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\nMorning, Gentle Readers! The Creative Section heard the news about the strange announcement from Iran about Oman and the Strait of Hormuz. It was a curious sort of press release which seemed to be warning Mr. Trump to clear the US Navy out of the region and abandon its campaign against the righteous and just people who share the great Persian heritage, ancestry and culture.<\/p>\n
Section Leader Miles made his own announcement, which was that his hard-worked Boomer contributors could join him for brunch over at Ruthie’s All Day at her newer location at Fair Oaks. I will be giving the Word this morning, so I am here, but The Boomer Boys and Girls like to sit at the bar and have fun with Nam, the bartender who keeps things rolling there on a Sabbath morning.<\/p>\n
Anyway, I expect that is why the crowd is a little thin here at the Socotra HQ on this particular Sunday.<\/p>\n
The news from the Gulf is strange. The Revolutionary Guard high command appears to be the center of gravity of the nonsense on the news. It is intended for their domestic audience, of course, but also to remind the White House that they are true believers who will never give up, regardless of the sacrifice, and that they will happily endure whatever pain can be dished out if they can interfere with the mid-term elections in 86 days.<\/p>\n
Or, in 2 months and 25 days if you prefer doing your calendar that way. Here at the Socotra HQ, we are going by the hours\u20142,064 of them\u2014since we can watch the time seeming to pass more swiftly.<\/p>\n
See? Only 2,063 to go!<\/p>\n
Which brings me to my Sunday Word. Or words.<\/p>\n
I had the chance to visit two special Japanese cities in my years out in the Far East. One of them was a place called “Hiroshima,” and the other “Nagasaki.”<\/p>\n
I do not want to dwell on the horror of that conflict, now 81 years in the past. I will limit myself to a couple short sentences, stark in their simplicity.<\/p>\n
On this day in 1945, the B-29 Superfortress Bockscar, with accompanying aircraft, flew from North Field on Tinian in the Mariana Islands toward the home islands of Japan. Later that morning, Major Charles William Sweeney arrived over the target area carrying a single weapon, the “Fat Man” atomic bomb, sister to the “Little Boy” device dropped on the city of Hiroshima on 06 August.<\/p>\n
I said I would keep this short, since this is a matter of context between our challenging times.<\/p>\n
We have rightly been concerned with the loss of American lives in attempting to open an international waterway to commercial traffic. Fragmentary reporting indicates as many as twenty have been killed in action and more than 400 wounded. The killed in action include a new price at the altar of war, in that women are now killed with the men with whom they serve.<\/p>\n
This is a heavy price to pay in terms of young lives with so much promise. We mourn their sacrifice as our families would have mourned ours.<\/p>\n
But on this day, 81 years ago, Major Sweeney brought Bockscar over Nagasaki after the primary target at Kokura could not be attacked. His bombardier, Captain Kermit Beahan, took control for the final seconds before bomb release over the city far below.<\/p>\n
The two atomic attacks ultimately killed an estimated 150,000 to 246,000 people, overwhelmingly civilians. Their use was deemed necessary to deal with resolute and formidable men who had no fear of sacrifice. Or even their own passing. My father was in final pilot training to support the invasion of the Home Islands. His life was saved.<\/p>\n
The full impact of the annihilation maintained an uneven but enduring legacy of peace\u2014or at least the absence of nuclear weapons hurled in anger.<\/p>\n
I have a certain sympathy for those who argue now that the only solution to the IRGC True Believers is their death. That may be the case. But since this is going to have to end, we will see how it plays out over the next couple thousand hours.<\/p>\n
And the other troubling news for this Sunday Word?<\/p>\n
They are talking about the renovation of America’s strategic inventory, since the original equipment is getting sort of obsolescent. They are talking about making a new family of weapons that are smaller. Not less deadly, just not fifty megatons.<\/p>\n
Maybe a few of them.<\/p>\n
We can finish the logic train on that argument about how the future is going to look, you know?<\/p>\n
And now that the Word has been spoken, I am going to head over to Ruthie’s for something nutritious on a Sabbath morn!<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 Vic Socotra<\/p>\n
www.vicsocotra.com<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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