ATOM BOMB USE

Press, Volume C, Issue 29620, 16 September 1961, Page 11

ATOM BOMB USE

Truman “Has No Regrets” (N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) DENVER, Sept 15. The former President Mr Harry Truman, told the American Legion yesterday that he was “sick and tired of these tear-jerkers” who criticised his decisions to drop the atomic bombs in World War 11. Mr Truman, who gave the major address at closing sessions of the Legion's national convention, opened the floor to questions with the statement that “if anyone of you smart legionnaires want to ask some smart-aleck questions, I'll give you some smart-aleck answers." The questions came, and so did the answers, United Press International said. (The American Legion is the equivalent of the Returned Services’ Association). Mr Truman said that his decision to intervene in Korea was the most difficult of his Presidency, “because it involved the United Nations and the entire free world.”

Asked if he had regrets on dropping the atom bomb on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, he said: “I do not, and I’ll tell you why. I’m getting sick and tired of these tearjerkers, these fellows who are ' always saying what ought to have been done but ’ weren’t there and don't know a damned thing about it. They are always crying : their eyes out about the : people who are killed . . . I don't hear them crying about the fellows who died in the upside-down battleships at Pearl Harbour.” Mr Truman, in his address, called for strength and unity among Western allies because “we are being seriously challenged and threatened by an imperialist nation, armed to the teeth, and a Power that is hell-bent on making trouble.” He urged the Legion to give support to the President of the United States in his foreign policy, saying: “This is no time for politicians to embarrass the President when they do not have and cannot have all the facts. This is the time for unity.”