Posted on 03/17/2008 5:00:40 PM PDT by Coleus
It was a clear, hot summer day on Aug. 6, 1945, when 10-year-old Kenji Kitagawa kissed his mother and brother goodbye before leaving for school. The fifth-grader didn't know that would be the last time he would see them alive. Life was forever altered for Kitagawa and the rest of the world 62 years ago, as an American B-29 bomber, flying 26,000 feet above his hometown of Hiroshima, Japan, dropped an atomic bomb.
Now 73, Kitagawa travels the world as part of an effort to educate people on the destructive power of nuclear weapons. Sponsored by the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation, Kitagawa has been publicly reliving his experiences from Hiroshima for the past three years. With foundation Chairman Steven Leeper serving as translator, Kitagawa shared his experience with an audience of about 60 people at Christ Church in Summit last Sunday.
"After retiring, I had this feeling that I was not going to live much longer, and I thought, 'What is the most important thing for me to do?' and my mind was brought back to this place," he said, referring to Hiroshima. Kitagawa and his classmates were awaiting an assembly program at their school when the bomb hit at 8:16 a.m. A flash of blue and white light came like lightning through the windows, charring all who were directly exposed, Kitagawa said. Confusion and panic followed, as a ferocious blast of wind came crashing into the school.
"There was an amazing roaring sound and the entire school started to collapse," said Kitagawa. "I remember falling and feeling like a hammer was hitting me over the head." When he came to, the classroom was in total darkness. He would learn later that the sun became obliterated by the mushroom cloud from the bomb.
(Excerpt) Read more at nj.com ...
We were also taught that this would keep us safe from an aircraft strafing attack. It was the flying shards of glass that we were ducking from.
Fact is that God blessed us with that weapon to save untold lives. They were warned.
I believe it can be traced to the socialist influence in America in the 1950’s and the “Better Red than Dead” philosiphy.
The civilians were given warning - more than we were given when Pearl Harbor was bombed.
The Japanese could have surrendered after the first atomic bomb was dropped.
It’s a question of whether American lives were to be lost in an invasion or Japanese lives were to be lost in a bombing. The Japanese figured we only had one bomb. They were wrong.
Fortunately, they didn’t call our bluff that we had many more bombs.
So if al-Qaeda were somehow to form a state, their surprise attack on the Pentagon using civilian assets as weapons would be completely legitimate?
On the other side, if they had not surrendered after the third atomic bomb, we did not have any more. I count Trinity site as the first.
BTW, I was able to smuggle home a piece of the melted sand from Trinity site. Such an interesting green color. On of the "perks" of working at WSMR.
Even Sun Tzu realized “attacking cities” was justified as a last resort (If you must mention his advice).
Of course the dude lived in the 5th century BC and never laid eyes on an atom bomb. Might have moved “attacking the cities” to the top if you had them and the enemy that “sneaked attacked” you did not.
“Do people still laugh when children are taught to duck and cover in the event of a nuclear war?”
You’ll laugh. Warning: Profanity
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sbw6Nxf8dYU
“Nah...it was whole “nuclear winter” scare that came to dominate the 1980s, with movies like The Day After”
The movies started way before then, remeber “On the Beach” from about circa 1960?
This was a Communist telling our children not to protect themselves, while the children in the USSR knew exactly what to do.
And this is funny?
Thats nothing...let me tell you about my Dads life after the war living in constant pain unable to walk after
being shot through both legs by a japanese machine gun on Okinawa
Interesting conception - Hadn’t considered that aspect.
Was God trying to tell them something?
AMAZING!
Please forgive the typos I worked a 14 hour day today. I think it’s time to pack it in.
The thoughts that you were trying to express is counts, unless it is impossible to understand.
I understood exactly what you were saying.
I feel distressed at the current crop of "Hate America" journalists who are denying those facts, such as the journalist for World War II magazine (currently on the news stands and in bookstores) who re-wrote history with "new" claims about why we really dropped the bomb (to frighten the Soviets, etc.) Now that the Greatest Generation is dying off, the Hate America crowd is determined to denigrate our history in this matter like they've rewritten all the other chapters to put us in the worst possible light.
They got numerous warnings. My dad was 8 months into a pacific tour after completing a tour in medium bomber in North Africa and Sicily. He made a number of runs right up to two days before the first drop that dropped warning leaflets. I still have one of them. My dad and a lot of others never had to try to take the Japanese Islands and survived when they might not have. I don’t care if a million Japanese died it was worth saving american lives.
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