Seventy-one years after a U.S. atomic bomb devastated Hiroshima, John Kerry will on Monday become the first incumbent Secretary of State to pay tribute to the tens of thousands of victims in the western Japanese city.
Kerry, the highest-ranked U.S. official to visit the site, arrived Sunday morning in Hiroshima for a meeting of the Group of 7 foreign ministers. His British and French counterparts are also expected to lay wreaths in the city’s peace memorial park -- the first time that serving foreign ministers of nuclear powers will commemorate one of the final acts of World War II.

Kerry may be testing the water for a potential trip to the city by President Barack Obama when he visits Japan for a G-7 leaders summit in late May. The bombing of Hiroshima on August 6, 1945, and Nagasaki three days later, is widely seen in the U.S. as preventing a bloodier land battle and hastened the end of the Pacific War.
A trip by the president would likely stir controversy at home and trigger debate among the candidates to become his successor.
"Kerry’s visit, following visits by U.S. ambassadors and other officials, suggests that a presidential visit is increasingly inevitable," said Tobias Harris, an analyst at Teneo Intelligence. "But the fact is that the president going to the memorial and, presumably, offering a statement could have unpredictable consequences at home, given that the politics of the U.S. atomic bombings is still fraught."
Final Decision
The Mainichi newspaper in February reported that Obama is considering a visit to the city, with a final decision expected this month.