War Photographer's Notebook

Chapter 1860 150 Nuclear Bombs

"Hana came to Beirut and became a local translator for MSF, while Kentaro Musashi hid in a refugee camp."

In the Musashi family restaurant, Renault said in Japanese, "On September 1982, 9, Hana was seriously injured by a grenade while trying to protect a wounded soldier. Although the MSF doctor saved the baby in her belly and the wounded soldier she was protecting, he was unable to save her."

When hearing this, Wei Ran couldn't help but shake his head secretly. He remembered clearly that the time he entered Beirut was September 1982, 9.

In other words, if he had gone in a day earlier, he might have had the chance to meet Hana and Kentaro Musashi.

For a moment, he couldn't even tell whether this was a coincidence or his father's intentional act.

In his wild thoughts, Renault paused for a moment and continued, "After Hana died, Musashi Kentaro returned to the Bekaa Valley with her body and child, but luckily he avoided the great Tusha behind him."

"He is so lucky," Mao Musashi couldn't help but sigh, just like Wei Ran sighed just now.

"It is actually a very painful thing to be alive but your companions are dead."

Renault's casual words almost caused Wei Ran to drop a piece of food on the table with his chopsticks.

"In January 1983, Musashi returned to the Bekaa Valley and participated in the battle against Yisheli."

Renault paused, "That year, he died before spring came. His companions took him back to the cave and buried him. That's all we know."

After that, Renault turned on his tablet again, pulled out a set of photos and handed them to Musashi Mao again, "The cave where Musashi Kentaro and Hana are buried is now guarded by a survivor who participated in the 8th Revolution and his son.

Since there are so many reading factories there now, I don't recommend you to go there and pay your respects in person. It would be too dangerous for you.

So if you don't mind, we can send them back to the recruitment center for you. This is the fastest way, much faster than you rushing over there and bringing them back."

"So. He died in the battle?" asked Mao Musashi.

"That's right," Renault nodded, "at least that's the information I got."

"In that case, let him stay there."

Mao Musashi unexpectedly gave a carefree answer, "Since he died there as a soldier, let him stay there.

Although I'm not a warrior, I guess he would definitely not be willing to leave there in such disgrace.

So let my parents stay there. When the war there is truly over in the future, if I am still alive, I will go and bring them back myself."

"Mrs. Musashi, that may take a long time." Renault said too bluntly.

"This is my daughter. Her name is Chihiro. She is just 21 years old."

Mao Musashi smiled and asked, "Chihiro, if I can't wait for that day, will you help me wait?"

"certainly"

Qianxun hugged her mother and said, "I will definitely go. Maybe in the future I will find a man I like like you and have a child with him. I guess that child."

"Don't say such stupid things."

The embarrassment of Mao Musashi, who was eager to cover Chihiro's mouth with her hands, at least diluted the sadness of the story brought by Renault.

"It seems that you have heard the story of the two warriors."

At this time, Mr. Holler had also filled his stomach. He wiped his hands with wet wipes and said, "We also brought some things that we found in the cave. Of course, we also brought the photo that Yashar's parents kept."

As he spoke, Holler had already opened the box he brought and took out some things from it.

The first thing was the family photo taken with a Polaroid camera. The photo had been put into a small photo frame with glass on both sides.

Immediately afterwards, Holler took out a Stanley kettle from the box.

The kettle shows a lot of signs of use, and even gravel can be seen in the cracks, perhaps from the Bekaa Valley.

Putting the kettle on the table, Holler took out the third thing, this time it was a radio, a Victory brand radio made by the Japanese.

“These are what we brought back from the cave.”

Holler said, "After we found the place, these things were sent to Beirut as quickly as possible, and then sent to Rabbit Rider, and then Yashar personally delivered them to me and asked me to bring them here."

“I’m sorry to trouble you all.”

Wei Ran said apologetically. He knew clearly that the other party did so much, in large part out of his face.

"Don't say that. Compared to what you've done for us, this is nothing."

Holler said as he buckled up the suitcase, "Take a quick look, especially the thermos. There's a lot of stuff in there."

Thanking Mr. Holler again, Wei Ran translated his meaning into Chinese.

Without waiting for him to finish, Mao Musashi, who had been looking at the small photo frame over and over again, impatiently but with great difficulty unscrewed the Stanley thermos - she even refused Chihiro's help.

As the inner lid of the thermos was unscrewed, she took out the few things and placed them on the table.

A pair of Japanese chopsticks, a Canon 110ED20 camera, and a bunch of 110 format saddle film.

“I remember this camera”

When Mao Musashi saw this camera, she said something that was contradictory in terms of time and space.

Fortunately, she immediately said the second sentence, "In Gentaro and Chiyoko's memoirs, they said that it was in the winter of 1978, when my father Kentaro was about to go to Lebanon again, they bought a newly produced Canon portable camera and enough film for him to take away."

At this point, Musashi Mao looked at Wei Ran, "They said that they hope that the camera will capture the enemy's evil deeds, rather than just capturing the evil deeds they committed like Hirano Daisho did."

