Hiroshima Nagasaki Russian Roulette chords by Christy Moore

Tuning: Standard (E A D G B E)

Difficulty: Novice

Verse 1:
Em            C       D   Em
They dropped the bomb in '45 to end the world war,
C     D        Em
No-one had ever seen such a terrible sight before,
  C          D      Em
The world looked on with eyes wide to see where it might lead,
  C      D      Em
The politics of power, they passed around their seed,
     D
It was a time to remember, we never can forget,
         Em     C     D    Em
They were playin' Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Russian Roulette.

Verse 2:
Em         C        D      Em
They arose like the saviours of our modern human race,
   C     D      Em
With radiation haloes, that hung about their face,
     C     D       Em
With the key to the sure-cure, the treatment of our ills,
C       D       Em
A hot-shot of cobalt, and a pocket-full of pills,
     D
Speaking always of the enemy, who lurked across the sea,
      Em    C        D    Em
While they crept in among us like a carrier disease.

Verse 3:
Em        C       D        Em
Deep down in the bunkers of the concrete and the lead,
C     D         Em
Einstein's disciples working steadily ahead,
    C      D        Em
Making heavy metal power-plants to fire the city lights,
C            D         Em
All you can hear in the underground is the humming through the night,
    D
And the walls of tight security, circle all around,
      Em       C     D       Em
Where they spill out their poison and bury it in the ground.

Verse 4:
Em       C        D    Em
Holed up in the harbours hidden secretly away,
C       D        Em
War-heads and submarines await to make their play,
 C      D       Em
The military masterminds improve on their design,
  C       D       Em
The soldiers get doped up and stumble through the lines,
     D
While the spills into the rivers get carried out by the tide,
   Em    C      D    Em
They call this security, I call it suicide.

Verse 5:
Em        C        D      Em
Our statesmen and leaders on their politicians pay,
C         D            Em
Quick to heed the hand that feeds, they're careful what they say,
       C     D       Em
They call out experts to assure us, to wave their magic wands,
      C      D        Em
This is the power of the future, And the future marches on,
     D
And they call in all their favours, all their political gains,
     Em       C     D       Em
While the spills fill the rivers and settle in the plains.

Verse:
Em        C           D        Em
I know the minds behind them, they are riddled full of holes,
C     D         Em
Not to be trusted with their hands at the controls,
   C       D       Em
Their eyesight it is twisted by the glory of their careers,
  C         D      Em
The heaped praise and flattery is music to their ears,
  D
To listen to them talk about how it hasn't happened yet's,
       Em     C     D    Em
Like playing Hiroshima, Nagasaki, Russian Roulette.