[ARC5] Re: Paul Tibbets Passes Away at 92

[Roger Basford]

Hi Dave,

Thanks for posting that. It seems to have been "missed" by the 
politically-correct BBC News 24 channel.

The atomic bombing of Japan is a very emotional subject and we hear a lot 
about what would have happened if the bombs hadn't worked or they had not 
been used.  I for one would definitely not be alive today if the bombs 
hadn't been dropped, as my late father was in his third year as a Japanese 
POW in Sumatra at the time, and from what I have read of the treatment he 
and others received he would not have survived until late 1946, the 
projected date of the end of fighting on mainland Japan after an invasion in 
1945.

My Dad never really spoke of his time as a POW but on a visit to the 
Imperial War Museum a few years before his death we looked at their B-29 and 
he said it was his favourite aircraft. I naturally assumed he was thinking 
of Enola Gay and The Bomb, but he said that a few days after the surrender, 
before aid teams reached his POW camp, a flight of B-29s came over low and 
dropped food in containers; he nearly died eating a whole tin of Klim 
powdered milk - but he never forgot the sight of those planes!

Of course, if the bombs hadn't been dropped I would not be here and would be 
none the wiser. However, when it comes to weighing the casualty lists, just 
remember to add all those Allied POWs and civilian internees to the balance 
along with the undoubted million or so killed invading or defending Japan.

Regards,

Roger Basford/G3VKM

> Date: Thu, 1 Nov 2007 15:26:02 -0600 (GMT-06:00)
> From: David Stinson <arc5 at ix.netcom.com>
> Subject: [ARC5] Paul Tibbets Passes Away at 92
> To: arc5 at mailman.qth.net, milsurplus at mailman.qth.net
> Message-ID:
> <32166815.1193952362469.JavaMail.root at elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
>
> Pilot of Plane That Dropped A-Bomb Dies
> By JULIE CARR SMYTH (Associated Press Writer)
>>From Associated Press
> November 01, 2007 4:16 PM EDT
> COLUMBUS, Ohio - Paul Tibbets, who piloted the B-29 bomber Enola Gay that 
> dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, died Thursday. He was 92 and 
> insisted for six decades after the war that he had no regrets about the 
> mission and slept just fine at night.
>



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