(2)
Bikini Islanders Lose Again to Radiatio
Centinved from First Page
Andrew finally came back about
eight years ago. He was among the
first to return. It was 24 years after
the Navy had taken him away, lwo
years after President Johnson's anfounctement that Bikini was safe.
From the front porch of his conerete block house overlooking Bikini
lagoon, the oid man recalled the jong
between departure and return.
There was fear starvation, much pnvation. There was shuttling from one
aken ssland to another and another
and yet another, There was scattemng
of family and friends, dislocation,
nearly total disruption of a hitherto
_@nel, untroubled way of life.
“Maybe there were some times
when | was not uchappy,” he admitted. “But ... every day I] remembered Bikini And every day [ wanted
to come back because it is my homeJand. because Biiani is a beautiful
place.”
He was quiet, deferentially polite.
But at last, in reply to the stranger's
question, Andrew dropped the emoonal veal slightly.
How, the stranger asked, will he
react when he leaves Bikim once
again and forever?
“IT will weep,” he said. “I will feel
anger... . 1 will not go. J will sit
SEBS
: “You'd have to: say
‘the removal was the
‘tight of the conqueror.’
here. They will have to carry me
away.”
He said he also believed some of
the others would do Lhe same as he,
fecl Lhe same as he.
~ And how, after all that had happened to hum and his people since
1946, did he feel now about the
Amencans?
The old man Jaughed, perhaps embarrassed by the question and by the
fact that the questioner was an
American,
Then he leaned cios#
stamng
through thick green-linted glasses
that made hus dark eyes seem enormous,
~ “The Amencan is a liar-man,” he
tard. “His promise is not kept”
——_—w
> The first Amencan promise to the
Biloni people was made by the U.S.
Navy after President Harty S$ Truman had, on Jan. 10, 1946. al the recommendauon of the Joint Chiefs of
Stall, given the go-ahead for Operation Crossroads, the first post-World
War II test of nuclear weapons.
In simplest terms, (he promise went
something like this; We have decided
to use your atoll to test a powerfut
few weapon. For your own safcty,
ou wiil be moved Lo another place.
€ will take care of you there. When
‘we're through using your atoll, we
will bring you back.
Few now quesiion that the Navy
had the legal ritht to appropriate Bikim Aloli for military purposes,
Bulan igs part of the Marshall Islands, which as part of Micronena,
which on turn wos estubhshed as a
UN. ‘ust Territory ander US. cde
Munisirauon by icra of the UN.
ifOG TOOT ST
a
5
Charter of 1945.
Specifically, it was designated a
ote,
i
on
Wh
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“strategic rus” which permitted the
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aw TS
Unued States to sect ase certain : oe
ve
3a
CLEAR
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areas of the former Japanese mandate a7
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aN TN .
termtory for miiilary sccunty pur.
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poses.
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Bikini seemed a logical choice or
”
ENE
ORT
EY
geographically, loo. The wea of Oper- rm
,
wy
N: 1
ation Crossroads was to see what the \
S a ‘aie
atomic bomb would do to a naval
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leet. The: three A-bombds of World t
o
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awe
we
War II had been explcded in the New L
Mexico desert and over the Jananese re
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cities of Hiroshima and Nagusaki
fa,
v:.
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f
we
Other sites were considered. But
ord
according to Crossroads hustorian .
Weal Ines. “Bikimy fulfilled ail the
“
av
conditions of ciimate and isolation. It
was...
2,500 miles west southwest
a
x
a
of Honojuiu.,.. but it also was aceesmble. ... Its inhabitants, who
then numbered 162, couid be moved
‘,
to another atoll”
{Most other sources say the papulation then was 166. Since then there
has Leen a population explosion, To‘sar
a
oe
day 860 pe-sons claim fand mahts in Bikini Atoil—140 now ving on Bikint =
. 3
1’
«
Island, 450 on Kili. and the others on
Scattered throughout the Marshalls.)
r
‘
“yy
There was concern on the part of
4
the U.S. fishing industry Lhat the test
a.
blasts might hurt the nch commermal .
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fishing grounds. There also were so
many complaints from animal lovers
that plans lo use dogs as lest animals
were canceled. But there 1s no recorded protest against removing the
Bikinians from the ancestral homedand.
“In retrospect ,.. you'd have to
say the removal was the ‘right of the
conqueror,’said Jim Wian.@ transplanted Kansan who ts district attorney of the Pacific Trust Territory's
Marshall Istands District.
“Qur atutude must have been that
we, at the cost of several thousand
Ameréan lives, look the Marshails
. .. took this whole area of the Pacrfic from the Japanese. Ana... part
of it was the attitude, ‘Weil, they (the
Bikamans} are pust itltle brawn pecpie
anyway. They don’l need thei atoll.
wejust move ‘em off someplace
else,
Certaindy the Bikinians were in no
position lo sctiously oppose the Navy
when, on Feb. 10, 1946, Commodore
Ben Wyatt, then the military governor, armved by seaplane and announced that Lhey must go elsewhere.
in effect, the landers then and
there adopted the United States as
ther ej aiap—their paramount
chicf, the power aver and beyond
their loca island chief, Juda. And, if
Marshallese tradiuon, this meant that
henecforward the United Slates was
responsible for the protecuion and
well-being of the Bikini people.
Although to American eyes the
atotls of the Marshails look much the
same, the removal was decpiy painful
and culturally destructive to ihe Bikinans,
For, as many anthropolomsts have
ovserved, there is among Micronesian
peopics a profound, mystical attachment to the particular, uny plots of
land owned by thew famtics or clans.
Anthropologist Robert Kiste, author of “The Bikimans: A Study in
Foreed Migration.” said in an mterview that the ret ition ip belween a
Pleese Tura te Page &, Colt
wed
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‘HOT BREW -—Jeladrick Jakeo checks sap fram coconut palm. He
Jets it ferment into ickauru, a midiy alconolic drink. While coconuts
are forbidden, Jokeo says mo one hos ever banned jakouru.