1. JAPANESE THANKS FOR THE ATOM BOMB-- Wednesday, a friend of mine was talking about a trip he'd made to the USS Missouri Memorial at Pearl Harbor. being a historian himself, he had lots of questions to ask of the tour guide.
Afterwards, the guide called my friend aside to tell him a story. A few weeks earlier, an elderly Japanese man and his family were on the tour. Afterwards, the man had called the guide aside and thanked the United States for dropping the atomic bombs.
Now this would absolutely be one of the last things you'd expect a Japanese person to say.
The man said he had been a kamikaze pilot and scheduled to fly a few days after the surrender. he then pointed to his family and said that if Japan had not surrendered, they would not be there.
2. PACIFIC BOMBER-- Earlier today, we were at Popeye's in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, and had one of the best fish fries you'll find anywhere. On the way out, I stopped at a giant map of the world and saw two other gentlemen closely inspecting it and talking about the Marianas Islands and World War II.
The older one had been a tail gunner on an American bomber and had been on raids over Japanese cities. He said that the planes were actually hot from all the fires and destruction below during their bombing runs.
Plus, there was a certain smell that bombers got after missions, that they were never able to clean away.
Talk to Those World War II Vets. --Cooter
No comments:
Post a Comment