When it came time to answer audience questions, Van Kirk mostly found himself recalling technical details of the mission - for example, the weight of the Enola Gay at takeoff.īut, when asked what a child should take away from his address, he didn’t mince words.
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It just gave Japan the excuse to get out of the war and save face.” “The (dropping of the) atomic bombs did not win the war. The Enola Gay carried the weapon, nicknamed 'Little Boy.' It weighed nearly 10,000 pounds and could produce an explosive force equal to an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 tons of TNT. “The Japanese were a licked people before we ever dropped the atomic bombs,” Van Kirk said. Parsons reports 15 minutes after drop as follows. There was no fighter opposition and no flak. He went without regrets, but knowing his controversial place in history, he explicitly asked to be buried without a headstone. Hiroshima bombed visually with only one tenth cover at 052315A. Tibbets, who lived in Columbus, died in 2007. Of the Enola Gay’s 12 crewmen, Van Kirk is the last survivor. “People ask, ‘Does that maneuver have a name?’” he said. 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. He also recalled the exceptionally sharp turn Tibbets had made to get their B-29 as far from the blast as possible. “It reminded you of a pot of boiling oil,” he said. Tibbets - Van Kirk recalled being able to see nothing but blackness. Looking down out of the Enola Gay - named for the mother of the plane’s pilot, Paul W. He interviewed the last surviving member of the Enola Gay, Theodore Dutch Van Kirk, who came here to deliver a speech. That’s the reason they did not react after we dropped the bomb on Hiroshima.” Enola Gay navigator has 'no regrets' Advertisement On board the flight that bombed Hiroshima As the Japanese city of Hiroshima marks the 65th anniversary of the world's first atomic bomb attack, a. “To this day,” he said, “I felt the Japanese thought we only had one bomb. The bomb leveled Hiroshima with an equivalent force of 15,000 tons of TNT. “But, if you’re in a war, you have to have the guts to fight the war to win it.”
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“You’re going to kill a lot of civilians. The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and, three days later, Nagasaki, prevented that. Bartlett, Pilot of 1st A-Bomb Plane: Quiet Man with No Regrets. The greater evil Van Kirk referred to was a possible invasion of Japan that likely would have resulted in mass American casualties. With the annual Vectren Dayton Air Show set for the weekend, Van Kirk’s testimony was a potent and timely reminder of the military’s might.