As we approach the anniversary of the dropping of the bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I am wondering what you, Desert News, will say about this act.
In the past it has been called an "infamous act." This "infamous act" saved my life and probably saved the lives of 500,000 Americans and a million or more Japanese.The continual U.S. bombing raids were killing thousands of Japanese with "accepted" high explosive bombs. The atomic weapons shortened the war by months. Many more lives were saved than were lost in the dropping of those two bombs.
I write this as a former combat armored artillery forward observer. I served under Gen. George Patton, a great general, during the fall and winter battles in France and the Battle of the Bulge in Luxembourg, then across Germany to the interior of Czechoslovakia when the European War ended. After a short leave at home, our unit was assigned to the invasion of Japan.
If you had experienced death and killing as I have, then you would not be so "brave" as to criticize President Truman's decision to stop the war. I quote the greatly respected George Romney, "When the present sit in judgement of the past, the future is lost."
I say again, "Thanks to you, President Harry Truman."
C. Mont Mahoney
Salt Lake City