“Henceforward all men everywhere will be living on the edge of a volcano”

With today being the 65th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima, I thought I’d excavate The Spectator’s leading article from the time:   

A Crisis of Civilisation, The Spectator, 10 August, 1945

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Francis Pike

How the Black Death helped bring prosperity to Europe

In Mr Churchill’s statement about the atomic bomb issued by Mr Attlee on Sunday exultation at having anticipated the enemy gave way to awe. Mr Churchill spoke of this “revelation of the secrets of Nature” as one “long mercifully withheld from man.” So terrific a power of destruction is now known to be in the hands of the Allies that in retrospect we can see that the race between the scientists threatened to be the decisive factor in the war against Germany. If Germany had won that rate – and through her own folly at least two of the ablest specialists transferred their services to us – she could have reduced the civilisation of Britain, Russia and America to ashes.