In high school I was a sort of a nerd, reading science fiction and building liquid-fueled rockets. Let’s face it, I was a real nerd. But I was also one of the “Rocket Boys” before it was fashionable. When I graduated in 1960, boys had a choice: Army or Navy. If you were really lucky you were able to get into the Air Force. And if you had a screw loose, you joined the Marines! (But if you ever got into a fight in a bar, and guys from your own ship wouldn’t help you, if there was just one marine in the place, he’d be there in the middle of things, swinging right beside you!)
Since I’d spent all my life around and on the water, I naturally picked the Navy. After passing a test at the recruiting office, I was guaranteed Guided Missile School, which was exciting because I could be around real rockets and actually get paid for it!
The original “Nuclear Weaponsman” insignia, which was later changed.
On the train enroute to boot camp in Great Lakes, IL, I found out that in the Navy, a “guarantee” was more like a “suggestion” and I was actually headed for Nuclear Weapons School. Not my choice but sounded OK. The “Nuclear Weaponsman” insignia you wore on your arm was a bomb dropping through an atom, which was also cool. Before I graduated the name of the rating was changed to “Gunner’s Mate, Technician” for security reasons and the insignia was a simple pair of crossed cannons. Bummer!
At any rate, for the next several years I was up close and personal with a lot of atomic bombs and knew more than anyone ever wanted to know about what they were capable of doing. Thank goodness no one has ever used one in wartime since World War II!
I think about it this time of year because on August 8th we are coming up on the anniversary of when the first bomb was dropped. There are still a lot of different opinions as to whether we should have used the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki at all. I’m not offering an opinion, but just putting out some statistics, and they are only approximations, since every source you look at has a different set of numbers.
Hiroshima and Nagasaki were both prime military targets, one with a torpedo plant and the other a major shipyard. The total loss of life was approximately 500,000 combined for both targets. This compares to 250,000 casualties per night due to the firebombing of Japanese cities. If we had to invade the Japanese main islands, storming the beaches as we did in Normandy, it would have likely cost one million American lives and 10 million Japanese, not to mention devastating the civilian population of Japan. These stats are what led to the dilemma that was dropped into Harry Truman’s lap when he unexpectedly became president upon FDR’s death in 1945. I’m glad it wasn’t my decision.
Fast forward 50 years and 10,000 miles east: When I moved up to Lake Lanier, my next-door neighbor was the original homeowner on our street. When he moved here, there was a goat farm right down Gaines Ferry Road, and one farmer still plowed his land with mules!
My neighbor’s house was a modern log cabin, and the inside looked like a cross between a museum and antique shop, and every artifact had a story behind it. As far as neighbors go, you couldn’t have asked for one better. Whenever I needed a hand on anything he was right there. Each year when the lake went down, we would move our docks out to the end of the cove together, then move them back when the lake came up in the spring.
Over the years, we had plenty of time to swap stories back and forth. He passed away this spring and the one story that I remember best is that he was a World War II veteran. He had graduated from high school in 1945 and immediately enlisted in the Army. In July of that year, he was at an Army base in the state of Washington waiting to get on a ship to take him to Japan. He was to be part of the Second Wave to storm the beaches on the big island of Honshu. He said, “When Harry Truman dropped that bomb, he saved my life.”
In memory of Robert Kopp, 1927-2024.
Photo: by Vinnie Mendes
