Atomic Bomb Exhibit Scrapped

Re “Smithsonian Says It Erred, Scraps Exhibit on A-Bomb,” Jan. 31:

The Smithsonian has tried to apologize for the “analysis” that was initially included with their exhibit of the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the first atomic bomb over Hiroshima. This “analysis” included the belief that the war in the Pacific was America’s “war of vengeance,” while for “most Japanese, it was a war to defend their unique culture against Western imperialism.” By analogy, would these “analysts” say that the Nazis were “defending their unique culture against Jewish influence”? They said the Enola Gay should be used as a symbol to “address the significance, necessity and morality of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, because the question of whether it was necessary and right to drop the bombs continues to perplex us.” Consider this perplexity: What would the Japanese have done if they had developed the atomic bomb before the United States?

The final analysis: The Smithsonian has a group of anti-American history revisionists who spread their unpatriotic diatribe by desecrating the World War II veterans who died protecting their freedom.

WALTER FORBES

Combat Infantrymen Assn.

San Marino

In your article you state that the core of the controversy of the exhibit at the Smithsonian was the estimate of casualties--a number originally estimated at 229,000 but lowered to 63,000.

Assuming even that the lowered estimate is correct, 63,000 American casualties were avoided and the war was ended. We do not need to rewrite the history of World War II for the sake of a “balanced view” and political correctness.

President Truman saved our boys. God bless him.

MIKE URETZ

Malibu

Recently, I was pleased to meet with Michael Heyman, secretary of the Smithsonian, and find that he was about to cut the Gordian knot on the Enola Gay exhibit, removing the material presenting the Japanese as “victims.”

I was in the 11th Air Force in the Aleutians in World War II, about to move to Okinawa to take part in the final assault on the Japanese home islands. We anticipated two years and hundreds of thousands of casualties. I’m very grateful the Enola Gay saved me from being among those statistics.

A fact overlooked in the challenge by New Age anti-nuclearists is that the final contribution of our nuclear weaponry was that, despite their desperate efforts, the Soviets were never able to match it, leaving the world in precarious peace for 40 years, till they collapsed in ruins. That may have saved my son’s life, in turn.

CHARLTON HESTON

Beverly Hills

I had believed that the U.S. was a country of freedom, including that of speech, until I saw the article about the Smithsonian scrapping the exhibit on the atomic bomb. I don’t understand why pressure groups were trying to keep the museum from displaying exhibits that I truly believe are worth seeing. What are they afraid of? Seeing pictures of people who suffered from the bombs is such a shocking experience that it won’t provoke myopic ideas such as downgrading American soldiers, but the experience will surely teach us broader perspectives--the misery of war and terror of nuclear weapons.

Is 50 years still too short for the American people to look history in the face?

TAKANORI KIKUCHI

Arcadia