Brig. Gen. Paul W. Tibbits, dies, "I only did my duty"

Brigadier General Paul W. Tibbets USAF (retired) died this past November 1, 2007. Tibbits was the commanding officer in charge of dropping the first atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, which forced the Japanese warlords to begin to seriously consider unconditional surrender. A second bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan brought them to the surrender table. Much has been written about whether we should have dropped to bomb on the homeland islands or have invited the Japanese to witness the destruction of a less inhabited piece of land. Much has also been written on our moral right to killed non-combatants in this atomic carnage.

Some modern day Japanese, and a few Americans, have conveniently forgotten that Japans warlords had global conquest in their sights when they attacked China in July 1937. Japanese solders bayoneted, machine-gunned, or beheaded 300,000 innocent civilians during their Rape of Nanking 1937-1938. These same modern apologists forget the Bataan Death March of April 1942 in which approximately 18,000 Allied solders were executed or left to die as they fell behind the forced march. To the militaristic Japanese, the idea of surrender was totally foreign; those that give up were considered to be less than human and were treated accordingly with utter disdain and contempt.

With that cultural viewpoint, the Japanese would never have yielded to defeat. It was only when faced with total destruction did the Japanese relent and do the unthinkable and submit to unconditional surrender. Who knows where Japan would have gone if not stopped.

K.