Warbird Information Exchange

Hello,

Another distinguished WW II airman has gone west. Legendary B-17/B-29 "Enola Gay" pilot Paul Tibbets.

It is real sad that he requested no headstone because of possible unwelcome people visiting his tomb. Sad indeed.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071101/ap_ ... it_tibbets

Ron Werneth

you're right- that sucks. He should have picked Arlington. They have a 24 hour guard service.

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"I knew the jig was up when I saw the P-51D-20-NA Mustang blue-nosed bastards from Bodney, and by the way the blue was more of a royal blue than an indigo and the inner landing gear interiors were NOT green, over Berlin."

The damnable slimey, sleazy left wing news media. They could not just give a decent discussion of Gen. Tibbets life.......Oh, NO........they have to spend three quarters of the article agonizing over the "questionable" use of the Atom bomb and repeating their shock at Tibbets inablility to apologize for his actions.

Just when I think I can ignore the liberal media in this country......they throw another cow pie in my face and spike my blood pressure. What a bunch of low life scumbags!

Ted

Wow, did you get something different from that article than I did.

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"Anyway, the throat feels a bit rough...the legs have gone...but I'm still able to chant, so let's get going."

Joe Strummer, 1999

wow........ dick becker, dave tallichette, & paul tibbets all passing within 24 hours. when it rains it pours!! cripes!! what a void in aviation history!! we all owe alot to tibbetts. if it wasn't for him my dad could have been a casualty during the planned japan invasion, & i wouldn't be here to give my thanks for his efforts. god bless you general.

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tom d. friedman - hey!!! those fokkers were messerschmitts!! * without ammunition, the usaf would be just another flying club!!! * better to have piece of mind than piece of tail!!

I agree with fotobass...I didn't see anything insulting in the news article. Still, the lack of funeral or headstone just isn't right...it shouldn't have to be that way.

to even fear the desecration of his resting place is as low as it gets. whether you were for or against the bomb is irrelevant, he was a human being 1st, a soldier 2nd.

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tom d. friedman - hey!!! those fokkers were messerschmitts!! * without ammunition, the usaf would be just another flying club!!! * better to have piece of mind than piece of tail!!

Ditto. The article did not seem out of line to me, either.

Sounds to me like they were spelling out facts surrounding a controversy that he was part of, intentionally or otherwise.
Where did they express any shock about Tibbets' refusal to apologize?
All they said was that he never expressed any regrets.

Duane

Sorry guys.......but this article is typical of the bilge that the AP, New York Times, and NBC put out. There are the obligatory facts of Gen. Tibbets life, interspersed with comments of near amazement that Tibbets was not suicidal over the Japanese who lost their lives at Hiroshima. And they also were apparently "shocked" that he could not bring himself to apologize for commanding the mission.

When Gen. Tibbets came to my town, ten years or so ago, the sleazy newsrag that passes itself off as an unbiased news source did the same type of hatchet job. When interviewing Tibbets they came back several times to whether he planned to "make an apology" or if he was "sorry" for what he had done.

Let some doped up rock star or foul mouthed lesbo get in trouble with the law and the New York Times will be there in a heart beat extolling the virtues of that "great person", but let a genuine military hero make the news and they (liberal media) can't keep from second-guessing the man's decisions and generally wishing they could re-write history!


Ted

God Speed Gen. Tibbets - it was only a month ago I was in Alabama at the Air University research center going over his donations and records - certainly a very opinionated gentleman but he did a spot on job when he was asked. In my opinion, I doubt that my grandfather would have come home had it not been for atomic bomb ending the war before Operation Olympic (?)

Anyway it is always a pleasure to speak with the men who trained with him here in Wendover.

Tom P.

Duane,

Do you honestly think there was all this controversy concerning Gen. Tibbets mission in November 1945 or November 1955. Hell no!!

The news media has created most, but of course not all of this controversy in the last several decades. A lot of the pukes writing "news stories" now-a-days are the same losers that spent all their waking moments divided between smoking dope and spitting on soldiers in the late 1960's.

I was 19 in 1969 and I saw it happen, first hand! Any opportunity to grow doubt and controversy in relation to the military is right up their alley.

These clowns in the "main stream" news media lost my respect a long time ago.


Ted

Ted,

Interestingly enough there were a few who didn't think much of it even then. I interviewed a wife of one of the 509th members a few years back. She said when she told her grandmother she was getting married it was all joy and tears until she told her that the groom was a member of the group that ended the war with the bomb. The grandmother reacted by telling her she could not understand why someone would marry a person who would do "that" to so many children and women and was she prepared to make herself a party to that kind of behavior?

It totally surprised me to hear but i guess even then. . . they just had the good sense to keep quiet!

Tom P.

Just an observation, but Fox News has the same article on their website, and I'm pretty certain Fox is not left-wing...

Regardless of what the article says, Paul Tibbets was a great American who helped put an end to a devastating war. He was a true hero who did what needed to be done. There is no doubt in my mind that the dropping of the atomic bombs saved more lives than they took.

Zack

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Curator - EAA Aviation Museum, Oshkosh, WI
"Let No Story Go Untold!"
http://www.timelessvoices.org

Ted, two things, if I may.



I don't see anything here where the writer expresses 'shock'. She states his feelings and follows it with a quote. His reaction to the event is certainly valid to include in the story. General Tibbets never did express regret to my knowledge, and that's all the writer states.

Secondly, the story was updated 23 minutes ago. I think perhaps you'll feel better about the tone. It was, incidentally, updated by the same writer.

I think it would be great if we could return the tone of this thread to one that honors General Tibbets, as I believe we are ALL trying to do. Perhaps we could continue the other aspect of this discussion elsewhere on the board.

_________________
"Anyway, the throat feels a bit rough...the legs have gone...but I'm still able to chant, so let's get going."

Joe Strummer, 1999