Wersgall tive they are, but they love one another and the American visitors who took their home.” “Two Idaho Potatoes’ Unfortunately, the removal of the Bikinians from their home in 1946 was the only time the United States ever executed an action involving them with such swiftness, energy. or commitment. The Bikinians were left on Rongerik with only a few weeks’ supply of food and water. The Navy, meanwhile, assured the media that the Bikinians were pleased with their move. One Navypress release reported that the ‘‘natives are delighted. enthusiastic about the atomic bomb, which has already brought them prosperity and a new promising future.’’ An Associated Press story, quoting a Navy spokesman, indicated that the move was a blessing in disguise: *“"Rongerik is much more beautiful and is a richer island than Bikini. Rongertk is about Bikinians in July 1947 reported that they were ‘visibly suffering from malnutrition.” Six months later another medical officer examined them and reported that they were starving. The people were rationing them- selves to one bucketful of water per household a day and were cutting down young palm trees in order to eat the heart of the palm because there was nothing else to eat. Bur U.S. military authorities understood neither the deplorable conditions on Rongerik nor the Bikinians’ deeply felt cies to their home. A 1946 New York Times article on the future of Bikini-afrer Operation Crossroads reported that ‘Juda of Bikini and his people, now living on Rongerik Atoll. will probably be repatriated if they insist on it. though the United States military authorities say they can't see why they should want to: Bikini and Rongerik look as alike as two Idaho potatoes.” The near starvation of the Bikinians on three times larger than Bikini... . Coconuts here are three or four times as large as those Rongerik could not be ignored indefinitely. however, and in March 1948 they were In fact, the move to Rongerik was ill atoll in the Marshalls that was being devel- on Bikini and food is plentiful.” conceived and poorly planned. The land area of Rongerik Atoll is actually much smaller than Bikini—its 17 islands comprise 0.63 square miles, compared to Bikini's 36 islands and 2.3 square miles-—and its lagoon is less than one-fourth the size of Bikini's. Thelife- sustaining coconut palms and pandanustrees on Rongerik were considerably less produc- tive than those on Bikini. and manyof the moved to a temporary camp on Kwajalein, an oped as a U.S. military base. That summer Bikinian leaders again were taken to explore possible relocation sites. They selected Kili, a fertile island 400 miles south of Bikini that had been used as a copra plantation by the Germans and Japanese. (Copra. or dried coconut meat, is the cash crop of the Marshalls: when processed. it yields coconut oil.) The Bikinians chose Kili partly out of frustration and anger at their plight. In the Marshalls almost all land is owned by para- fish in Rongerik's lagoon proved to be poisonous. Moreover, because the Bikinians thought they would be living on Rongenk for only a short time. they did not bother to tell the Navy that according to their mythology the atoll was inhabited by an evil spirit that contaminated thefish in the lagoon. By May 1946, less than two monthsafter they arrived, the Bikinians asked the Navy's permission to leave Rongerik and return home, but their request was denied. There were severe food shortages during the winter of 1946-1947; a U.S. doctor who visited the logical stress the Bikinians experienced on Rongerik led them to question their traditional belief in the power of their irois, whose role as protector had begun to diminish by the twentieth century. One of the strong attractions of Kili was that it was not con- 80. 81. mount chiefs, or troijes. who historically functioned much like feudal lords. receiving a form of tithe from the subjects who worked their land and providing them protection in times of danger. The deprivation and psycho- we Repee rete tere Strange People from Bikini,” stated: ‘“Primi-