By May 1978, a high percentage of the Marshallese
body levels were above the maximum permissible dose
and the Bikinians were evacuated again.
Conard and representatives of other
U.S. government agencies, in
apologizing for the complications
(left} People walking on the
concrete dome covering an atomic bomb
crater on Runit Isiand, Enewetak
reer ronan
hill
’
.
atoll. (below) Nuclear clean up on
Runit Island. Gef} U.S. Army
personnel in full protective gear.
(right) Armypersonnei mixing
plutonium-contaminated soil with cement
to form the massive concrete dome.
then were not as sophisticated as
those available today: that the sur-
veys of Bikini were far less extensive
than those subsequently carried out
at Enewetak atoll.'® The facts, however, suggest otherwise.
In 1972-1973, the United States
Robert Conard of Brookhaven
National Laboratory—which has
coordinated the Marshall Islands
medical
eles hee ee
which occurred, frequently say that
radiation measurement techniques
program
since
1954—
estimated the health risks of the ex-
conducted an “‘exhaustive radiologi-
cal survey of Enewetak,”” which included both ground and aerial sur-
veys of the islands, according to the
Department of Energy. It was not
posure:
done at Bikini, however. In fact, it
‘‘Assuming that they [143 people]
had all been there since 1970 and received the average estimated integrated total douse of 2.6 rems for the
thorough radiological survey of Bikini and the northem Marshall Is-
penod. based on knownradiationinduced msk data. one would expect
only about 0.005 total cases of
leukemia to develop in that population as a result of their radiation ex-
posure.
The need for further medical
examinations is not indicated based
on possible radiation effects associated with such low doses.’*'4
But Dr. Konrad Kotrady. a former
Brookhaven resident physician in
the Marshalls. strongly disagreed
with this philosophy:
‘**The people fail to understand
how’ scientists can say they do not
knowall the possible late effects the
radiation can cause. . . and then tell
the people a medical program is un-
necessary,
If in 40 or $0 years medical problems do occur as a result of the exposure,
would be better Wfa well
designed medical program was
already tn progress to detect the
problems.''S
December 1980
wasn't until the Bikinians filed a federal law suit in 1975. asking for a
lands, that the government agreed to
do it. But because of three years of
bureaucratic infighting among the
Departments of Energy, State and
Interior, the radiological survey was
not conducted until after the evacu-
ation of Bikini in late 1978.
The United States did have
sophisticated
techniques
for
measuring radiation at the outset of
the Bikini resettlement: it chose to
employ them only at Enewetak.
U.S. policies with respect to pro-
tecting the health of the Marshallese
have been totally inconsistent. For
example, in 1946. prior to the first
nuclear test series, Operation Cross-
roads, the people from islands within
a radius of 300 miles of Bikini—
including the Rongelap—were
evacuated as a safety precaution.!7
The yield of these bombs was ap-
proximately 20 kilotons, But in 1954,
there was no official warning ofthe
Bravo test. much less an evacuation
of the populations, Yet Bravo wus
the largest U.S. hydrogen bomb
tested—more than [5 megatons,
More than 200 Marshallese on
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 27