Tonight I was washing some lettuce over the sink, and I noticed a few bugs (a bonus from buying organic produce) on the leaves as I removed them from the bag. I flicked a few into the compost basket nearby, then as I rinsed I saw a few more and absent-mindedly rinsed them down the drain. As soon as I did that, I regretted not stopping to give them an opportunity to join their kin awaiting a trip to the big bin in the back yard.

As I paused for a moment to consider this small drama I reflected back a few hours to a piece on the radio about the passing at age 92 today of Paul Tippets, the captain of the B-29 Enola Gay (named after his mother, I believe). When asked about his feelings about the 100,000 or so folks immediately incinerated by the device his aircraft dropped on the port city of Hiroshima, he was not known to express remorse. I do not mean to criticise him or question his morality, or imagine that I am a better person. The circumstances were quite different in many respects.



But it just struck me as odd - that I was standing over my sink remorseful about needlessly rinsing a very small bug or two down my drain, while he had to deal with the sight and knowledge of what he and his crew (and his fellow humans) had done to the inhabitants of that city five miles beneath him that morning in August - and he was able to justify the event and by all accounts sleep well in the years and decades that followed.

It is worth remembering what we can be capable of when we get caught up in warfare. Here is what Wikipedia says about one of the major causes of the onset of hostilities between Japan and the United States:

To...ensure a safe supply of oil and other critical resources, Japan would have to challenge the European colonial powers over the control of oil rich areas such as the Dutch East Indies. Such a move against the colonial powers was however expected to lead to open conflict also with the United States. On August 1941, the crisis came to a head as the United States, which at the time supplied 80% of Japanese oil imports, initiated a complete oil embargo. This threatened to cripple both the Japanese economy and military strength once the strategic reserves would run dry. Faced with the choice of either trying to appease the U.S., negotiate a compromise, find other sources of supply or go to war over resources, Japan chose the latter.



"We were at war. ... You use anything at your disposal," Tippet was quoted as saying in 1975, "I sleep clearly every night."

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