Nobody wanted it getting back to the states that Hiroshima survivors’ skin was falling off by the handful. From J.W. Rich at mises.org:
How do you cover up an atomic bomb? The same way you cover up anything else: you don’t allow people to know what really happened. Of course, the magnitude and power of a mushroom cloud are plainly unmistakable. However, the effects of that bomb can be concealed and obfuscated from the general population.
For over a year after the nuclear destruction of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the full extent of the bomb’s killing power was kept secret from the world. While little known today, the truth was only revealed due to the actions of a single war correspondent and the stories of six individuals who were forever scarred by what they saw.
On August 6, 1945, a nuclear weapon was used in war for the first time in history against the city of Hiroshima. Just hours after the bombing of Hiroshima, President Harry Truman made a radio broadcast to the world, announcing both the fate of the city as well as the United States’ possession of atomic bombs. Truman emphasized the power of these new weapons, stating that they had the explosive power of “twenty thousand tons of TNT.”
On August 9, the city of Nagasaki was the target of the second—and so far, last—use of nuclear weapons in history. Six days later, the Japanese surrendered.
