I formed my views before reading "The Making Of The Atomic Bomb" by Rhodes, because I am the son of a serviceman who was in the Pacific at the time and regarded Hiroshima and Nagasaki as events which saved his life and made my life possible. I found Rhodes' book to be outstanding, because it starts with the history of the philosophies of the men behind it, and for one book contains incredible range and great depth.

I was very impressed not with the arrogance of the Americans but with the broad inclusiveness of the decision making that went into the decision and targetting of the atomic weapons. Whatever one thinks about the validity of the decision, it is clear that a great deal of discussion took place among the leadership of the allies. It was a decision made from knowledge and not from prejudice.

The atom bomb was an incredible weapon, but it should be noted that a single such bomb carried the destructive capacity of a couple of thousand plane raids. Japan was already experiencing thousand plane raids and Hiroshima and Nagasaki would have been targetted conventionally had there not been an atomic option.

What should give us pause is the capability of thermonuclear weapons, which expanded the destructive principles another three orders of magnitude beyond the atom bomb. The first hydrogen test in '52 was about 800 times larger than Trinity. Richard Rhodes wrote an excellent successor to the book mentioned above covering the development of thermonclear and the Soviet concurrent developments: "Dark Sun".

There is also some very practical backing of the decision, i.e., an invasion of Japan was in the planning stages and would clearly take the war into 1946. Considering the vast numbers of enemy being killed by the existing aerial war machine, it is hard to argue convincingly that the A-Bombs did not save lives on both sides by shortening the war considerably.

This is not an exercise in chest beating, and Tibbets never undertook it as such. I think he was honorable, decent, and intelligent, and in a way it is a warning we should all take to heart about what honrable, decent, and intelligent people are capable of.