chee
§ Port H—sun., July 23, 1978
Zos Angeles Times
ini Ilanders—Anothe
Continued from Third Page
is an expressionof who I am—ofindividual idenuty.”
Or, as fellow anthropologist Jack
farewell. The next morning they were
was not something he could under-
bomber called Dave's Dream dropped
during the winter of 194 6-47. In
unloaded at Rongenk.
On the mormng of July 1, a B-29
Tobin, another academic expert With
a “nominal yield” 20-kuoton (the
pressed it:
“In those islands, a man without
land is no man.’
By a split vote of the atoll’s leaders,
the Bikinians chose to go to Rongerik
Atoll, 128 miles east of their home
atoll. The Navy, which put out press
releases at the time indicating that
“the natives were delighted” by the
move, was only slightly more reStrained a year later 11 its official history of Crossroads, “Bombs at Bikini.”
“The Bikimans, convinced that the
(A-bo) tests would be a contribution
to world peace, indicated their willingness to evacuate,” the Navy his-
atomic bomb over <he fleet of 70 obsolete U.S. and captured Japanese and
German warsimps moored just off Bikim Island. It exploded 500 feet above
the fleet, sinking five shins, twisting
and crushing other lixe cheap toys—
and imtiating the radiation poisoning
of Bikin.
Among the 42,000 observers of the
awesome blast was Chief Juda,
watching as a guest of the Navy from
the deck of the USS Mt. Mckinley,
several miles away. The Navy used
more than 10,000 instruments to record test data.
Chief Juda’s reaction was not recorded. The next day he rejoined his
people at Rongerik.
long
experience in the Marshalls, ex-
tonan wrote.
{It wasn't quite that way, according
to Tobin, ememtus professor of anthropology at University of Hawau.
“They did not go willingly,” Tobin
said. “They were forced to @0....
They agreed because thev had to. just
as tney had agreed to do things wnen
the Japanese had bayonets in the
background.
“Put yourself in their shoes: You've
been told what to do by the Japanese
for a quarter-century. . . and told by
the Japanese military the Americans
were weak. So when the Americans
wiped out the Japanese . . . all those
American ships appearing, the natural reaction. . . would be to go along
with what theyare tald.”
On the afternoon of March 7, 1946,
the 166 men, women and children of
Bikini Were loaded aboard Navy LST
1108. As the awkward landing craft
backed off the beach at Bikim Island
end churned out of the blue-green iaBoon, the people gathered on the
main deck to sing traditional songs of
Loss
equivalent of 51000 tons of TNT)
Rongerik was a disaster. Jt was too
small. There was tco iittie foed. And,
according to lesend. it was hauntea
by an evi wen named Litorva, wie
poisoned the fish of the lagoon. In
fact, certain fish of the lagoon were
poisonous which was why Rongerik
had been uninhabited for years.
But it was close to Bikini and the
peopte had chosen it for that reason.
They thought they could bear up under the hardsnmips until they went
back to theur home atoll. That, they
were convinced, would be in a couple
of years al most.
Chief Juda had returned from the
first bomb test (the second. an underwater shot, was held July 25, 1946) to
tell his people that while there had
been great aamage to the ships, there
seemedto be little to Bikini itself, The
trees were still standing, still cearing
coconuts. But the radiauon, invisinle,
ee ee
Stand.
Severe: food shortages developed
spring of 1947, fire destroyed a third
of Rongenk’s coconuttrees. The peo-
ple pressed for a return to Bikini, but
a radic.ogical survey indicated that it
was too “hot” for permanent occupancy and would be for manyyears.
In October, the Navy announced
that the Bikimians would be relocated
on Ujelang. But two monthslater, the
Pentagon announced a newseries of
nuclear tests would be held. this ume
at Enewetak, another atoll in the
Marshalls. The Enewetak people
would go to Ujelang instead of the Bikimans. The Bikimans had to wait.
Andrew Jakeo remembered the
Rongerik period well. “I was a bis
man then,” he said. “but I got skinny.” He held up the little finger of his
Jeft hand. “Skinnylike this. One cis
woman died from hunger... . For <
year and a half, we cid net have
enough food. (sometimes) got our
food by cutuing open the coconut tree
and eaung the heart of the tree. This
killed tne tree.”
Jeladrik Jakeo, Andrew's 48-yearold brother, was a teen-ager on Rongerk. “It was termble,” he remembered. “We ate things that were noi
good, gathered coconuts that floatea
in from the sea. Bad food; we got sick
Arms and legs swelled up, and we got
blisters on the arms and we had a:arrhea.”
Late in January, 1948, the Nas
dispatched anthropologist Leonaru
Mason. now of the University of Hawail, to Investigate. He found the exiles at the point of starvation, hvins
on rawflour diluted with water.
In strong terms, Mason recommended that the peopie be remove:
from Rongerik as soon 2s possi) edt
also recommended Kili Isiand.