Amidst all the scientific notation and hot-blooded nationalistic fervor, I would like to point out a different perspective on this story. But first, thanks Steve, for purchasing this story and running it. You seem to choose all 'our' stories by some kind of innate sense of feeling and although I don't like every story, I find that most of them are either fun or thought provoking.
To those whose heads didn't explode trying to figure out the logistics of meeting oneself on a road outside of Hiroshima or Nagasaki, I'd like to offer that the time travel angle was just a vehicle for the story and not the central part. Some might say, "Well that's what makes it SciFi", but think about it this way - if you lived in an age when time travel was normal, and you told a story involving time travel, wouldn't it be just plain fiction?
To the marine who bleched all over the page above, I'd like to ask why the word 'reparations' makes you feel so guilty? One meaning of the word 'reparation' is "restoration to a good condition", which is all the little team of volunteers (repeat - volunteers) was doing. And this is exactly the reason they didn't go back just a little before so they could cut the throats of the pilots who dropped the bombs. When you can't go back and change something so big in history, the best you can do is go back and take care of some of the little things. Maybe ease one person's pain for a few days.
Which brings me to a conclusion. The point of this story was about sacrifice. Once I stopped trying to figure out the "how" of this story and just accepted the story at face value, it dawned on me that it was all about the protagonist's own sacrifice for that one little boy. Love and sacrifice, baby. Not guilt through service. That's what it was all about to me. Nice job, Steve.