lessonslearned
Brief Encounter
A Navy submarine officer cements his opinion about the country’s use of an atomic bomb in World War II after hearing a story about a machinist’s granddaughter.
I
n the fall of 1958, I had just com-
pleted an arduous 72-day-long mis- sion in the waters of the North Pacific
Ocean on my submarine, the USS Diodon (SS-349). It was well-known at the time that those given a duty assignment on a diesel submarine were the young and strong; I was 19 years old then, 6 feet 2 inches tall, and in great physical shape, which made me a perfect candidate for the assignment. Each night, we raised the submarine’s
snorkel to suck in fresh air and ran the diesel engines to charge the submarine’s batteries. When daylight was upon us, we lowered the snorkel and began breath- ing the air trapped inside our submerged boat. Fresh fruit and vegetables were not available for the entire duration of the trip. The last of our canned meat — Vi- enna sausages — saw us through the final week at sea. After sailing up Tokyo Bay in the south- ern Kanto region of Japan, we entered the shipyard dry dock at Yokosuka. Within one day, the amazing shipyard workers had the submarine completely surrounded with bamboo staging, all tied by hand with twine. I received an assignment to assist a 50-year-old Japanese machinist and a 25-year-old Japanese shipfitter to inspect and make a minor modification to the sub- marine’s safety tank. As soon as the manhole cover was
loosened, a crane operator was there to lift it off. I then stepped in. Looking closely at the great shape the subma-
6 8 MI L I T A R Y O F F I C E R J U N E 2 0 1 0
rine’s safety tank was in, the shipfitter commented, “Now I see why we lost the war.” After hearing this statement, the older, and in my opinion wiser, machinist looked up at me and asked whether the shipfitter and I would follow him to his machine shop, because he had something he wanted to show us. We all walked down a tunnel that led
to the machine shop. Pictures of young children dressed in school uniforms lined the tunnel’s walls. Stopping at one particular picture, the machinist tapped his finger on the glass and said, “That is my granddaughter.” In the photo, a young girl stood at
attention. In her right hand she held the square end of a pointed stick, or picket, with the pointed end resting on her shoulder. The machinist said in a quiet but firm voice, “Do not ever forget that your atomic bomb saved my grand- daughter’s life. It woke up our leaders. She would have died trying to defend our land with that pointed stick.” (That same atomic bomb also saved a servicemember from having to live with the memory of shooting this little girl.) Now, 51 years later, the lesson of that
brief encounter remains with this grand- father, drowning out the voices decrying the American military’s use of the atomic bomb in World War II.
MO
— H.L. “Hal” Bartke is a retired Navy lieu- tenant. He lives in Bridgton, Maine. For submis- sion information, see page 18.
IMAGE: SHUTTERSTOCK
Tell Your Story Your Thoughts?
■ If you found yourself in this same situation, would you have learned the same lesson? Discuss this column with other officers at
www.moaa .org/lessonslearned.
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