Several national and international groups, including AU professors, are planning to protest an upcoming exhibit at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum of the Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, on Aug. 6, 1945, .
Museum Director, Gen. John Dailey said that the Smithsonian will display the B-29 airplane "in all of its glory as a magnificent technological achievement," a phrase that many find objectionable.
The exhibit is expected for Dec. 15 and will be presented in the museum's new annex at the Dulles International Airport. The Enola Gay will be displayed with other World War II aircraft.
AU history professor Peter Kuznick said he doesn't oppose an exhibition of the Enola Gay, but what he finds to be inappropriate is the manner in which the plane will be displayed.
"Clearly, the Enola Gay is more than a magnificent technological achievement," Kuznick said. "If [the Smithsonian] wanted to celebrate World War II military technology they could choose any B-29. The Enola Gay is the most symbolically significant plane there is for one reason - it dropped the first atomic bomb and wiped out most of the population of the city of Hiroshima."
Kuznick said that the planned exhibit does not accurately reflect world opinion of American militarism.
"The rest of the world doesn't see the bombing as a heroic act that should be celebrated," Kuznick said. "They view this as an example of American militarism that doesn't fully consider the consequences and the ramifications of its actions."
As a result, a national coalition is forming to protest in opposition to the exhibit.
Kuznick said the protest is still in its planning stages and there is no formal organization yet. However, he said that the coalition is working with historians, grassroots organizations and peace organizations, as well as groups in Japan and elsewhere.
Kuznick said that he doesn't want to shut down the exhibit, but instead encourage a balanced presentation of the Enola Gay that shows all the news about atomic bombing, rather than solely an American perspective.
"What I think is necessary is to open up a serious discussion of what happened in 1945 and what's happening in nuclear proliferation today," Kuznick said.
The Air and Space Museum's upcoming Enola Gay exhibit isn't its first. In 1995, historians at Smithsonian presented a different one, which Kuznick said most thought was fair and balanced. However, the American Legion and Air Force protested the exhibit because they found it too "sympathetic."
A spokesman for the Air and Space Museum said he hadn't heard of the planned protests of the exhibit and couldn't comment on them.
The spokesman said that veterans groups' reactions were positive and that "lots of people are excited about seeing it for the first time. It's a great opportunity to get big artifacts out to the public."
Andrew Willis, a junior in the School of International Service, agreed with Kuznick.
"The fact that [the Enola Gay] was used to slaughter hundreds of thousands of people is a secondary consideration to the Smithsonian, apparently," Willis said. "It should be acknowledged as part of an important event in our history, but only to the extent that its use in the final weeks of World War II was enormously cruel and completely unjustifiable."
Kuznick and Willis both drew comparisons of the atomic bombing to current American foreign policies.
"Our policies have created a system where the world mistrusts the U.S.," Kuznick said, adding the current Bush administration policy of research to "build a new generation of nuclear weapons."
"Bush's policy of 'preemptive war' is all about using threats, posturing and mass slaughter as deterrence," Willis said.