I wanted to come here and post my thoughts on the atomic attacks against Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
I am troubled when so many of my fellow countrymen seem ignorant of the historical facts surrounding the Second World War.
Case in point:
In Seattle we have this yearly event called *Seafair*. The HydroBoats have a big race today and the Blue Angles will put on their usual magnificent display in front of hundreds of thousands of people over Lake Washington.
Interestingly, the Navy always sends a contingent of Warships to display for the Public. This year we will have an Aircraft Carrier on one of the docks at Elliot Bay for public tours. The Navy also is sending the US Alabama, a nuclear attack submarine
for the public to see.
A group of anti-nuclear people petitioned the Seattle City Councel to ban the Alabama from coming to Seattle. There was a lot of support for this by the people of Seattle because nuclear weapons are so evil and killed so many innocent men, women and children at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
I saw the potentiol banning of the Alabama as a joke to say the least. First off, the carrier is nuclear powered but no one said anything about that. They were picking on the submarine unfairly. Neither a sub nor an aircraft carrier were involved in the attacks on either Japanese city.
Now if the CAF B29 was going to do a flyby over Lake Washington I could probably understand the antis a little better but I would still be against banning even a B29 flyby. I like B29s.
Im one of those people that think nuclear weapons are aweful destructive. Im also thankful that a nation of decent people (more or less) who are basically self governed (more or less) invented the first nuclear weapons. Imagine what could have happened if Hitler had invented his own nuclear weapon in the summer of 1941, or the Japanese military rulers in 1941! So Im thinking the world got aweful lucky on that count.
I also believe that the invention of nuclear weapons was inevitable. Sooner or later someone would have figured this thing out and lets just be glad that things have turned out the way they have.
I am troubled however because technology has enabled nuclear weapons to be brought down in size to the point where someone can walk a suitcase into a building and blow up an entire city. Im surprized this hasnt happened yet and I suspect that eventually something like this will occur. I do not know what the result for humanity will be.
The United States, Russia, France, England, Pakistan, India and others have these weapons
and the world could still be denied the company of humans at any moment of any day.
Mass nuclear destruction is just a heartbeat away. As it has been since 1945.
Having said all that, let me say that whats done is done. I would have preferred a different route against Japan, perhaps an atomic demonstration to the military leaders of Japan on a spot largely uninhabited in Japan (if there was such a spot). Still, I do not know whether the rulers would have folded in the face of such a demonstration or what would have happened if the damn bomb turned out to be a dud (surprize was probably considered to be an important factor in the attacks). I do know that upwards of twenty atomic devices were either en-route for Japan or under construction when the military leaders finally shutdown shop, and that previoulsy a massive invasion of the southern part of Japan was planned for December of 1945. The projected loss of life was somewhere around 1 million Allied soldiers and scores of millions of Japanese peoples. With this knowledge I suspect that the people of Hirsoshima and Nagasaki, that lost their lives in the atomic attacks, may have actually helped save millions, even billions of lives by the terrible demonstrations of atomic power unleashed upon them. The use of atomic weapons against Japan was as regrettable as the World War itself. No more, no less.......
Let me conclude by saying I am not proud of the route taken to end the war in the Pacific, but that I understand completely why the attacks were carried out. My father would have turned eighteen in May of 1946 and he was simply not looking forward to going to Japan. When he heard about the atomic attacks and the subsequent unconditional surrender of Japan he, his mother and father cried together with Joy.
I really wish the world had not endured the Second World War but in the summer of 1945, the Allied people of the world were tiring of the death and the brillaint flash attacks were probably the best route to insure a speedy conclusion to a hundred million violent bloody deaths.
In the end who knows....its all second guessing but I will not wonder too much. If my father had died in Japan in the summer of 1946, I would not even be here to second guess, so I wont.
To the peace loving peoples of Japan, I salute you and wish a million years of happiness and prosperity to you <S>
Yeager
ps
The USS Alabama was permitted to attend Seafair.
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[This message has been edited by Yeager (edited 08-06-2000).]
