A-bomb exhibit without Japan's atrocities not balanced: U.S. veteran+

NEW YORK, May 5 Kyodo - The head of a U.S. veterans group says exhibitions focusing on the damage wrought by the U.S. atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki alone without touching on Japan's wartime atrocities are unbalanced and undesirable.

Michael Dunn, president of the Air Force Association, indicated in a recent
interview with Kyodo News that the group has not changed its position since it
opposed an A-bomb exhibition planned at the Smithsonian National Air and Space
Museum in 1995, leading the event to be cancelled.
The museum ''should have a balanced presentation,'' Dunn, a retired Air Force
general, said. Not showing the ''atrocities that the Japanese forces put on the
allied forces did not seem to be a balanced approach.''
Efforts to achieve nuclear disarmament have been gaining momentum as the
delegates of nearly 190 nations huddle for a nearly monthlong U.N. conference
to review the performance of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in New York.
But Dunn remains convinced that the nuclear attack on the two Japanese cities
in 1945 was legitimate.
He said the Smithsonian A-bomb display was apparently based on the belief that
atomic bombs should not have been used. But, he argued, the United States had
to invade Japan's mainland and could have faced a million U.S. casualties if it
had not used nuclear weapons.
Asked what the Enola Gay -- the B-29 bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on
Hiroshima -- represents for U.S. veterans, Dunn said, ''I think the Enola Gay
is a symbol of a very hard-fought war in the Pacific.''
''We don't see it as this machine of death. We see it as a symbol of the end of
the war.''
''Part of the Enola Gay issue was not the display of the damage but the attempt
to rewrite history, an attempt to say that an attack did not have to be made.''
He said ''mountains of historical evidence'' show that was not the case.
Dunn said the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki helped people around
the world understand the destructive power of nuclear weapons and that they
should never be used again.
Regarding the demand by A-bomb survivors and kin of the victims that the damage
caused by the bombs should be displayed to represent the tragedy to succeeding
generations, Dunn said, ''I don't believe one small change in the national
museum is going to make much difference.''
In January, U.S. President Barack Obama told the mayor of Hiroshima he would
like to make a visit to the city but without mentioning the timing.
Dunn, who has himself visited Hiroshima, said, ''I see nothing wrong with the
president's visiting'' the city. However, he added that ''most Americans would
be very upset'' if the president apologizes for dropping the nuclear bomb.
Dunn welcomed the recent trend toward nuclear disarmament, including Obama's
pledge in April 2009 to seek a world without nuclear weapons.
But the world is not yet ready to achieve such a goal, he said, noting that
tactical nuclear weapons are not covered by the recent U.S.-Russia arms
reduction deal and that other nuclear powers such as China are not engaged in
nuclear disarmament talks.
==Kyodo