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SESSION V
THE SPANISH INCIOENT
INTRODUCTION
LANGHAM:
As a proper beginning [ would like to invite Merril to
speak up with "incredible!" at any time he feels the urge.
FREMONT-SMITH: Or even with "credible!"
BUSTAD:
Are you restricting it to Merril?
ee
seee
LANGHAM: Maybe I'm intimidating Merril.
the rest of you.
I'm sure I haven't
In listening to the discussion yesterday with regard to the socio-
peychological reactions among the Japanese, I was thinking about
how the reporting of this incident is ao different from the things that
Merril was saying. That was why I was saying ‘incredible, '' because
my experience has been quite different from Merril's. Perhaps the
problem we faced was not nearly as great, but 1am sure that one
cannot help but wonder why the reactions to these two situations were so different, I have eliminated a few pictures that deal with the details of the health physics and how we handled the contamination and
related matters in order to concentrate on those things which I think
have some bearing on the subject of this meeting. I feel the differences in Merrill's experiences and mine in Spain may, in part, lie
in the psychological conditioning of the people.
,
A pertinent question may be why the psychological reaction was so
much different, because many of the problems were quite the same.
There was delay by both nations involved in admitting there had been
an accident that involved radioactive material, just exactly as there
was inthe other case. There was a serious economic problem insofar
as the people in this limited area were concerned.
FREMONT-SMITH:
“a
had been an accident?
You mean the nations didn't admit that there.
How long?