Bikini Islanders Lose Again to Radiation Coatiaved from First Page Andrew finally came back about e@ight years ago. He was among the first to return. [t was 24 ycars after the Navy had taken him away, two years aftcr President Johnson's anpouncementthat Bikini was safe. From the front poreh of his concrete block house overtocking Bikini lagoon, the old man recalicd the long years between departure and return There was near starvation. much pnvation. There was shuttling from one alien island to another and another and yet another. There was scattenng of family and fnends, disiocauon, nearly total disruption of a hitherto , Gunes, uniroubied way of Life, “Maybe there were some times when | was not unhappy,” he admitted. “But... every day I remembered Bikin. And every day I wanted to come back because it 1s my homejJand, because Bikini is 2 beavuful place.” He was qwet, deferenually polite. But at last, in reply to the stranger's question, Andrew dropped Lhe emoonal veil slightly. How, the stranger asked, will he Teact when he Jeaves Bika once again and forever? “1 will weep,” he said. “I wil! feel . anger... . 1 will not go. I will st ERTL ‘You’d have to say ‘the removal was the tight of the conqueror.’ SA here. They will have to carry me away.” He said he also believed some of the others would do the same as he, feci the sameas he. ~ And how, after ail that had happened to him and his people since 1946, did he feel now about the Americans? The old man laughed, perhaps embarrassed by the question and by the fact that the quesuoner was an Amencan. Then he lcaned close staring Charter of 1945, Speesficalty, it was designated a “strategie rust.” which permuted the United States to set aside certain areas of the former Japanese mandate temmtory for muitary security pur- ee 7"OG OERa yt poses. Bikini seemed a logical choice geographically, loo. The idca of Operation Crossroads was to see what the atoms bomb would do to a naval Nicet. The-theee A-bombs of World War II had been expicded in the New Mexico desert and over the Jaoanese ciues of Hiroshima and Nagusake Other sites were considered. But according to Crossroads historian Neal [ines, “Bikins fulfilled all the conditions of climate and isolation. It was... 2.500 miles west southwest of Honoluiu . . . but it also was accessble, ... [ig inhabitants, who then numbered 162, couid be moved to another alolL” (Most other sources say the popu lation then was 166. Since then there has Leen a popuwiation explosion, Today 860 pe-sons clam Jand mghis in Bikiot Atoll—140 now ving on Bikini Isiand, 450 on Kili, and the others scatlered Unroughout ihe Marshalls.) There was concern on the part of the U.S. fishing industry that the test blasts might hurt the nch commercial fishing grounds, There aiso were so Many complaints from animat lovers that plans lo use dogs as test animals were canceled. But there is no recarded protest against removing the Bikimans from their ancestral homeland. “In retrospect... you'd have to Say the removal was the 'nght of the conqueror,” said Jim Wian. a transplanted Kansan whois distnet attorney of the Pacific Trust Terntory’s Marshall Islands District. “Our atutude must have been that we, at the cost of scveral thousand Amer&an lives, took the Marshalls ... tok this wnole area of the Pacifie from lhe Japanese. Ama... part of it was the attitude, ‘Weil, they (the Biksnians) are just lille brown people anyway. They don’t need their atoll. We'll just move ‘cm off someplace else’ * through thick green-linted glasses + Certainly the Bikinians were in no that made hus dark eyes seem enorposition to scnously oppose the Navy mous. when, on Feb. 10. 1946, Commodore “ “The Amencan is a fiar-man,* he Ben Wyatt, then the military goverSard. “Hus promise us not kept.” hor, armved by seaplane and announced that lhey must go ctsewhere. In effect, the isianders then and + The first Amencan promise to the there adopted the United States a3 Bitani peopic was made by the U.S. thew srosy aiap—their paramount Navy after President Harty S$ Truchicf, the power over and beyond man had, on Jan. 10, 1946, at the reetheir focal island chief. Juda. And. in ommendauan of the Joint Chiefs of Marshallese tradiuon, this meant that Staff, given the go-ahead for Operahenccforward the United States was tion Crossroads, the first post-World responsible for the protecuon and War If test of nuciear weapons. weil-being of the Bikini peopie. in sumpiest terms, the promise went Although to American eyes the something like this: We have decided atoils of the Marshaits took much the to use your atoll to test a powerful same, the removal was deeply painful Tiew weapon. For your own safety, and culluraily destructive lo ihe Bi‘ou will be moved lo another ptace. kimans. e will take care of you there. When Far, as many anthropolomsts have ‘we're through using your atoll, we observed, there ts among Micronesian will bring you back. peopics 3 profound, mystical attachFew now question that the Navy mentto the particular, uny plots of had the icgal rizht to approprate Biland owned by their famulics or clans. kimAtoli for military purposes. Anthropologist. Robert Kiste, auBakim is part of the Marshall ts. thor of “The Hikimans: A Study in lands, which 1s part of Micronena, Fareed Migration,” said in an interwhieh in turn wes established as a Saew thal Ue relaiion titp belween a UN. Trust Serritery unites US ads minisirauon by wrus of the UN. Please Ture to Tage 6, Col. ‘HOT BREW’ —Jeladrick Jakeo checks sap from coconut palm. He lets it ferment into jakauru, a mudly aiconole drink, While coconuts are forbidden, Jokeo says no one hos ever banned jckauru.