Featured moment · World history

Atomic bombing of Hiroshima

6 August 1945

The United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, bringing nuclear warfare into history.

1945 photograph of widespread destruction in Hiroshima seen from the roof of the Red Cross Hospital — Photograph: US government photograph, Hiroshima in 1945 / Wikimedia Commons. View image, creator and licence on Wikimedia Commons.

What happened?

On 6 August 1945, during the final weeks of the Second World War, a US B-29 aircraft dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan. The explosion and ensuing fires devastated much of the city, and radiation exposure caused further deaths and illness. A second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki on 9 August.

Why it mattered

Hiroshima was the first wartime use of an atomic weapon. The human consequences and the threat posed by nuclear arms transformed international security, diplomacy and debates about warfare and disarmament.