The Bomb, the Song, and My Dad

Over 200,000 Japanese civilians perished in the two Atomic Bomb blasts. Horrific. Planners estimated 400,000 to 800,000 American dead, millions more Japanese, if the war carried on.

Today (Friday) is VJ Day — Victory over Japan.

The day the guns finally fell silent across the Pacific and the most brutal chapter of the Second World War came to an end. In the UK, it’s marked on 15 August, the date in 1945 when Japan announced its surrender. In the United States, they often mark it on 2 September 1945, when the formal surrender docume…