In researching the "Hiroshima in America" book I came upon some long overlooked but fascinating material on Tibbets' initial bombing mission in World War II. He told a Washington Post reporter, for a favorable profile, in 1996, "For awhile in the 1950s, I got a lot of letters condemning me.but they faded out." On the other hand, "I got a lot of letters from women propositioning me." He intended to do it again elsewhere, but international protests forced a cancellation. After the war he called Hiroshima and Nagasaki “good virgin targets†- they had been untouched by pre-atomic air raids - and ideal for “bomb damage studies.†In 1976, as a retired brigadier general, he re-enacted the Hiroshima mission at an air show in Texas, with a smoke bomb set off to simulate a mushroom cloud. In any event, Tibbets (like Truman) had acted in a consistent manner for decades, while at times traveling under an assumed name to avoid scrutiny.
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Japan had earlier rejected "unconditional surrender" demands but, after Hiroshima, accepted a conditional surrender, as it was allowed to keep its emperor. Japan offered to surrender nine days after the Hiroshima blast but many historians hold that the Russians' entry into the war, as planned, two days after the bomb was dropped was at least equally responsible. "His advice was appreciated but unnecessary," Tibbets explained. In fact, he wrote in his autobiography, "The Tibbets Story," that President Truman at a meeting in the White House after the bombing had instructed him not to lose any sleep over it. It was a success, and that’s where I’ve left it.…I can assure you that I sleep just as peacefully as anybody can sleep….†When August 6 rolled around each year "sometimes people have to tell me. "It wasn’t my decision to make morally, one way or another…I did what I was told - I didn't invent the bomb, I just dropped the damn thing. There wasn’t anything personal as far as I’m concerned, so I had no personal part in it… “I felt nothing about it….I'm sorry for Takahashi and the others who got burned up down there, but I felt sorry for those who died at Pearl Harbor, too.People get mad when I say this but - it was as impersonal as could be. €œI’ve got a standard answer on that,†he informed me, referring to guilt. He confirmed the meeting with Takahashi (he agreed to do that only out of "courtesy") and most of the details, but scoffed at the notion of shedding any tears over the bombing. So, on May 6, 1985, I called Tibbets at his office at Executive Jet Aviation in Columbus, Ohio, and in surprisingly short order, he got on the horn. Takahashi swore he saw a tear in the corner of one of Tibbets’ eyes. At that recent meeting, Takahashi expressed forgiveness, admitted Japan’s aggression and cruelty in the war, and then pressed Tibbets to acknowledge that the indiscriminate bombing of civilians was always wrong.īut the pilot (who had not met one of the Japanese survivors previously) was non-committal in his response, while volunteering that wars were a very bad idea in the nuclear age. Takahashi showed me personal letters to and from Tibbets, which had led to a remarkable meeting between the two elderly men in Washington, D.C. At least 90% of them were civilians, mainly women and children. The August 6 bombing led to the deaths of at least 75,000 people in a flash and at least that many more in the days and years that followed. He was one of the many child victims of the atomic attack, but unlike most of them, he survived (though with horrific burns and other injuries), and grew up to become a director of the memorial museum in Hiroshima. The hook for the interview was this: While spending a month in Japan on a grant in 1984, I met a man named Akihiro Takahashi. I had a chance to interview Tibbets more than 20 years ago, and wrote about it for several newspapers and magazines and in the book I wrote with Robert Jay Lifton, “Hiroshima in America.†Some of the obits noted that he had requested no funeral or headstone for his grave, not wishing to create an opportunity for protestors to gather. Tibbets was 92, and defended the bombing to the end of his life. Tibbets, pilot of the plane, the "Enola Gay" (named for his mother), which dropped the atomic bomb over Hiroshima on August 6, 1945. NEW YORK A bulletin topping many news sites this afternoon announced the passing of Paul W. On the Death of 'Hiroshima Bomb' Pilot Paul Tibbets Thanks for posting that my friend and for honoring the man.