Although Renault did not understand Chinese, he reminded them at this time, "Please be careful, these films have not been developed yet, but they are in very good condition.

In addition, according to the 8th Liberation Army soldier who helped with the burial, the soldier who sent Kentaro's body left these relics and then left, and never came back, so these things have remained in the cave ever since. "

"Mrs. Musashi, do you want me to develop these negatives for you?"

Wei Ran waited for Marta to finish translating and asked, "Just buy some."

"Then I'll trouble you, Mr. Wei."

Without waiting for him to finish, Musashi Mao looked at Chihiro who was sitting next to him and said, "Take Mr. Wei to that room."

"Ok!"

Chihiro nodded vigorously, then hugged her mother Mao tightly, then stood up, took the pocket films, and called Wei Ran to leave the restaurant with her temporarily.

"Where are we going?" Wei Ran asked as he followed Qianxun.

"This is the room where Chiyoko used to live," Qianxun said, and she took Wei Ran into a room on the side of the first floor.

The room is decorated in traditional Japanese style, but in the corner, there is a wooden ladder leading upstairs.

Following Chihiro, he climbed the ladder to the second floor. It was not a very big darkroom, but it had all kinds of things. What made him particularly envious was that there was a whole wall of display cabinets, in which various old film cameras were placed next to each other.

“My mother was a not very successful painter and a not very successful photographer.”

Qianxun closed the window familiarly and said, "Although she has no talent in either painting or photography, she at least likes taking pictures with a film camera."

"Are these cameras her collection?"

"Some of them came from Sachiko's father, the photographer who disappeared in China, and some were collected by Mr. Zhang Taichuan. The rest belonged to Chiyoko. She loved taking pictures and was very talented. She even ran a photo studio."

"What's its name?" Wei Ran asked with a smile while looking for the things he needed.

"Dongyi Photo Studio"

Qianxun gave an unexpected answer, but then asked another question, "Do you know the meaning of this name?"

"You know?" Wei Ran asked in surprise.

"Um"

Qianxun nodded, "Dong is the direction, Yi is Houyi, Houyi shot down the sun, probably he is also an anti-Japanese hero."

"Where did you find such a statement?" Wei Ran asked with a smile.

"The Hoshino sisters' mother said so," Chihiro explained with a smile.

“It seems to make sense.”

Wei Ran smiled and said, "I'm going to start developing these negatives. Do you want to stay and help?"

"Forget it. I'll only make things worse in this matter." Chihiro said, "But I'll wait for you outside."

"I'll lock the door to prevent you from breaking in suddenly." Wei Ran said in advance.

"My mother would do the same," Chihiro said, and turned to leave the darkroom, and helped to close the door. After locking the door, Wei Ran first carefully checked the room, and then found the corresponding potion, just like he did in Musashino Photo Studio, and slowly developed the films one by one into negatives that could be seen by light.

Finally, he translated some photographic paper that had been expired for three or four years, and Wei Ran tried to print it with the attitude of giving it a try first.

Overall, his luck was pretty good. While he was busy, one color photo after another was printed out and hung on the drying line.

Opening the sunshade and pushing open the window, Wei Ran lit a cigarette and took a deep puff, then opened the locked door of the darkroom.

"If you don't mind the smell of smoke, come in and take a look," Wei Ran said, "A considerable number of these photos are extremely bloody."

Hearing this, Chihiro, who was waiting outside the door, was stunned for a moment, then nodded, and followed Wei Ran into the dark room filled with light smoke, looking at the war memories left by her grandfather Kentaro Musashi one by one.

Because the Canon portable camera has its own date printing function, the edges of these photos clearly record the year, month and day of each time the shutter was pressed.

Because of this, they can clearly distinguish the timeline of each shot.

At the beginning, these photos clearly recorded the life, study and four seasons scenery of some ragged people in the Bekaa Valley.

Later, the photos showed refugees, corpses and ruins.

He even found the MSF doctor's sewing machine and cradle, the Edelweiss flower, and her ambulance.

He also found a brother and sister named Ed and Lamar, who had been helping in the operating room. How could they be gone?
But in these photos, they were all extremely busy and didn't even have time to look at the camera, so only their silhouettes were left.

But even so, he still recognized these friends, and he believed that those who survived would also be able to recognize them.

As you continue to look further, the photos are filled with more and more wounded people, corpses, raging flames, and soldiers with weapons in their hands.

But later in the photo, the body of Musashi Kentaro's wife Hana appeared, as well as a baby lying in the arms of the corpse who seemed to be crying.

The date on this photo is September 1982, 9.

Continuing to flip forward, the photo skipped a long period of time and when it appeared again, it was already January 1983.

In the following photos, the first thing that appears is the refugee camp that has been completely changed beyond recognition.

Next, at the rate of one or two photos a day, all the photos showed were the bodies of soap soldiers, or the destroyed soap armored vehicles, tanks and armed bulldozers.

Finally, on February 2, Kentaro Musashi's selfie appeared in the photo for the first time.

