Enola Gay

The man pictured in the pilot's seat of the most famous B-29 in history is, of course, the pilot, then Col. Paul Tibbets. On August 6, 1945, the first atom bomb used in war, called "Little Boy," dropped from this airplane (named for Tibbets' mother) and exploded 1,890 feet above ground zero at Hiroshima, Japan. This one plane which dropped one bomb is said to have hastened the end of World War II, avoided an invasion of Japan, and saved hundreds of thousands (or more) lives of our young soldiers, sailors, and marines. Oddly enough, I had yesterday talked to a man who had participated in the atom bomb testing at Bikini Atoll in 1945.

As I am wont to do, I engaged a man in conversation while waiting for new prescriptions at Walgreen's in Bloomington, MN. The man was obviously quite my senior, and it turned out that he had served in the U. S. Navy during WWII. As we talked, he told the story of watching his father's farm being auctioned off during The Great Depression and subsequent years of itinerant living his family endured almost to the beginning of that great war. I then learned that he had served his country, had seen the U. S. S. Saratoga sink, and had been part of the testing of the a-bomb. He hadn't heard the news of Paul Tibbet's death, and it definitely had an effect on him.

He said something I've heard many times over the years. Dropping those bombs (a second, called "Fat Man," was dropped on Nagasaki on August 9, 1945)) saved more lives than were lost in the blast and its aftermath. Given the history of our government's lies to us over the last 60-plus years, one must be skeptical of all official versions of history.

However, I come down on the side of those who say the bombs should've been dropped. Invading a country of people who thought their leader was "divine" isn't a prospect I would relish, as their fanaticism and visciousness in the conduct of the war was almost beyond belief. One interesting fact I gleaned from my casual study of my favorite period of American history is that one had a more than 30 times chance of dying in a Japanese P. O. W. camp than in a German P. O. W. camp. Of course this comparison is primarily military, but the Japanese were truly viscious.

So, my conclusion has for some time been that we did the "right" thing, if you can call such a conflagration "right." One can't negotiate with a "divine" emperor or a leader who thinks he speaks to God.

In any case, I experienced yesterday afternoon something I've experienced a great deal over the years: people will tell you a lot about themselves if you'll just listen. And more often than not, what you hear is usually interesting and sometimes exciting.