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Atomic Veterans: Human
Experimentation in Connection with
Atomic Bomb Tests
Introduction
Human Research at the Bomb Tests
The Bomb Tests: Questions of Risk, Records, and Trust
The Bomb Tests:
Questions of
Risk, Records, and Trust
Introduction
In 1946, the United States conducted Operation Crossroads, the first
peacetime nuclear weapons tests, before an audience of worldwide press
and visiting dignitaries at the Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Marshall Islands. In
1949 the Soviet Union exploded its first atomic bomb, and in December
1950, shortly after the United States entered the Korean War, President
Truman chose Nevada as the site for "continental testing" of nuclear
weapons. Testing of atomic bombs in Nevada began in January 1951
and continued throughout the decade. Further testing of atomic, then
hydrogen, bombs took place in the Pacific. By the time atmospheric
testing was halted by the 1963 test ban treaty, the United States had
conducted more than 200 atmospheric tests and dozens of underground
tests.[1]
The rules governing nuclear weapons tests were not spelled out by law or
handed down by tradition. They had to be created in ongoing interplay
between the new Atomic Energy Commission and the new Department
of Defense.
The tests were important to many governmental agencies but, of course,
critical to the AEC and the DOD. The AEC, as the source of weapons
design expertise, was interested in the performance of new bomb designs
and, along with DOD, in the effects of the weapons. The DOD, and each
of the armed services, had particular interests in the use of the tests to
learn how atomic wars could be fought and won, if, as seemed quite
possible at midcentury, they had to be. Along with "civilian agencies,"
such as the Public Health Service, the Veterans Administration, and the
Department of Agriculture, they shared an interest in civil defense against
the use of the bomb in wartime and the impact of the bomb's use--in
peacetime tests as well as war--on the public health and welfare. The
bomb tests inevitably involved risk and uncertainty; safety was a basic
and continued concern, and the development of radiation safety practices
and understanding was therefore an essential part of the test program.
At its core, the test program was established to determine how well
newly designed nuclear weapons worked; but officials and researchers
quickly saw the need and opportunity to use the tests for other purposes
as well. More than 200,000 people, including soldiers, sailors, air crews,
and civilian test personnel, were engaged to staff the tests, to participate
as trainees or observers, and to gather data on the effects of the
weapons.
The Committee was not chartered to review the atomic bomb tests or the
experience of the troops present at the detonations. However, early in
our tenure we heard from veterans who participated in the tests, and their
family members, who urged that we include their experiences in our
review. In testimony before the Advisory Committee, "atomic vets" and
their widows stated forcefully that all those who participated in the bomb
tests were in a real sense participants in an experiment. It also was
argued that biomedical experiments involving military personnel as human
subjects took place in connection with the tests. The interest among
atomic veterans and their families in the activities of the Advisory
Committee and the government's commitment to investigating human
radiation experiments was intense. When the Department of Energy
established its Helpline for citizens concerned about human radiation
experiments, for example, bomb-test participants and their family
members were the single largest group of callers among the
approximately 20,000 calls received.
That the bomb tests were in some sense experiments is, of course,
correct. The tests of new and untried atomic weapons were, wrote the
chief health officer of the AEC's Los Alamos lab, "fundamentally large
scale laboratory experiments."[2] At the same time, although there was a
real possibility that human subject research had been conducted in
conjunction with the bomb tests, the tests were not themselves
experiments involving human subjects.
The Committee reviewed the historical record to determine if human
experiments had taken place in connection with the tests. We found that
somewhere in the range of 2,000 to 3,000 military personnel at the tests
did serve as the subjects of research in connection with the tests. In most
cases, these research subjects were engaged in activities similar to those
engaged in by many other service personnel who were not research
subjects. For example, some air crew flew through atomic clouds in
experiments to measure radiation absorbed by their bodies, but many
others flew in or around atomic clouds to gather data on radiation in the
clouds. The Defense Department generally did not distinguish such
research from otherwise similar activities, treating both as part of the
duties of military personnel. The experience of the atomic veterans
illustrates well the difficulty in locating the boundary between research
involving human subjects and other activities conducted in occupational
settings that routinely involve exposure to hazards.
The more the Committee investigated the human research projects
conducted in conjunction with the bomb tests, the more we found
ourselves discussing issues that affected all the service personnel who had
been present at the tests, and not just those who also had been involved
as subjects of research. This occurred both because of the boundary
problem just described and because critical decisions about initial
exposure levels and follow-up of veterans were generally not made
separately for research subjects and other personnel present at the tests.
Legislation passed in 1984 and 1988 that provides the basis for
compensation to some atomic veterans similarly does not distinguish
between those veterans who were research subjects and the vast
majority who were not.
In this chapter we present what we have learned about human
experimentation conducted in conjunction with atomic bomb testing as
well as some observations about the experience of the atomic veterans
generally. In the first section of the chapter we focus on research
involving human subjects. We begin by a review of the 1951-1952
discussions in which DOD biomedical advisers considered the role of
troops at the bomb tests and the need for biomedical research to be
conducted in conjunction with them. We then look at a research activity
that was given the highest priority by these advisers, the psychological
and physiological testing of troops involved in training maneuvers at
bomb tests and of officers who volunteered to occupy foxholes in the
range of one mile from ground zero. We next turn to the so-called
flashblindness experiments conducted to measure the effect on vision of
the detonation of an atomic bomb. Finally, we look at research in which
men were used to help measure the radiation absorbed by protective
clothing, by equipment that humans operated, and by the human body.