In this color photo, Kentaro Musashi is holding an AK rifle in his arms. His hair and beard are messy.

On that face covered with sweat, scratches, dirt and fatigue, there was an apologetic and simple smile, and at the upturned corners of the mouth was bright red blood filled with dense bubbles.

He was shot in the lungs. Wei Ran could tell at a glance. He knew even more clearly that it was an extremely painful way to die.

"Next is the last photo," Wei Ran reminded.

Subconsciously turning her head to look over, Chihiro couldn't help but cover her mouth.

It was painted on half of the snow-white wall with bright red blood as the paint, when the person was dying and suffocating.

It was a large anti-war symbol, with a five-pointed star drawn at each of the three intersection points below the symbol.

"He died as a warrior." Wei Ran reminded.

"This is also to recruit nuclear personnel, right?" Chihiro asked.

"Yes, this is also to recruit nuclear personnel." Wei Ran nodded.

"The uncle downstairs whose French name is Renault, he is also recruiting nuclear people, right?" Chihiro continued to ask.

"Yes, he is also recruiting nuclear personnel." Wei Ran gave an affirmative answer again.

"If Ms. Hirano Aoi saw what they are doing, she would probably be pleased."

Qianxun seemed to be asking Wei Ran, but also seemed to be asking herself, "Will they change your opinion on recruiting nuclear power and recruiting nuclear power people?"

"You want to hear the truth?"

Wei Ran asked seriously, he didn't treat Qianxun as a child.

"Of course," Chihiro nodded.

"Do you know how many people died in Nanjing, China in 1937?"

After Wei Ran asked this question, he did not wait for Qianxun to answer and asked again, "Do you know how many people were killed by the little boy who was dropped into Hiroshima?"

"I," Chihiro said, "I know the answer to the first one."

"In Nanjing in 1937, more than 30 people were killed. More than 20 died at the hands of the little boy."

Wei Ran said calmly, "Those recruits who died at the hands of the little boy were lucky. They didn't have to endure rape and looting, nor did they have to endure the long pain and despair brought about by blood loss after the bayonets pierced their bodies."

"Snap!" Wei Ran suddenly snapped his fingers, and Qianxun also shuddered subconsciously.

"It was just like Thanos snapped his fingers, and the people in Hiroshima died. There was no pain, no humiliation, they died quickly and cleanly, they didn't even understand what happened before it was over.

Not only did he die cleanly, Zhao He even packaged himself as a victim, what a joke!"

Wei Ran continued, "You probably won't find a single thing in that memoir."

"What. What happened?"

Qianxun asked hesitantly, she already regretted starting this topic.

"Zhang Taichuan's first love came from Jinling"

Wei Ran said calmly, "No, it's not first love, it can only be considered a secret love. They are classmates, and they came together to recruit students to study abroad.

The female classmate he had a crush on came from a wealthy family and had a two-story courtyard in Jinling.

"she"

"she died"

Wei Ran said calmly, "After she read about the tragedy in Jinling in the newspaper, she hanged herself in the overseas student apartment she rented.

Zhang Taichuan, he never even had the chance to tell that female classmate that he liked her. "

At this point, Wei Ran had already walked out of the darkroom. "During China's 14-year war of resistance against Japan, the cumulative casualties of Chinese soldiers and civilians exceeded 3500 million, which is equivalent to the tragedy of Nanjing happening at least a hundred times in China. It is equivalent to the direct killing power of more than 150 little boys."

Stopping at the stairs, Wei Ran turned around and looked at Chihiro with a smile, "I am grateful for the kindness and justice that Hirano Aoi has done during the war.

I agree that Kentaro Musashi is a respectable internationalist fighter.

I admire even more the selfless act of Mr. Renault from Zhaonu downstairs who joined Doctors Without Borders.

But this is not enough.”

"What is enough?"

Chihiro asked subconsciously, "Throw another 150 little boys at Zhaohe?"

“It’s not a bad idea”

Wei Ran said very bluntly, "Or recruit 3500 million people like Hirano Aoi and Musashi Kentaro.

Just like what the old gentleman said in front of the poetry monument in Arashiyama that day.

In fact, I also don't expect the person who recruited the nuclear weapon or recruited the nuclear weapon to truly repent and apologize.

I now also hope that Zhao He can invade China again, just like he did back then."

"Mr. Wei is really ruthless," Qianxun said weakly.

"I can choose not to answer this question, but I can't show mercy. This is a question of attitude and bottom line."

Wei Ran spread his hands, "Instead of expecting others to show mercy, it is better to work hard to make more Hirano Aoi, otherwise..."

"150 nuclear bombs, right?"

Chihiro asked helplessly, "Are all historians so straightforward?"

Wei Ran smiled and answered as he walked downstairs, "History books and historians may lie, but history never does."

Woof! Woof woof woof! Woof woof woof woof! Woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof! Woof woof! Woof!
I updated it in advance because I won’t have time to update it after dawn.

(End of this chapter)