(2) ikini Islanders Lose Again to Radi years after President Johnson's announcement that Bikini was safe. From the front porch of his con- crete block house overlooking Bikini lagoon, the old man recalled the long "years between departure and return. There was near starvation, much privation. There was shuttling from one alien island to another and another and yet another. There was scattering of family and friends, dislocation, nearly total disruption of a hitherto _ quiet, untroubled wayoflife. “Maybe there were some times when | was not unhappy,” he admt- ted. “But... every day | remembered Bikini. And every day J wanted to come back because it is my home- land, because Bikini is a beautiful place.” He was quiet, deferentially polite. Butat last, in reply to the stranger's question, Andrew dropped the emo- onal veil slightly. How, the stranger asked, will he react when he leaves Bikini once again and forever? “I will weep,” he said. “I will feel anger. ... 1 will not go. I will sit at ote. dt a o yor id b. r War II had been exploded in the New Mexico desert and over the Jananese historian then numbered 162, could be moved to anotheratoil.” (Most other sources say the popuJation then was 166. Since then there has Leen a population explosion, To- here. They will have to carry me away.” He said he also believed some of the others would do the same as he, feci the sameashe. ~ And how, after all that had happened to him and his people since 1946, did he feel now about the Americans? . The old man laughed, perhaps embarrassed by the question and by the fact that the questioner was an American. Then he leaned clos staring through thick green-tinted gtasses that made his dark eyes seem enor- mous. : ~ “The American is a liar-man,” he Said. “His promise is not kept.” - The first American promise to the Bikini people was made by the U.S. Navy after President Harry S$ Truman had, on Jan. 10, 1946, at the recommendation of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, given the go-ahead for Operation Crossroads, the first post-World y day 860 persons claim tand rights in Bikini Atoll—140 now living on-Bikini Island, 450 on Kili, and the others scattered throughout the Marshalls.) There was concern on the part of the U.S.fishing industry that the test blasts might hurt the rich commercial fishing grounds. There also were so War Il test of nuclear weapons. _ In simplest terms, the promise went something like this: We have decided to use your atoll to test a powerful new weapon. For your own safety, that plans to use dogs as test ammals were canceled. But there is no recorded protest against removing the Bikinians from their ancestral homedand. “In retrospect... you’d have to say the removal was the ‘nght of the conqueror,’ ” said Jim Winn, a trans- planted Kansan who 1s district attor- ney of the Pacific Trust Territory’s Marshall Islands District. “Our attitude must have been that we, at the cost of several thousand Ameran lives, took the Marshails . . . took this whole area of the Paci- fic from the Japanese. Amd... partof it was the attitude, ‘Weil, they (the Bikimians) are just little brown people anyway. They don't need their atoll. We'll just move ‘cm off someplace else.’ ” Certainly the Bikinians were in no position to seriously oppose the Navy when, on Feb. 10, 1946, Commodore Ben Wyatt, then the military goverhor, arnved by seaplane and an- nounced that they must go elsewhere. In effect, the islanders then and there adopted the United States as ther i7voij alap—their paramount chicf, the power over and beyond their local island chief, Juda. And.in Marshallese tradition, this meant that henceforward the United States was responsible for the protection and . well-being of the Bikini people. Although to American eyes the atolis of the Marshalls look much the same, the removal was deeply painful tee * ‘ 3 Te : .> . 3 c=. ‘ or ~: , 2 a . os ; i NNO te “8 ah 2 gee oe oe POET eee oe a Many complaints from animal lovers ‘tthe removal was the ‘right of the conqueror.’ oe \e batt conditions of climate and isolation. lt of Honolulu... but it also was accesmble. ... Its inhabitants, who . “se re . Neal Hines, “Bikini fulfilled all the was... 2,500 miles west southwest wN . 4 \ to. cites of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Other sites were considered. But Crossroads — we oe atomic bomb would do to a naval flect. The three A-bombs of World to - h ” atton Crossroads was to see what the according ” rn more, the Navy had taken him away, two GPE Y YE Charter of 1945. Specifically, it was designated a “strategic trust,” which permitted the United States to sct aside certain areas of the former Japanese mandate terntory for military sccurily purposes. Bikini seemed a logical choice geographically, too. The idea of Oper- or Centinoed from First Page Andrew finally came back about eight years ago. He was among the first to return. It was 24 years after ; Te sn at neat cansGAL va"yee . f at ae Oo BeteescypeasShee ‘HOT BREW’ —Jeladrick Jakeo checks sap from coconut palm. He lets it ferment into jakauru, a midly alcoholic drink. While coconuts are forbidden, Jokeo says no one has ever banned jakauru.