We note at the outset that while the studies all took place in the context
of the atomic bomb, and therefore involved some potential exposure to
radiation, none of them were designed to measure the biological effects
of radiation itself (as opposed to the levels of exposure). A basic reason
this was so was the determination of the DOD and the AEC to keep
exposure levels of test participants below those at which acute radiation
effects were likely to be experienced (and therefore measurable).
In the second section of the chapter we discuss issues of concern to the
Committee that affected all the atomic veterans. We review how risk was
considered by AEC and DOD officials at the time the tests were being
planned, the creation and maintenance of records related to bomb-test
exposure, and what is now known about the longer-term risks of
participation in the tests. We also discuss the legacy of distrust among
atomic veterans and their families that stems, in part, from the failure to
create and maintain adequate records. Finally, we conclude with a
discussion of what the atomic bomb-test experience tells us about the
boundary between experimental and occupational exposures to risk and
some lessons that remain to be learned from the experience of the atomic
veterans.
Chapter 10: Human Research at the Bomb
Tests
The Defense Department's Medical Experts: Advocates
of Troop Maneuvers and Human Experimentation
As we saw in the introduction, in 1949, when AEC and DOD experts
met to consider the psychological problems connected to construction of
the proposed nuclear-powered airplane, the NEPA project, there was a
consensus that America's atomic war-fighting capability would be
crippled unless servicemen were cured of the "mystical" fear of
radiation.[3] When routine testing of nuclear weapons began at the test
site in Nevada in 1951, the opportunity to take action to deal with this
problem presented itself. DOD officials urged that troop maneuvers and
training exercises be conducted in connection with the tests. Whole
military units would be employed in these exercises, and participation, as
part of the duty of the soldier, would not be voluntary. DOD's medical
experts simultaneously urged that the tests be used for training and
"indoctrination" about atomic warfare and as an opportunity for research.
The psychological and physiological testing of troops to address the fear
of radiation was the first of the research to take place; this testing was
largely conducted as an occupational rather than an experimental activity.
In a June 27, 1951, memorandum to high DOD officials, Dr. Richard
Meiling, the chair of the secretary of defense's top medical advisory
group, the Armed Forces Medical Policy Council, addressed the
question of "Military Medical Problems" associated with bomb tests.[4]
The memorandum made clear that troops should be placed at bomb tests
not so much to examine risk as to demonstrate relative safety.
"Fear of radiation," Dr. Meiling's memorandum began, "is almost
universal among the uninitiated and unless it is overcome in the military
forces it could present a most serious problem if atomic weapons are
used." In fact, "[i]t has been proven repeatedly that persistent ionizing
radiation following air bursts does not occur, hence the fear that it
presents a dangerous hazard to personnel is groundless." Dr. Meiling
urged that "positive action be taken at the earliest opportunity to
demonstrate this fact in a practical manner."[5]
He continued, a "Regimental Combat Team should be deployed
approximately twelve miles from the designated ground zero of an air
blast and immediately following the explosion . . . they should move into
the burst area in fulfillment of a tactical problem." The exercise "would
clearly demonstrate that persistent ionizing radiation following an air burst
atomic explosion presents no hazards to personnel and would effectively
dispel a fear that is dangerous and demoralizing but entirely
groundless."[6]
Dr. Meiling's proposal to put troops at the bomb tests in order to allay
their fears may well have been an echo of what the military already had in
mind. The Army's 1950 "Atomic Energy Indoctrination" pamphlet, a
primer for soldiers, showed that the military was concerned that
misperception of the effect of an air burst could be damaging in combat.
"[L]ingering radioactivity will be virtually nonexistent in the case of the
normal air burst,"[7] it reassured the soldiers. The greater danger, it told
them, was the probability that "an unreasoning fear of lingering
radioactivity" would take "an unnecessary toll in American lives."[8]
While the tests provided an opportunity to allay fears, they simultaneously
provided the opportunity to gather data. In this regard, Dr. Meiling
appeared to be ahead of his military colleagues in expressing concern that
the military was not taking adequate advantage of the bomb tests as an
opportunity for "biomedical participation." In February 1951, in fact,
following tests in Nevada, he had urged the DOD to incorporate
"biomedical tests" into plans for future bomb tests.[9]
Meiling's suggestion that planning for biomedical tests be undertaken
wound its way through the secretary of defense's research and
development bureaucracy and fell into the lap of the civilian-chaired Joint
Panel on the Medical Aspects of Atomic Warfare.[10] Under the
chairmanship of Harvard's Dr. Joseph Aub, the Joint Panel was the
gathering place for the small world of government radiation researchers
and their private consultants. Its periodic "Program Guidance Reports"
laid out the atomic warfare medical research agenda, summarizing work
that was ongoing and that which remained. At its meetings, participants
heard from the CIA on foreign medical intelligence, debated the need for
human experimentation, and learned of the latest developments in
radiation injury research, of the blast and heat effects of the bomb, and of
instruments needed to measure radiation effects.
In September 1951 the Joint Panel considered a draft report on
"biomedical participation" in bomb tests.[11] "It is, of course
obvious,"
the report noted, "that a test of a new and untried atomic weapon is not a
place to have an unlimited number of people milling about and operating
independently." Planning was therefore in order. There were, the
document explained, basic criteria for "experimentation" at bomb tests.
