Although the US military government (headed by Douglas MacArthur)[20] dissuaded publishers from bringing out the book in Japan, small numbers of copies were distributed; in January 1947 Hersey gave a reading in English in Tokyo.[2] A Japanese translation of Hiroshima was first published in 1949 Japan (it has not been out of print since).[5][21][22] According to Gar Alperovitz in The Decision to Use the Atomic Bomb, "Occupation authorities suppressed various accounts of the atomic bombings. A noteworthy instance involved the denial in later 1946 of a request by the Nippon Times to publish John Hersey's Hiroshima (in English)."[23] MacArthur said in 1948 that despite numerous charges of censorship made against the censors office by the US news media Hiroshima was not banned in Japan.[24]