“GUINEA PIGS" OR VICTIMS OF CIRCUMSTANCE?
The Event
Were the Rongelapese and their neighbors used as are guinea pigs in
laboratory experiments?
Did the United States of America intentionally
cause 239 Marshallese to be exposed to deadly radioactive fallout in order
to study the effects on human beings?
Or did the incident which occurred
aS a result of the March 1, 1954, test simply come about from the oftenStated “unexpected shift of wind"?
The Special Joint Committee believes
that the answers are more complex than can be implied in a single statement.
Although consideration of this subject area is not specifically a part of the
Committee's mandate under Public Law No. 4C-33, it believes that since the
issue was raised and given great publicity and since it is inextricably
intertwined with the work of the Committee, the subject deserves to be
broached and discussed,
Furthermore,
the Committee has had available to it
a great quantity of information and data, much of which pertains to the
question, and some of which has never been widely known, a situation the
Committee wishes to correct by including it in this report.
Location
Bikini
{and later Enewetok)
was an ideal test site for nuclear weapons.
It suited all necessary specifications:
airfield which could handle a B-29,
it was within 1,000 miles of an
there was no continuously heavy weather
and no extreme cold, it offered an anchorage large enough for test ships and
Support vessels,
it was far from densely populated areas, fishing zones,
coastal waters and shipping lanes.
choosing Bikini:
Two other requirements were also met in
although inhabited, the islands could be evacuated without
causing hardship to a "large number of inhabitants" (62, 9.22)
and perhaps most
importantly it was under control of the United States (originally under the Navy,
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