For example, "Does the experiment have to be done at a bomb
detonation; is it impossible or impractical in a laboratory?"[12]
The document turned to "specific problems for future tests." The list of
twenty-nine problems was not intended to be all-inclusive, but was
"designed to show the types of problems which should be considered as
a legitimate basis for biomedical participation in future weapons tests."
The term human experimentation was not used, and most of the items
could be performed without humans.[13] However, the list included
several examples of research involving human subjects:
11. Effects of exposure of the eye to the atomic flash . . .
24. Measurements of radioactive isotopes in the body fluids
of atomic weapons test personnel . . .
27. The efficiency and suitability of various protective
devices and equipment for atomic weapons war . . .
28. Psychophysiological changes after exposure to nuclear
explosions.
29. Orientation flights in the vicinity of nuclear explosions
for certain combat air crews.[14]
By the end of the decade, human research would be conducted in all
these areas.[15]
At the same September meeting, the Joint Panel also considered a
"Program Guidance Report" on the kinds of atomic warfare-related
research that needed to be conducted, in the laboratory as well as in the
field. The areas singled out for immediate and critical attention included
the initiation of "troop indoctrination at atomic detonations" and
"psychological observations on troops at atom bomb tests."[16]
A section on "Biomedical Participation in Future Atomic Weapons Tests"
concluded that the next step should be
4.1 To complete present program and plan for participation
in future tests in light of results from Operation
GREENHOUSE [a prior atomic test series]. These plans
should include studies on the effect of atomic weapons
detonations on a troop unit in normal tactical support
[emphasis added].[17]
Thus, while it was well known at the time that troops participated at the
bomb tests and were subjected to psychological testing, it now is evident
that the DOD's medical advisers advocated the presence of the troops at
the tests for both training and research purposes. The doctors were not
alone in attaching high priority to such research. The Joint Panel's
September guidance punctuated, perhaps echoed, the Armed Forces
Special Weapons Projects's midsummer 1951 call for a "systematic
research study . . . [to] provide a sound basis for estimating troop
reaction to the bomb experience and . . . the indoctrination value of the
maneuver."[18]
The HumRRO Experiments
Just two months later, in November 1951, at a bomb test in the Nevada
desert, the Army conducted the first in a series of "atomic exercises."[19]
This exercise was designed primarily to train and indoctrinate troops in
the fighting of atomic wars. The exercise also provided an opportunity for
psychological and physiological testing of the effects of the experience on
the troops.
Desert Rock was an Army encampment in Nevada adjacent to the
nuclear test site. At the exercise named Desert Rock I, more than 600 of
the 5,000 men present would be studied by psychologists from a newly
created Army contractor, the Human Resources Research Organization
(HumRRO). HumRRO's research was directed by Dr. Meredith
Crawford, who was recruited by the Army from a deanship at Vanderbilt
University.[20] The identity of all the participants involved in the
"HumRRO experiments," and the further DOD research discussed later
in this chapter, is not known. The numbers of those who participated
must be reconstructed from available reports.[21]
The highly publicized bomb test was well attended by military and civilian
officials. "Las Vegas, Nevada," Time magazine reported, "had not seen
so many soldiers since World War II. . . . The hotels were jammed with
high brass. . . . [o]ut on the desert, 65 miles away 5,000 hand-picked
troops were getting their final briefing before Exercise Desert Rock I--the
G.I.'s introduction to atomic warfare."[22] The detonation,
Representative Albert Gore (father of the current Vice President), told
the New York Times, was "the most spectacular event I have ever
witnessed. . . . As I witnessed the accuracy and cataclysmic effect of the
explosion, I felt the conviction that it might be used in Korea if the
cease-fire negotiations broke down."[23]
To render the experience more realistic, the observers and participants
were told to imagine that aggressor armies had invaded the United States
and were now at the California-Nevada border. An atomic bomb would
be dropped, with the troops occupying a position seven miles from
ground zero. After the detonations they would "attack into the bombed
area."[24]
At their home base, two groups of troops--a control group that would
stay at home base and an experimental group that would go to
Nevada--had listened to lectures and seen films intended to "indoctrinate"
them about the effects of the bomb and radiation safety. Both groups
were administered a questionnaire to determine how well they had
understood the information provided. Dr. Crawford explained in a 1994
interview that "indoctrination," which today has a negative connotation,
was not intended to suggest misrepresentation of fact, but "had more to
do with attitude, feeling and motivation."[25] At Desert Rock, the
experimental group was given a further "non-technical briefing." They
were "reminded that no danger of immediate radiation remains 90
seconds after an air burst; that they would be sufficiently far from ground
zero to be perfectly safe without shelter; and that with simple protection
they could even be placed quite close to the center of the detonation,
with no harm to them."[26]
After the blast, a questionnaire was again administered to most of the
experimental subjects, and physiological measurements including blood
pressure and heart rates were taken. The questionnaire was designed to
test the success of the "indoctrination."[27] For example, questions
included (answers in parentheses were those the HumRRO report stated
were correct):
l. Suppose the A-bomb were used against enemy troops by
exploding it 2000 feet from the ground and suppose all
enemy troops were killed. How dangerous do you think it
would be for our troops to enter the area directly below the
explosion within a day? (Not dangerous at all). . . .
6. If an A-bomb were exploded at 2000 feet, under what
conditions would it be safe to move into the spot directly
below, right after the explosion? (Safe if you wore regular
field clothing.)[28]
These answers were not correct. Answers to questions like the above
depend on weather conditions, the yield of the weapon, and the
assumptions about the degree of risk from low levels of exposure. For
example, while an airburst (where the fireball does not touch the ground)
may result in little fallout in the immediate area of the blast, it does not
result in none; if rain is present, a substantial amount of fallout may be
localized.
