SESSION I 19 There was still manifested, I believe, some of the hostility which had arisen in certain Japanese scientific circles in the years imm-diately after the wac. Most of the physicians with ABCC, and, in fact, most of the American physicians who went to Japan couldn't communicate effectively with their Japanese colleagues, few of whom spoke English, The language of medicine in Japan has been German, and only recently has English come to play a prominent role in the exchange of medical information, It was not easy under circumstances such as these to establish rapport. The situation with respect to genetics was quite different. This was ascribable to a number of largely fortuitous happenings. First, there was a firmer body of experimental information from which to attempt extrapolations to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and even to the members of the crew of the Fukuryu Maru, Second, many of the Japanese geneticists of stature at that time nad been trained either in the United States or in Europe, and as a consequence we often spoke a common language, namely, Eng- lish, Japanese geneticists, in general, strongly supported ABCC's genetics program; whereas the endorsement tha* was being given to medicine, for example, was of a more qualified nature. The absence ofa strong endorsement encouraged opportunists and oppo *tunism, and the Fukuryu Maru incident was replete with both. The emotional climate that was created in Japan when word reached there of the Fukuryu Maru was really a very strange and almost un- believable one. Rightly or wrongly, I'm inclined to ascribe it in large part to the "devil's brew'' to which I have previously referred. The newspapers seized upon the incident and began a drumfire of daily accounts which almost seemed intentionally designed to heighten anxieties, real or fancied. The Japanese government as well as our own had effectively lost control of the situation. “grabbed the ball and wererunning with it." The newspapers had I can recall quite vividly some of the headlines which appeared. There was one, for example, in the Osaka English-language Mainichi; the headline said; 'WBC counts of fish-eaters rise."' It appeared shortly after it had been announced that radioactively contaminated fish had accidentally reached the Osaka market, and that some had been inadvertently sold, A few individuals who had presumably eaten the fish were being studied by local authorities. This headline accompanied a report of their work which, by theway, was unobjectionable. They had carefully indicated that numerous factors could produce a rise in white blood cells, including upper respiratory infections so common at that time of year: they further stated that on this account one could not conclude that the elevation was necessarily due to the