US President Barack Obama’s Hiroshima speech on Friday was a very carefully crafted document, meriting some scrutiny - both for what it contained and what was ostensibly excluded.
Predictably, Obama did not apologise for what the US did in August 1945 and this was stated even before he began the Japan visit.
The visit itself was high on symbolism for it was the first time in 70 years that a White House occupant has chosen to visit Hiroshima and Obama is to be commended for this decision.
Yet there is a sharp contrast in the high symbolism and the less than modest substantive outcome of the visit.
Hiroshima is recalled annually every August to remind the world of the apocalyptic death and destruction that a nuclear weapon can wreak.
Both Hiroshima and Nagasaki are deep scars that remain indelibly etched on the global consciousness.
Whether the US was justified in using this capability remains debatable even now - seven decades later.
But as in all such cases of historical import, it may not be valid to critique in hindsight certain decisions taken by a nation’s highest political authority in the dust and fog that a protracted conflict such as World War II poses.
The question that still lingers is: Should the US apologise for Hiroshima? Whatever be Obama’s personal determination, it was evident well before his visit that a formal apology was not on the table and his Japanese hosts did not expect one.
However, the spirit of forgiveness is invoked in an elegantly elliptical manner - an Obama trait - when the US president noted: “We see these stories in the hibakusha (survivors of Hiroshima). The woman who forgave a pilot who flew the plane that dropped the atomic bomb because she recognised that what she really hated was war itself. The (Japanese) man who sought out families of Americans killed here because he believed their loss was equal to his own.”
Thus, in an adroit and elegant manner, the imperative of forgiving is underlined.
And the Japanese interlocutor is being acknowledged for forgiving, and empathising with the American adversary of August 1945.
The appropriate reference to a nuclear weapon-free world has been made by Obama at Hiroshima - but as in the case of the 2009 Prague speech, the caveat is unambiguous: “We may not realise this goal in my lifetime.”
Yet it must be averred that this visit is important and the Obama speech draws attention to the nuclear sword of Damocles and the need for a solemn commitment that they will never be used again.
As much as 93% of the global nuclear weapon inventory is held by the US and Russia.
Will the US do a Hiroshima-Nagasaki again? This is the central question that remains excluded from the Obama speech and while the US remains sceptical of a commitment to no-first-use as a dilution of the efficacy of deterrence, societal trends are cause for concern.
Scott D Sagan, an eminent nuclear expert in the US, has reviewed a number of surveys carried out among average Americans in relation to the use of a nuclear weapon and Obama and the nuclear apex in the Beltway would be well-advised to ponder over the findings.
Certain exigencies were posed to respondents in a poll and these included an Al Qaeda target and a 21st century variation of Pearl Harbour carried out against US assets by Iran. A fairly high percentage - 59% - supported the use of a nuclear weapon against Iran. The corresponding figure in August 1945 against Japan was 23%.
Based on these poll findings, albeit with very small numbers, Sagan concludes (Wall Street Journal, May 19): “Would we drop the bomb again? Our surveys can’t say how future presidents and their top advisers would weigh their options.
“But they do reveal something unsettling about the instincts of the US public: When provoked, we don’t seem to consider the use of nuclear weapons a taboo, and our commitment to the immunity of civilians from deliberate attack in wartime, even with vast casualties, is shallow.
“Today, as in 1945, the US public is unlikely to hold back a president who might consider using nuclear weapons in the crucible of war.”
Now that the Republican nomination is sealed, it will be instructive to note what candidate Donald Trump will say about the Obama speech and the relevance of nuclear weapons in the US security strategy.
The Obama nuclear vision outlined first in Prague and reiterated eloquently in Hiroshima will have a Barmecidal contour to it if the current American orientation is not objectively reviewed and progressively altered towards nuclear restraint and related fidelity.

- C Uday Bhaskar, is director, Society for Policy Studies (SPS), New Delhi. He can be contacted at [email protected])