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AO FORM NO. 64
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fice Memorandum
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+ uNiTED STATES GOVERNMENT
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: Dr. A. H. Seymour
DATE: February 13, 1958
FROM
< Gordon M. Duming, Chief, Radiation Wiho Weapons Branch
Environmental Sciences Branch, DBM
Division of Biology and Medicine
SUBJECT: OPERATIONAL. RESPONSIBILITIES
SYMBOL: DBM:REWB
There is a problem I would like to discuss with you on a subject
we have talked about before. Our Division has the_responsibility
to support research for its own end. It also has’the responsibility
to meet obligations of a more operational nature.
once remarked, "We have to pay the rent."
As Dr. Shilling
Perhaps it is even more
than that - our responsibilities in one area are equally valid
to those in another.
During the past year there have been three occasions that come to
mind where we have not fully met the operational responsibilities,
and thus laid our Division open to criticism. A resurvey of
Rongelap Island should have been made prior to the return of the
Rongelapese. I strongly recommended this to the Invirormental
Sciences Branch, but for what I am sure must have been good reasons
it was not felt possible to do so. As a poor second alternative,
I requested DMA to ask the Rad-Safe people of Holmes and Narver to
make external gamma measurements. They did a very nice job, but
of course these measurements represented only a small part of the
data we should have obtained.
After the return of the Rongelapese we were surprised to learn that
about ten or so of them had taken up permanent residence on Aneaetok
Isiand to the north. Since this Tsland was initially more heavily
contaminated than Rongelap, it was essential that we obtain data there
comparable to those from Rongelap. The Department of State learned
of this situation and strongly recommended that such a survey be made
without delay. After discussion with the invironmental Sciences
Branch you decided that it was not possible to mak: this survey, so
that once again I had to turn to another Division (DMA) and have
measurements of external gamna taken on Aneaetok Island. We still
do not have the essential data on foodstuffs from Aneaetok Island,
and I truly hope that the survey that is about to start on Rongelap
Atoll will include this.
9002113
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