Thursday, November 1st 2007, 11:27 AM
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul Tibbets, the pilot who dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, died Thursday. He was 92.
Tibbets died at his home in Columbus, Ohio, longtime friend Gerry Newhouse said. He had been in declining health for some time.
As a 30-year-old Air Corps colonel, Tibbets piloted the Enola Gay — named after his mother — when it dropped the five-ton "Little Boy" bomb on Aug. 6, 1945. It was the first use of a nuclear weapon.
At least 70,000 people died instantly and countless others were injured. Two-thirds of the Japanese city of Hiroshima was demolished.
On Aug. 9, the U.S. dropped a second nuclear bomb on the city of Nagasaki, killing an estimated 40,000 people. A day later, Japan surrendered.
Decades later, Tibbets - who did not fly on the Nagasaki mission - talked about Hiroshima.
"I knew when I got the assignment it was going to be an emotional thing," Tibbets told The Columbus Dispatch for a story on Aug. 6, 2005, the 60th anniversary of the bomb.
"We had feelings, but we had to put them in the background. We knew it was going to kill people right and left. But my one driving interest was to do the best job I could so that we could end the killing as quickly as possible."
After the war, Tibbets was a technical adviser on nuclear weapons tests at Bikini Atoll and oversaw the purchase of the B-47 six-engine bomber for the Air Force. He also set up the National Military Command Center in the Pentagon.
Tibbets rose to the rank of brigadier general and retired from the Air Force in 1966. He later moved to Columbus, where he ran an air taxi service until he retired in 1985.
Despite widespread condemnation of the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Tibbets said he had no problem living with what he had done.
"I'm not proud that I killed 80,000 people, but I'm proud that I was able to start with nothing, plan it and have it work as perfectly as it did," he said in a 1975 interview.
"You've got to take stock and assess the situation at that time. We were at war. ... You use anything at your disposal."
He added: "I sleep clearly every night."
Tibbets is survived by his wife, Andrea, and three sons, Paul III, Gene and James.
He requested there be no funeral to avoid attracting protesters. A friend said he had asked that his body be cremated and the ashes scattered over the English Channel.
Source:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/wn_repo ... ml?ref=rss
P.S.: He was a Greatest Hero of XX century who kill a lot Nazis. How we need some guys like him to stop a series of conflicts...
R.I.P.
In your eyes hitler must be even a greater hero because if you would kill all jews today there would be much less trouble in the world...