THE crew of the Enola Gay, more than thirty years later, go their separate ways. Since 1945 they have continued to receive hate mail from those who protest the morality of dropping the atomic bomb on Hiroshima; the mail peaks every year on August 6. From time to time the police are called in to investigate death threats. For the most part, the fliers have learned to live with anonymous insults and recriminations.
Paul Tibbets retired from the air force in 1966 with the rank of brigadier general, convinced he was an "expendable victim" of a changing public attitude toward what he had been ordered to do over Hiroshima.
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For many years Claude Eatherly, the flamboyant Texan who flew the Straight Flush, did not adjust to civilian life—there were stays in Veterans Administration mental hospitals. He was treated by some of the press as the Hiroshima pilot who went mad because of his guilt over the bombing. The Texan became a figurehead for Ban the Bomb groups. Eatherly loved the publicity. A hero at last, he found himself repeating the views attributed to him before he ever pronounced them.
In 1974 a throat malignancy robbed Eatherly of his voice, but in 1976, at the age of fifty-seven, he seemed to have found serenity. He lives with his family on social security and a disability pension in a modest cottage near Houston, Texas, a graying man in a straw hat and cowboy boots.
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American leaders, fearing that the Hiroshima bomb might have hardened Japan's will to resist and also that it be regarded as an unrepeatable phenomenon, decided to use a second atomic bomb—the plutonium weapon—the only other one then ready. They hoped to convince Japan's leaders that America's nuclear capability was far greater than it was.
LeMay asked Tibbets, "Don't you think you should lead the second attack?" Tibbets replied, "No. I'm getting enough publicity. The other guys have worked long and hard and can do the job as well as I can."
Charles Sweeney was chosen to command the second strike. He told his crew he wanted "to do it just like Paul did." Among those on board would be Radar Officer Jacob Beser, the only man to accompany both atomic bombs to Japan. Cheshire and Penney, the British representatives, would ride in one of the two observer planes.
More:
http://www.ourcivilisation.com/smartboard/shop/tomwitts/after/chap1.htmAlso:
My God, what have we done?' - the commander of the 'Enola Gay'
By David McNeill in Hiroshima
Published: 05 August 2005
Sixty years ago tomorrow, the crew of the Enola Gay watched in awe as their payload detonated over the city of Hiroshima. "As the bomb exploded, we saw the entire city disappear," said Commander Robert Lewis. "I wrote in my log, 'My God, what have we done?'"
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In March this year,
Paul Tibbets, the pilot of the Enola Gay, also said the bomb had saved lives. Asked whether he had any regrets, he said: "Hell no, no second thoughts. If you give me the same circumstances, hell yeah, I'd do it again."More:
http://64.233.169.104/search?q=cache:1ljHgEXT2k0J:politicsinternational.web-log.nl/politicsinternational/war/index.html+%22the+crew+of+the+enola+gay%22+tibbets+guilty+regret&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=2&gl=usAlso:
'One hell of a big bang'
Today is Hiroshima Day, the anniversary of the first use of a bomb so powerful that it would come to threaten the existence of the human race. Only two such devices have ever been used, but now, a decade after the end of the cold war, the world faces new dangers of nuclear attack - from India, Pakistan, Iraq, al-Qaida, and even the US. Launching a special investigation into nuclear weapons,
Paul Tibbets, the man who piloted the Enola Gay on its mission to Japan, tells Studs Terkel why he has no regrets - and why he wouldn't hesitate to use it again. More:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,3604,769634,00.html