Similarly, whereas the 1946 Bikini bomb tests at Operation Crossroads
in the Pacific had caused contamination so severe that many of the
surviving ships were scrapped, the question and answer provided said:
Some of the ships in the Bikini tests had to be sunk because
they were too radioactive to be used again.
(False).[29]
In a 1995 review of the 1951 questionnaire, the Defense Department
found that "changes/corrections/clarifications" would be in order for nine
of the thirty questions.[30]
In January 1952, the Army surgeon general expressed "continuing
interest in the conduct of psychiatric observations," offering funds for
"Psychiatric Research in Connection with Atomic Weapons Tests
Involving Troop Participation."[31] In March 1952, however, the Army
and the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project (AFSWP), which
coordinated nuclear weapons activities for the DOD, provided critical
reflections on Desert Rock I. "[O]ne is inevitably drawn to the
conclusion," the Army reported, "that the results, though measurable,
were highly indeterminate and unconvincing. The limitations of evaluation
were inherent in the problem. Handicapped by a preconceived notion
that there would be no reaction, it took on the form of a gigantic
experiment whose results were already known. No well controlled
studies could be undertaken which could presume even superficial
validity. . . ."[32] In a letter to the AEC, the AFSWP went further.
Owing to the "tactically unrealistic distance of seven miles to which all
participating troops were required to withdraw for the detonation,"[33]
troops might get the wrong impression about nuclear warfare.
In 1994, Dr. Crawford reflected on the logic of testing for panic in an
environment that was thought to be too safe. "No troops," Dr. Crawford
recalled, "were exposed anywhere where anybody thought there was any
danger, so you might ask the question, so what? I've asked that question
myself and I've thought about it. It was the first HumRRO project. It was
really pretty well agreed upon before I got up here from Tennessee . . .
so we did what we could."[34]
Despite the reservations about the 1951 study, on May 25, 1952, the
Army conducted its second HumRRO experiment at the exercise called
Desert Rock IV. It was similar in methodology to the first experiment and
involved about 700 soldiers who witnessed the shot and 900 who served
in the control group as nonparticipants.[35] This time, to add more
realism, the troops witnessed the blast, an 11-kiloton weapon that was
set off from the top of a tower, from four miles from ground zero. By the
end of the second research effort, there was even more reason to
question the utility of the experiments. HumRRO's report on Desert Rock
IV stated that while knowledge increased as a result of the indoctrination,
the actual maneuver experience did not produce significant improvement
in test scores and decreases were actually reported on some
questions.[36]
In both Desert Rock I and Desert Rock IV, the Army hoped that the
troops who witnessed the blasts would disseminate information to the
troops who stayed at home base. However, the troops who participated
in the exercises were warned that discussion of their experiences could
bring severe punishment, and the researchers found that communication
was at a minimum.[37] Moreover, those who stayed home, HumRRO
found, "showed no evidence of great interest, of extensive discussion, or
of any important benefit from dissemination as a result of the atomic
maneuver."[38] Meanwhile, the experience that the participants had been
warned not to discuss and that was of little interest to their comrades was
front-page news throughout the country. "When they returned to camp,"
Time reported of the first Desert Rock exercise, "the men were quickly
herded into showers. Some were given test forms to fill out. Did you
sweat? Did your heart beat fast at any time? Did you lose bladder
control? Most of the answers were no."[39]
Without any direct comment on the results of the Desert Rock I and IV
experiments, in September 1952, the Joint Panel urged that the
psychological research continue:
It is possible that inclination to panic in the face of AW
[atomic warfare] and RW [radiological warfare] may prove
high. It seems advisable, therefore, to increase research
efforts in the scientific study of panic and its results, and to
seek means for prophylaxis. . . . The panel supports the
point of view that troop participation in tests of atomic
weapons is valuable. As many men as possible ought to be
exposed to this experience under safe conditions.
Psychological evaluation is difficult and results can be
expected to appear superficially trivial, but the matter is of
such extreme importance that the research should be
persisted in, utilizing every opportunity.[40]
Indeed, a third set of experiments was carried out in April 1953, at
Desert Rock V; this time, the number of participants is unknown.[41]
The final HumRRO bomb test study was conducted in 1957 at
Operation Plumbbob.[42] No formal report was prepared, but the
experience was recorded in a personalized recollection by a HumRRO
staffer.[43] Weather-related delays, the departure of HumRRO staff, the
continued redesign of the exercises, and the failure of a fifth of the troops
to return from a weekend pass in time for the events took their toll. The
researchers were not given the script used in the indoctrination lectures to
the troops. Thus, it was impossible for the researchers to know whether
incorrect responses were due to "lack of inclusion of the topic in the
orientation or to ineffective instruction."[44] The research was to include
exercises such as crawling over contaminated ground.[45] But, yet again,
the researchers found that the safety rules in force precluded important
study: "shock . . . and panic . . . would not be observed."[46]
There is no question that HumRRO activities were research involving
human subjects; the projects involved an experimental design in which
soldier-subjects were assigned either to an experimental or a control
condition. Available evidence suggests, however, that the Army did not
treat HumRRO as a discretionary research activity but as an element of
the training exercise in which soldiers were participating in the course of
normal duty. The HumRRO subjects were apparently not volunteers. Dr.
