Truman, the man who decided to unleash the powers of the nuclear age, or of J. But nowhere in the entire exhibit is there a picture of President Harry S. There are jaunty pictures of the crew, led by the pilot, Col. There are detailed descriptions of the plane's famous markings, some intended to deceive Japanese air defenders, and long explanations of how the craft was restored after years of neglect. Conversely, the compactness of the bomb itself - a bit over 10 feet long - seems oddly out of sync with the mental image of a weapon that killed 150,000 to 200,000 people. In a war known for small fighters, from the Japanese Zero to the British Spitfire, the B-29 Superfortress is something of a shock just because of its size. The silvery plane itself makes a surprisingly strong impression. The result of the historical wrangling is a strikingly incomplete exhibition that leaves visitors totally in the dark about how a decision was reached to use the bomb, and the aftermath of the most militarily decisive and horrific mission in the history of air war. The protests by American veterans groups, who said the original plans for a vast exploration of the Hiroshima bombing portrayed the Japanese as victims and the Americans as aggressors, led the Smithsonian's leadership to back off from its grand plans and forced the resignation of the museum's director, Martin O. The bomb bay doors are still open, as if they never swung shut again that morning a half century ago.īut in many ways, Washington's most argued about, most crowded exhibit of the year is also the most diminished display in Smithsonian history, a testament to the emotional power the Enola Gay still conveys. After two years of unending controversy, the Enola Gay has finally arrived in downtown Washington, sitting atop a copy of Little Boy, the atomic bomb that destroyed Hiroshima 50 years ago today. Louis and the Apollo capsule that it hardly looks threatening, though it is so huge that the curators of the National Air and Space Museum had to leave the wings off.
IT sits so quietly in gleaming splendor inside an exhibition hall near the Spirit of St.