The Japan Earthquake: The Cataclysm This Time

At his first press conference, Prime Minister Naoto Kan called it a crisis, and for an hour or so that felt right. No nation is immune from tragedy, and the expectation is that slowly, with the help of friends, people of character dust themselves off and rebuild.

Then the videos began—of waters rising with horrible speed to swallow entire towns. Of shipping containers rolled like toys. Of roads turned to tofu and nuclear plants wheezing radiation. As a sense of proportion settled in, crisis rapidly proved inadequate. What Japan suffered on Mar. 11—a 9.0 earthquake, followed by a 20-foot tsunami, followed by a nuclear threat that stirred excruciating historic echoes—was three crises. A cataclysm unlike any Japan has faced before.