Hiroshima bomb pilot dies aged 92

[Chugalug2]

Not mentioned, AFAIK, in this thread is the fate decreed for the Allied POW's in Japanese hands. Many had already been forced to dig large pits in the ground that they surmised were their own mass graves. An order for their mass execution in the event of an invasion was issued, and indeed known to the Allied High command, no doubt as a means of deterring them from proceeding. All my father's comrades would have been slaughtered, he being spared their fate merely because he had expired from the effects of over three years of Japanese hospitality some four months before the surrender. Faced with such a cruel and obdurate enemy the availability just in time of the A bombs was nothing less than a god send and, as has been said, saved lives in the millions.
RIP General Tibbets, your duty done Sir. History will be kinder than the armchair warriors. It always is.