Barack Obama Is First Sitting President To Visit Hiroshima

Source: NICHOLAS KAMM / Getty

Lame duck? Where?

Barack Obama is finishing his last days in office strong by making a historic visit to Hiroshima.

Barack is the first sitting president to visit the Japanese city since the atomic bombing of the city 71 years ago , The Guardian reports.

In a touching move, Obama laid a floral wreath on a memorial to the dead. He then began a speech, urging the world to learn the lessons of the dark past to make room for a brighter future.

“On a bright, cloudless morning, death fell from the sky and the world was changed,” he said poetically.

“Why did we come to this place, to Hiroshima? We come to ponder a terrible force unleashed in the not so distant past. We come to mourn the dead,” he said.

While Barack’s visit was somber, he did not apologize for the decision Harry Truman made in 1945 to drop a bomb over the city.

But the impact of the moment was felt, with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe saying, “An American president has come into contact with the reality of an atomic bombing and renewed his resolve toward realising a world without nuclear weapons.

This is just another example of the power moves Barack has made during his presidency to restore relations between America and the rest of the world.