Dei enola gay

The granddaughter of Paul W. Tibbets Jr. — the aviator who piloted the bomber Enola Gay, which unleashed an atomic bomb upon Hiroshima during World War II — termed the Trump administration's flagging of the aircraft's images for removal as "shameful" in an interview with The Dispatch.

Kia Tibbets, aged forty-nine, a resident of Columbus' Clintonville neighborhood, conveyed on Tuesday that she was astonished and disbelieving when she initially learned that pictures of her grandfather's airplane had been flagged by the U.S. Department of Defense, ostensibly solely because its title contained the word "gay."

"It's disgraceful that a word that hurts no one, that denotes joyful, could evoke such immense hatred," Kia Tibbets expressed.

The photo flagging transpired amidst the Trump administration's clampdown and removal of what it deemed "DEI content" from a plethora of government agency and military websites. This information purge incorporated the deletion of language pertaining to social well-being, racial equity, and feminism.

President Donald Trump's administration is likewise attempting to pressure schools and universities receiving public funding to shut down programs it considers steeped in DEI principles.

Where did the moniker 'Enola Gay' originate?

The U.S. Department of Defense mandated the removal of the Enola Gay's photographs — which was christened in honor of Paul Tibbets' mother — amid that very purge, as the Associated Press documented on Friday. Thousands of images, including numerous ones featuring women and minorities in the military, were also tagged.

'We are gratified by the expeditious conformity across the Department with the directive pertaining to deleting DEI content from all platforms," Pentagon spokesman John Ullyot stated in a Friday statement to the AP. "In those rare instances where content is eliminated that falls outside the precisely defined purview of the directive, we furnish instructions to components accordingly.'

A majority of the Enola Gay photos remained on Defense Department websites at the time of publication.

Tibbets adored and respected his mother, opting to designate his aircraft in her honor because she supported his decision to become a pilot rather than a physician. If he were still alive presently, he would most likely deem the ongoing controversy "absurd," Kia Tibbets stated.

"I anticipate a whole lot of emotion, and likely not many of them very happy," she communicated.

Who was Paul W. Tibbets Jr.?

Army Air Force Colonel Tibbets, who was thirty years old, served as the commander and pilot of the Enola Gay on August 6, 1945, when the crew of the B-29 Superfortress dropped an atomic bomb designated "Little Boy" on the metropolis of Hiroshima. It represented the inaugural atomic bomb employed in warfare, a choice made by President Harry Truman to persuade Japan to surrender, avert what would have been deadly combat, and mitigate the loss of numerous American lives in the endeavor to seize the Japanese main island, thereby culminating World War II.

But the Japanese could not, or opted not to, comprehend the scope of destruction and death in Hiroshima. On August 9, 1945, a subsequent atomic bomb was unleashed upon the Japanese city of Nagasaki. Japan capitulated on August 15, 1945, subsequent to the two bombings and Russia's declaration of war against Japan.

Immediately following the landing from the bombing, Tibbets was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross, the second-highest accolade for members of the U.S. Army.

He continued his military service until 1966, ascending the ranks to Brigadier General within what transformed into the U.S. Air Force post-World War II.

"My grandfather championed the American people. Regardless of those people, whoever those individuals might be," Kia Tibbets stated.

After Tibbets' departure from the military, he established an air taxi enterprise, Executive Jet Aviation, in Columbus, as the Cincinnati Enquirer previously reported. He died in Columbus on November 1, 2007, at the age of ninety-two.

Kia Tibbets mentioned that she was raised by him and her grandmother, Andrea, in a family abode on the east side of Columbus. She characterized him as resolute, equitable, upright, and a man who led an unremarkable life.

"He was simply your average man who happened to perform an extraordinary deed that his country requested of him," she said.

As a child, she became accustomed to individuals offering their opinions on her grandfather's part in the bombing, which claimed the lives of approximately one hundred and forty thousand people, many of whom were civilians. However, the Trump administration's action has "pushed the envelope" like no other event, she said.

"This is even more personal because this is an attack on my family. That's how I view it," she asserted. "It's on my family name. It's on my great-grandmother. I find it very personal."

NHart@dispatch.com

@NathanRHart

This story was updated to add a photo gallery.