‘A-bombing saved more lives’

In view of the 60th commemoration of the atomic mission to Japan this week, surviving crew members of B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay, led by retired Brigadier General Paul W. Tibbets, have issued a joint statement, reiterating that they have no regrets over the 1945 atomic bombing.

At the same time, the group called on the nation’s leaders to uphold “reason” and avoid the use of nuclear weapons.

“To our fellow veterans and the American nation, we will all echo one sentiment, [we] pray that reason will prevail among leaders before we ever again need to call upon our nuclear might,” said the group.

The Bush administration recently sealed a partnership agreement with India on the development of civilian nuclear energy technology, which is seen as move to balance Chaina’s power in the region.

Meantime, the Enola Gay crew said that the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was a last resort.

He said that U.S. President Harry Truman, in consultation with allied leaders, particularly Britain Prime Minister Winston Churchill, approved the use of the atomic bomb when then Japanese Prime Minister Baron Kantaro Suzuki issued his nation’s refusal to surrender.

The surviving crew said it was Truman’s decision and his hope “to avoid an invasion of the Japanese homeland. An invasion that would have cost tens of thousands of Japanese and allied lives.

“The use of the atomic weapon was a necessary moment in history. We have no regrets,” they said, noting that they have taken the same position for the past six decades.

Tibbets, in the statement, said that he has in fact received many letters from people all over the world, most of them thanking his team, the 509th Composite Group, “for delivering the bombs that ended the war.”

Over the years, he said, he has been thanked by thousands of former soldiers and military families as well as Japanese veterans and civilians for that epic flight to Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945.

The second atomic bomb was dropped on Nagasaki three days later, on Aug. 9, by another team using the B-29 Superfortress Bocks Car.

The 1945 Hiroshima atomic bombing killed over 140,000 people, while the Nagasaki explosion destroyed a third of the city and killed about 150,000 people.

In an interview during his visit to Saipan and Tinian in 2004, Tibbets said he followed the order with full resolve.

“That’s why I went there to do. My mind was bent on it and I did it successfully. I didn’t falter. There’s absolutely no regrets,” Tibbets told the Saipan Tribune in 2004.

Tibbets traveled to Saipan with two other Enola Gay crewmen, navigator Theodore Van Kirk and weaponeer Morris Jeppson.

This developed as the Tinian government holds this weekend the 60th Commemoration of the Atomic Mission to Japan, which is attended by three atomic bombing victims or Hibakusha as well as U.S. veterans.

The Tinian Mayor’s Office sponsors the U.S. veterans’ commemoration rites while the 10th Tinian Municipal Council holds the Hibakusha activities.

Gov. Juan N. Babuata and Tinian Mayor Francisco Borja will lead the commemoration main event tomorrow, Aug. 6, on Tinian, from 9am to 9pm.