Crawford in 1994 said of the HumRRO subjects, "Whether they were
requested to formally give their consent is pretty unknowable because in
the Army or any other military service people generally do what they're
asked to do, told to do."[47] Indeed, as HumRRO's initial report stated,
the primary purpose of the atomic exercise was training; "research was
necessarily of secondary importance."[48] However, Dr. Crawford felt
confident that the risks were disclosed. Because of the "number and
intensity of briefings . . . [n]o soldier, to our knowledge, went into the test
situation with no idea about what to expect. They were adequately
informed."[49]
We now know that in 1952 the Defense Department's medical experts
were simultaneously locked in discussion of the need for psychological
studies and other human research at bomb tests and, as we saw in
chapter 1, the need for a policy to govern human experimentation related
to atomic, biological, and chemical warfare. In October of that year, the
Armed Forces Medical Policy Council recommended that the
Nuremberg Code be adopted, as it was by Secretary Charles Wilson in
1953. What is still missing is information that might show how, as seems
to be the case, the same experts could have been having these
discussions without communicating the essence of them to those
responsible for conducting the human research at the tests. There is no
evidence that the investigators responsible for HumRRO were informed
about the Wilson memo. Dr. Crawford, for example, when queried in
1994, reported that he did not know of the 1953 Wilson memorandum.
It is possible that HumRRO was not viewed as being subject to the
requirements stated in the Wilson memo despite the fact that it was
human research relating to atomic warfare. Although the experimental
variable was participation at a bomb test, arguably, the troops would
have been present at the test in any event, along with many thousands of
other soldiers who were not subjects in the HumRRO research.
Atomic Effects Experiments
At the same time that the third set of HumRRO experiments was being
conducted, in April 1953 at Desert Rock V, the Army called on several
dozen "volunteers for Atomic Effects Experiments."[50] According to the
Army, all were officers familiar with the "experimental explosion involved"
and were able to personally judge "the probability of significant variations
in [weapon] yield." They were instructed to choose the distance from
ground zero they would like to occupy in a foxhole at the time of
detonation, as long as it was no closer than 1,500 yards. If the surviving
documentation is the measure, these officers, and perhaps officer
volunteers in the subsequent Desert Rock series, were the only subjects
of bomb-test research who signed forms saying that they were voluntarily
undertaking risk.[51] The exposures were meant to set a standard for
developing "troop exposure programs and for confirming safety doctrine
for tactical use of atomic weapons."[52]
An Army report on the volunteers at Desert Rock V concluded that there
would be "little more to be gained by placing volunteer groups in forward
positions on future shots."[53] An April 24, 1953, Army memorandum
recommended termination of the program "as little will be gained in
repeatedly placing volunteers in trenches 2000 yards from ground
zero."[54] However, officer volunteers were called on again at the next
Desert Rock exercises at the 1955 nuclear test series called Operation
Teapot. Following Teapot, the Army recommended that further
experiments be conducted in which the volunteers would be moved
closer to ground zero, "until thresholds of intolerability are
ascertained."[55] This "use of human volunteers under conditions of
calculated risk," the Army told the AFSWP, "is essential in the final phase
of both the physiological and psychological aspects of the overall
program."[56]
In response, the AFSWP pointed out that the injury threshold could not
be determined "without eventually exceeding it."[57] The Army was
essentially proposing human beings be exposed to the detonation's blast
effects to the point of injury. The proposal, an AFSWP memo explained,
would not pass muster under the rules of the Nevada Test Site and was
otherwise unacceptable:
In particular, it is significant that the long range effect on the
human system of sub-lethal doses of nuclear radiation is an
unknown field. Exposure of volunteers to doses higher than
those now thought safe may not produce immediate
deleterious effects; but may result in numerous complaints
from relatives, claims against the Government, and
unfavorable public opinion, in the event that deaths and
incapacitation occur with the passage of time.[58]
If the Army wanted more data on blast effects, AFSWP declared, it
should proceed with laboratory experiments, for which money would be
made available. The AFSWP was not opposed to the kinds of activities
that had previously taken place at Desert Rock. But those activities,
AFSWP's memo observed in passing, "cannot be expected to produce
data of scientific value."[59]
The Desert Rock experience was apparently repeated, again with officer
volunteers, in the next Nevada test series, the 1957 Operation
Plumbbob. Although the total number of officers involved in all of the
"officer volunteer" experiments is not known, it is probably fewer than
one hundred.
The Flashblindness Experiments
Beginning with the 1946 Bikini tests, experiments with living things
became a staple of bomb tests. At Operation Crossroads, animals were
penned on the decks of target ships to study the effects of radiation. In
the 1948 Sandstone series at the Marshall Islands Enewetak Atoll,
seeds, grains, and fungi were added. In 1949, the AEC and the DOD
began to coordinate the planning of the biomedical experiments at tests
and set up a Biomedical Test Planning and Screening Committee to
review proposals.[60] Presumably, the human experiments at bomb tests
should have been filtered through this or some other review process
designated to consider experiments. Yet, in only one case--flashblindness
experiments--did this happen.
