DUmmie "WeDidIt" gets it Bombing Japan saved lives, he still gets skewered

[tuolumnejim]

but of course the other DUmmies won't stand for anything like that in their little revisionist heads.

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WeDidIt  (1000+ posts)      Thu Aug-06-09 01:41 PM
Original message
An This Day, Let's Pause To Give Thanks For Some Great American Heroes
 Edited on Thu Aug-06-09 01:42 PM by WeDidIt
These men served their country and saved millions of Japanese civilians from death, not to mention hundreds of thousands of American and Japanese soldiers. In addition to that, their actions saved the world from potentially the first conflict where two sides actually used nuclear weapons against each other as the Japanese were well on their way to developing a nuclear weapon by war's end:


Colonel Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. – Pilot and Aircraft commander

Captain Robert A. Lewis – Co-pilot; Enola Gay's assigned aircraft commander*

Major Thomas Ferebee – Bombardier

Captain Theodore "Dutch" Van Kirk – Navigator

U.S. Navy Captain William S. "Deak" Parsons – Weaponeer and bomb commander

Lieutenant Jacob Beser – Radar countermeasures (also the only man to fly on both of the nuclear bombing aircraft)

Second Lieutenant Morris R. Jeppson – Assistant weaponeer

Technical Sergeant George R. "Bob" Caron – Tail gunner*

Technical Sergeant Wyatt E. Duzenberry – Flight engineer*

Sergeant Joe S. Stiborik – Radar operator*

Sergeant Robert H. Shumard – Assistant flight engineer*

Private First Class Richard H. Nelson – VHF radio operator*
 

[franksolich]

Oh my.

A Republican must not be in the White House this anniversary of Hiroshima.

The bonfire's pretty anemic, and it's not the same sorts of primitive comments gotten back when a Republican was in the White House.

One wonders what's up with that.

[diesel driver]

Oh my.

A Republican must not be in the White House this anniversary of Hiroshima.

The bonfire's pretty anemic, and it's not the same sorts of primitive comments gotten back when a Republican was in the White House.

One wonders what's up with that.

Like Ron Silver cursing the flyover at Klintoon's inauguration:

"Ron, those are OUR planes now..."

[The Village Idiot]

I doubt Japan was well on its way to nuclear weapons though

[Vagabond]

I doubt Japan was well on its way to nuclear weapons though

According to a few Japanese scientists, they did detonate their own test device off the coast of North Korea a few days after Hiroshima.  They did not have a delivery capability by that point obviously.  Of course, it is convenient that since the site is in North Korea, there is no way to determine the accuracy of that report.

[Chris_]

According to a few Japanese scientists, they did detonate their own test device off the coast of North Korea a few days after Hiroshima.  They did not have a delivery capability by that point obviously.  Of course, it is convenient that since the site is in North Korea, there is no way to determine the accuracy of that report.

It was a large reason why the Soviets declared war against Japan immediately after Hiroshima.  They figured they could scoop up the Korean Penninsula for a song, and get all that atomic weapons reasearch hardware from Pyongyang to back up their intelligence coup in Los Alamos.

[GOBUCKS]

It was a large reason why the Soviets declared war against Japan immediately after Hiroshima.  They figured they could scoop up the Korean Penninsula for a song, and get all that atomic weapons reasearch hardware from Pyongyang to back up their intelligence coup in Los Alamos.

And that's something rarely mentioned. Had the bombs not triggered an earlier end to the war, the Russians would surely have found a way to take part in the invasion in a way that would have given them authority over half the post-war country. Japan would have been partitioned, and half would have suffered under communism, just as happened to Germany. Japan would never have been able to develop into the economic powerhouse it has become. Japan would have been a carbon copy of Korea: prosperous capitalist half, destitute communist half.