Poddy I am going to tip my toe into the water here.
My knowledge is only from stories my uncle and Dad and an old lady friend told me about their "war" within WW11 and after.
Had the atomic bombs not dropped, the POWS (and some of the Jap guards) wouldn't have made it home. They were dying. Not only from the starvation but from the continual physical ill treatment and seeing their mates die because of that treatment.
The young girls in Malaysia initially used as tea-ceremony maids who eventually were used for "comfort" were also thanking (selfishly?) that the bombs had brought the enemy to their knees and consequently the end of the war.
Civilians in Australia were harmed by the war. The death of loved sons and husbands and nurses, the not-knowing, the mental anguish for everyone everywhere during the event and long afterwards in shell shock and memories that haunted them till they died.
There was not the support that is available now for newly returned servicemen.
I don't know if there was any support for the Vietnam vets upon their return. What they witnessed and experienced must have been just as powerfully traumatic. Their treatment was not fair by the media and consequently by the general public. But support is available now, isn't it?
Many people question what has been in the past. And it is impossible to change that past. We can't un-think it or un-experience it. But we have to adapt (somehow) our lives to live the "now" life.
PEACE TO ALL
DEB