With Dr. Meiling's 1951 call for renewed DOD effort at biomedical
experimentation came a revival of the DOD-AEC joint biomedical
planning. From the start, the AEC doubted DOD's willingness to
cooperate.[61] In a January 1952 letter to Shields Warren, Los
Alamos's Thomas Shipman complained that the committee was limited to
reviewing proposals from civilian groups, and not the military: "[I]f," he
wrote, the "AEC can not exercise a measure of control in this matter,
they might better withdraw from the picture completely and permit the
military to continue on its own sweet way without the somewhat ludicrous
spectacle of an impotent committee's snapping its heels like a puppy
dog."[62] In retrospect, Shipman wrote to Warren's successor in June
1956, the military's refusal to participate "reduced that committee to
impotence."[63]
Whatever its effectiveness, in 1952 the biomedical research screening
group did consider at least one of the military's flashblindness
experiments.[64] Flashblindness--the temporary loss of vision from
exposure to the flash--was a serious problem for all the armed services,
but particularly for the Air Force. Pilots flying hundreds of miles an hour
in combat could not afford to lose concentration and vision even
temporarily.[65]
The flashblindness experiments began at the 1951 Operation
Buster-Jangle, the series that included Desert Rock I, with the testing of
subjects who "orbit[ed] at an altitude of 15,000 feet in an Air Force
C-54 approximately 9 miles from the atomic detonation. . . ."[66] The
test subjects were exposed to three detonations during the operation,
after which changes in their visual acuity were measured.[67] Although
these experiments were conducted at bomb tests that potentially exposed
the subjects to ionizing radiation, the purpose of the experiment was to
measure the thermal effects of the visible light flash, not the effects of
ionizing radiation.
When another experiment was proposed for Operation
Tumbler-Snapper, the 1952 Nevada tests, the AEC sought a "release of
AEC responsibility" on grounds that "there is a possibility that permanent
eye damage may result."[68] It is not clear how the military responded,
but the experiment proceeded. Twelve subjects witnessed the detonation
from a darkened trailer about sixteen kilometers from the point of
detonation.[69] Each of the human "observers" placed his face in a hood;
half wore protective goggles, while the other half had both eyes
exposed.[70] A fraction of a second before the explosion, a shutter
opened, exposing the left eye to the flash.[71] Two subjects incurred
retinal burns, at which point the project for that test series was
terminated.[72]The final report recorded that both subjects had
"completely recovered."[73]
At the 1953 tests, the Department of Defense engaged in further
flashblindness study.[74] During this experiment, "twelve subjects
[dark-adapted] in a light-tight trailer were exposed to five nuclear
detonation flashes at distances of from 7 to 14 miles."[75]
The flashblindness experiments were the only human experiments
conducted under the biomedical part of the bomb-test program and the
only human experiments where immediate injury was recorded. They
were also the only experiments where there is evidence of any connection
to the 1953 Wilson memorandum applying the Nuremberg Code to
human experimentation.
Recently recovered documents show that upon a 1954 review of a
report showing the injuries at the 1952 experiment, AFSWP medical
staff immediately declared that "a definite need exists for guidance in the
use of human volunteers as experimental subjects."[76] Further inquiry
revealed that a Top Secret policy on the subject existed. That policy
detailed "very definite and specific steps" that had to be taken before
volunteers could be used in human experimentation. But, the AFSWP
wrote, "No serious attempt has been made to disseminate the information
to those experimenters who had a definite need-to-know."[77]
Nonetheless, some form of consent was obtained from at least some of
the flashblindness subjects. In a 1994 interview, Colonel John Pickering,
who in the 1950s was an Air Force researcher with the School of
Aviation Medicine, recalled participating as a subject in one of the first
tests where the bomb was observed from a trailer, and his written
consent was required. "When the time came for ophthalmologists to
describe what they thought could or could not happen, and we were
asked to sign a consent form, just as you do now in the hospital for
surgery, I signed one."[78] There is no documentation showing whether
subsequent flashblindness experiments, which followed upon the issuance
of the secretary of defense's 1953 memorandum, required informed and
written consent. However, given the recollection of Colonel Pickering
and the military tradition of providing for voluntary participation in
biomedical experimentation, this may well have been the case. (A report
on a flashblindness experiment at the 1957 Plumbbob test uses the term
volunteers;[79] a report on 1962 "studies" at Dominic I provides no
further information.)[80]
In early 1954 the Air Force's School of Aviation Medicine reported that
animal studies and injuries at bomb tests (to nonexperimental
participants) had shown that potential for eye damage was substantially
worse than had been understood.[81] Studies of flashblindness with
humans continued in both field and laboratory tests through the 1960s
and into the 1970s. These experiments tested prototype versions of eye
protection equipment, and the results were used to recommend
requirements for eye protection for those exposed to atomic
explosions.[82]
Research on Protective Clothing
In late 1951, following the first Desert Rock exercise, the government
conducted Operation Jangle, a nuclear test series that detonated two
nuclear weapons, one on the surface and one buried seventeen feet
underground. The two Jangle shots were tests where the weapon's
fireball touched the ground. When a nuclear weapon's fireball touches the
ground it creates much more local fallout than an explosion that bursts in
the air. Consequently, these tests posed some potential hazard to civilians
who lived near the test site and to test observers and participants.
