Pilot of plane that bombed Hiroshima dies
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QUOTECOLUMBUS, Ohio - Paul Tibbets, the pilot and commander of the B-29 that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, died Thursday, a spokesman said. He was 92.
Tibbets died at his Columbus home after a two month decline from a variety of health problems, said Gerry Newhouse, a longtime friend. Tibbets had requested no funeral and no headstone, fearing it would provide his detractors with a place to protest, Newhouse said.
Tibbets’ historic mission in the plane Enola Gay, named for his mother, marked the beginning of the end of World War II. It was the first time man had used nuclear weaponry against his fellow man.
“It’s an end of an era,” said Newhouse, who served as Tibbets’ manager for a decade. “A lot of those guys are gone now.”
It was the morning of Aug. 6, 1945, when the plane and its crew of 14 dropped the five-ton “Little Boy” bomb over Hiroshima. The blast killed 70,000 to 100,000 people and injured countless others.
Three days later, the United States dropped a nuclear bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, killing an estimated 40,000 people. Tibbets did not fly in that mission. The Japanese surrendered a few days later, ending the war.
“I knew when I got the assignment it was going to be an emotional thing,” Tibbets told The Columbus Dispatch for a story on Aug. 6, 2005, the 60th anniversary of the bomb. “We had feelings, but we had to put them in the background. We knew it was going to kill people right and left. But my one driving interest was to do the best job I could so that we could end the killing as quickly as possible.”
Tibbets, then a 30-year-old colonel, never expressed regret over his role. It was, he said, his patriotic duty—the right thing to do.
“I’m not proud that I killed 80,000 people, but I’m proud that I was able to start with nothing, plan it and have it work as perfectly as it did,” he said in a 1975 interview.
“You’ve got to take stock and assess the situation at that time. We were at war. ... You use anything at your disposal. There are no Marquess of Queensberry rules in war.
“I sleep clearly every night.”
it's going to be weird in 10-15 years that there will be hardly no WWII vets left. -
What I find weird is that there are WWII vets left. For someone like me that seems like it was in a completely different time period. It's something that we learn in history class and have no direct association with whatsoever. But there are people around that actually experienced it. I find it eerie to think that something like that happened that short a period ago that people are still alive that experienced it. It makes me wonder if anything like that will happen in my lifetime.
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There are still a few WWI vets left. As in, maybe 20 worldwide. We'll have A FEW WWII vets around for quite a while.
For the record, the last civil war vet died sometime in the '50's. -
QUOTE (Kiwi @ Nov 2 2007, 08:48 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>This man shouldn't have to fear protesters at his headstone, aside from killing many, people do not understand how many lives he ultimatly saved for both sides
of course he should....look at the world we live in today? people protest anything and everything. the man did what he was told to do. it was his job, and he obeyed the orders he was given. people are going to admire what he did, or condemn the man forever. he will never be able to rest in peace. people will bicker and blabber about where you draw the line between your job/orders, and your morals, and i respect the man for being able to do what he did knowing the outcome of that decision, but in my opinion that was a moral line i could never cross -
QUOTE (CJ. @ Nov 5 2007, 03:31 PM) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>i would have done it and then posted a video of it on youtube
and then made a remix of it using apologize by timbaland/laugh.gif" style="vertical-align:middle" emoid=":lol:" border="0" alt="laugh.gif" /> I basically just peed.
In all seriousness, I think that the bombing was justified and necessary.
A little analogy goes "If you punch me in the face unprovoked, you can't try and act surprise when I beat the crap out of you".
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