of Haiti

Monday, March 31 // 9:30–10:45 am (ET)

Has the international response meaningfully improved security in Haiti? Has the Transitional Presidential Council helped bridge political divisions? What other international support is needed to prepare Haiti for elections? How have changes to US policy, including a freeze on most foreign assistance, impacted the crisis in Haiti? Join the Wilson Center’s Latin America Program to discuss the future of this long troubled nation.