Two weeks before Jangle the DOD requested an additional 500
observers at each of the Jangle shots, to acclimate the troops to nuclear
weapons. The AEC advised against the additional participants, declaring
that "[t]his [the first detonation] was an experiment which had never been
performed before and the radiological hazards were unpredictable." In
the AEC's view, no one should approach ground zero for three or four
days after the surface shot.[83]
The AEC seems to have been successful in persuading the Department of
Defense not to include the extra observers, but the DOD did not agree to
the AEC's suggestion on approaching ground zero. Four hours after the
first shot, the DOD conducted research involving troops who were
accompanied by radiation safety monitors.[84] Eight teams of men
walked over contaminated ground for one hour to determine the
effectiveness of protective clothing against nuclear contamination.[85]
Similar tests were conducted after the second shot at Jangle, but this time
after a longer period. Five days after the shallow underground shot, men
crawled over contaminated ground, again to determine the effectiveness
of protective clothing.[86] Other men rode armored vehicles through
contaminated areas to check the shielding effects of tanks and to check
the effectiveness of air-filtering devices.[87] According to the final report,
the protective clothing was "adequate to prevent contact between
radioactive dust and the skin of the wearer."[88]
The information on this research is limited. The only mention of the
subjects in the report reads, "The volunteer enlisted men, too numerous
to mention by name, who participated in the evaluation of protective
clothing were of great assistance which is gratefully acknowledged."[89]
It is likely that at the time these men were not viewed as subjects of
scientific research but rather as men who had volunteered for a
hazardous or risky assignment. We know nothing about what these men
were told about the risks or whether they felt they could have refused the
assignment if they had an interest in doing so.
The Jangle activities are a good illustration of difficulties in drawing
boundaries in the military between activities that are research involving
human subjects and activities that are not. Although the Jangle evaluation
was likely not considered an instance of human research at the time, it
has many similarities to ground-crawling activity conducted several years
later, not in conjunction with a nuclear test, that was treated as research
involving human subjects. In 1958 ninety soldiers at Camp Stoneman, in
Pittsburg, California, were asked to perform "typical army tactical
maneuvers" on soil that had been contaminated with radioactive
lanthanum.[91] The soldiers were then monitored for their exposure to
study beta contamination from this nonpenetrating form of radiation. In
1963 soldiers were again asked to maneuver on ground contaminated
with artificial fallout, this time at Camp McCoy in Wisconsin.[91]
The plans for the 1958 maneuvers, which were administered by the
Navy's Radiological Defense Laboratory, had been submitted for
secretarial approval, as was required for biomedical experiments
involving Navy personnel.[92] In accordance with the Navy rules, the
soldiers signed "written statements of voluntary participation."[93] During
the 1963 experiments the Army processed the activity under its 1962
regulation on human experimentation (AR 70-25).[94] This rule, a public
codification of the secretary of defense's 1953 Nuremberg Code rule,
also required secretarial review and written consent.[95]
Cloud-Penetration Experiments
What are the dangers to be encountered by the personnel
who fly through the cloud?--How much radiation can they
stand?--How much heat can the aircraft take?--Can the
ground crews immediately service the aircraft for another
flight?--If so, what precautions are necessary to insure their
safety?[96]
The Air Force felt that it was essential to answer these questions. To do
so, it carried out experiments, including some with animals and a few with
humans.
At the first atomic tests the military used remote-controlled aircraft, called
"drones," to enter and gather samples from atomic clouds in order to
estimate the yield and learn the characteristics of the weapon being
tested. Military pilots did, however, "track" mushroom clouds, gathering
information and plotting the cloud's path in order to warn civilian aircraft.
During a 1948 test, a cloud tracker piloted by Colonel Paul Fackler
inadvertently got too close to a cloud. But after the accident, Colonel
Fackler commented, "'No one keeled over dead and no one got
sick.'"[97] Colonel Fackler's experience, an Air Force history later
recorded, showed that manned flight through an atomic cloud "would not
necessarily result in a lingering and horrible death."[98]
Some of the trackers had "sniffers" on their aircraft to collect small
samples. The Air Force conducted experimental sampling missions at
1951 tests and later permanently replaced the drones with manned
aircraft because drones were difficult to use, and they often did not get
the quality samples of the atomic cloud that Atomic Energy Commission
scientists desired. By Operation Teapot (1955), the AEC considered the
testing of a nuclear device "largely useless" unless sampler aircraft were
used to obtain fission debris that would be used to estimate the nuclear
weapon's performance.[99]
As the sampling mission became routine, a new mission in the clouds
began. At Teapot the Air Force performed the first manned "early cloud
penetration." The phrase was used by the Air Force to refer to missions
conducted as soon as minutes after detonation of the test weapon. The
main purpose was to discover the radiation and turbulence levels within
the cloud at early times after detonation.
Like the first sampling missions, the first early cloud-penetration missions
were conducted by unmanned drone aircraft. In 1951 Colonel (now
General) E. A. Pinson, an Air Force scientist who had earlier conducted
tracer experiments on himself and other scientists, placed mice aboard a
drone aircraft; in 1953 he flew mice, monkeys, and instrumentation in
drone aircraft through atomic clouds. Pinson concluded that the radiation
risk from flying manned aircraft through atomic clouds could be
controlled by monitoring the external gamma dose.[100] But the Air
Force was not convinced and asked Pinson to follow up the animal
experiments with studies with humans during Operation Teapot (1955)
and Operation Redwing (1956) to confirm the results. This research
appears to have involved a small number of subjects, perhaps in the
range of a dozen or so.
