In the late 1990s I hosted a 16 year old Japanese exchange student for a year and I took her to see the Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C. Much to my surprise, there we saw the Enola Gay airplane. At the end of her visit she presented me with 1,000 cranes on strings which I still have. Looks like the US celebrates the atomic bombing of Japan.
Thank you for sharing this story! Regarding the Enola Gay, Paul Tibbets, the pilot who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, was interviewed by Studs Terkel of the Guardian in 2002. Terkel asked, "When you hear people say, 'Let's nuke 'em, let's nuke these people,' what do you think?"
Tibbets responded: "Oh, I wouldn't hesitate if I had the choice. I'd wipe 'em out. You're gonna kill innocent people at the same time, but we've never fought a damn war anywhere in the world where they didn't kill innocent people. If the newspapers would just cut out the shit: 'You've killed so many civilians.' That's their tough luck for being there."
He was asked if he had any regrets about Hiroshima. He didn't. Tibbets was asked again if he had any regrets in 2005. The answer: "Hell no."
I think adopting this mentality was the only coping mechanism allowing him to continue living in peace with himself because the alternative would be reflection and guilt for something so monstrous I'm not sure it could ever be reconciled with. And I suspect on a smaller, less personal scale, this is the case with many Americans who don't want to even consider the possibility that nuking entire cities is widely indefensible.
Amazingly well written. I found your article from AntiWar, excited to read more of your articles.
Thank you for the support!
In the late 1990s I hosted a 16 year old Japanese exchange student for a year and I took her to see the Air and Space Museum in Washington D.C. Much to my surprise, there we saw the Enola Gay airplane. At the end of her visit she presented me with 1,000 cranes on strings which I still have. Looks like the US celebrates the atomic bombing of Japan.
Thank you for sharing this story! Regarding the Enola Gay, Paul Tibbets, the pilot who dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, was interviewed by Studs Terkel of the Guardian in 2002. Terkel asked, "When you hear people say, 'Let's nuke 'em, let's nuke these people,' what do you think?"
Tibbets responded: "Oh, I wouldn't hesitate if I had the choice. I'd wipe 'em out. You're gonna kill innocent people at the same time, but we've never fought a damn war anywhere in the world where they didn't kill innocent people. If the newspapers would just cut out the shit: 'You've killed so many civilians.' That's their tough luck for being there."
He was asked if he had any regrets about Hiroshima. He didn't. Tibbets was asked again if he had any regrets in 2005. The answer: "Hell no."
I think adopting this mentality was the only coping mechanism allowing him to continue living in peace with himself because the alternative would be reflection and guilt for something so monstrous I'm not sure it could ever be reconciled with. And I suspect on a smaller, less personal scale, this is the case with many Americans who don't want to even consider the possibility that nuking entire cities is widely indefensible.