The joy in Mudville at the dropping of the atom bomb was inversely proportional to the distance from the epicenter of the blast.
My father was on a troop ship somewhere in the Pacific when word came that we'd used a secret weapon - an atom bomb - to erase an entire Japanese city. At first, the guys thought it was some sort of joke or propaganda, but when the ship's captain came on and confirmed it was for real, Dad said you never - NEVER - saw such a happy bunch of guys.
They knew they'd make it home now.
Back on the home front, similar reactions came from most folks, the majority of whom had friends and/or family in the Service.
The distance
in time seems to be dimming the joy, as newer generations are farther and farther removed from WWII - many may never have even spoken to a WWII vet . . . or, thanks to publik skool, even
studied it in any depth. (A few years back I saw that my little cousin's 20th century American History textbook had less than 2 pages on WWII, but about 20 pages
each on the Women's Movement and the Civil Rights Struggle.
)