Pinson designed the human experiments to "learn exactly how much
radiation penetrates into the human system"[101] when humans flew
through a mushroom cloud. The Air Force had pilots swallow film
contained in small watertight capsules. The film was attached to a string
held in their mouths, so that it could be retrieved at the end of the
mission.[102] When the film was retrieved, the researchers compared the
exposures measured inside the human body with those measured on the
outside. They found that the doses measured outside the body were
essentially identical to the doses inside the body; this was a critical
finding, because it meant that surface measurements would be
"representative of the whole-body dose."[103]
For the experiment, the AEC test manager for Teapot waived the AEC's
test-exposure limit of 3.9 roentgens and permitted four Air Force officers
to receive up to 15 roentgens whole-body radiation.[104] The exemption
was "based on the importance of [the project] to the Military Effects Test
program and the fact that radiation up to 15 R may be necessary for its
successful accomplishment."[105] When the air crews entered the atomic
clouds, they measured dose rates of radiation as high as 1,800 rad per
hour. Since the crews were in the cloud for such a short period of time,
however, the actual doses were much lower than 1,800 R.[106] The
maximum reported dose received on a single mission was 17 R,[107]
higher than the 15 R authorized for the project. Since the air crews flew
on several missions, two of the crew members received more than 17
R.[108]
A year later, at Operation Redwing, where the atomic and hydrogen
bombs were tested, the Air Force conducted another series of
experimental cloud penetrations. Part of the Redwing experiment was to
measure the hazard from inhaling or ingesting radioactive particles while
flying through a mushroom cloud. When mice and monkeys were flown
through clouds during earlier tests they were placed in ventilated cages to
determine the hazard from inhaling radioactive particles. The studies
found that the hazard from inhalation was less than 1 percent of the
external radiation hazard. As General Pinson put it, "In other words, if the
internal hazard were to become significant, the external hazard would be
overwhelming."[109] To confirm this finding, Pinson undertook a similar
experiment with humans, and again, as with the Teapot experiment,
Pinson was a subject as well as a researcher. To perform the experiment,
no filters were installed in the penetration aircraft.[110] Again, it is
estimated that about a dozen subjects were involved.
The military this time set the authorized dosage (the maximum dosage to
which Pinson could plan to have people exposed) at 25 R and a limiting
dosage (in which case a report had to be filed) at 50 R.[111] During the
experiment "maximum radiation dose rates as high as 800 r/hr were
encountered, and several flights yielded total radiation doses to the crew
of 15 r."[112] (To measure the internal dose of radiation the scientists
analyzed urine samples and used whole-body counters.)
The project, as Pinson's final report noted, marked the transition from
animal experimentation to human measurement:
Although a considerable amount of experimentation had
been done with small animals which were flown through
nuclear clouds, the early cloud-penetration project of
Operation Redwing was the first instance in which humans
were studied in a similar situation.[113]
The results confirmed those of the animal experiments. The internal
hazard of radiation was insignificant relative to the external hazard.
Consequently, the researchers recommended "that no action be taken to
develop filters for aircraft pressurization systems nor to develop devices
to protect flight crews from the inhalation of fission products."[114]
Experimental Purpose: Military Tactics, Money, and
Morale
Why was the Air Force interested in showing that atomic clouds could be
penetrated soon after a detonation?
Most important, the military wanted to assure itself that it was safe for
combat pilots to fly through atomic clouds, if need arose during atomic
war. But the research did not make much of a scientific contribution.
Researchers had already established the levels of radiation in atomic
clouds by flying drone aircraft through them, and there was nothing
pathbreaking about humans being exposed to levels of radiation under 25
R. General Pinson later noted, "there are no research people that I know
of that gave a damn [about manned early cloud-penetration experiments],
because this is . . . a negligible contribution to research and
scien[ce]--scientifically, you know, this contributes less than I suspect
anything I've ever done . . . its only virtue is the practical use of it."[115]
From the scientific perspective the data would not likely be of great use;
from an immediate practical perspective human data were felt to be
essential for reassurance. Should the Air Force have been satisfied with
the wealth of data it had from the drone experiments? In retrospect
Pinson found the question difficult. "There's reason to say, 'Well, you
should have been satisfied with the data that had been gathered with the
drones.' But, you know, these are hard-nosed, practical people that--that
put their life on the line and in military combat . . . where the hazards are
far greater than in this modest exposure to radiation."[116]
The budget also played a key role in cloud-penetration research, as well
as the related decontamination experiments, which will be discussed
shortly. The Defense Department declared that the knowledge gained
through its cloud-penetration experiments would save "the taxpayers
thousands upon thousands of dollars" because there would be no need to
develop special protective clothing or equipment, which had been thought
to be necessary.[117]
As in the case of the HumRRO experiments and the troop maneuvers,
indoctrination and morale were important forces behind the
experimentation. "Perhaps the most important problem of all," a popular
men's magazine of the day wrote about the Teapot experience, "might be
a psychological resistance of combat pilots and crews flying into the
unknown dangers of hot, radio-active areas."[118] The press, therefore,
depicted the Teapot experiment as a message to the world--pilots can fly
through atomic clouds safely.
Research, Consent, and Volunteerism
Like the HumRRO experiments, the cloud flythrough experiments were
treated as occupational, rather than experimental, activities. None of the
participants signed consent forms, and waivers to dose limits were
sought, and approved, under the process followed for the
nonexperimental flythrough activities. In 1995 General Pinson said that he
had not been aware of the ethical standards declared in the 1953
secretary of defense memorandum. If he had been, he "would have
gotten written consent from the people that were involved in this."[119]
A 1963 Air Force history of the cloud-sampling program does not
describe the process of crew and pilot selection, but does provide a
perspective:
The Strategic Air Command pilots picked to fly the F-84G
sampler aircraft were pleased to learn that they were doing
something useful, . . . not serving as guinea pigs as they
seriously believed when first called upon to do the
sampling.[120]
Did the personnel understand the risks? Some of them surely did. The
aircraft carried airmen and scientific observers. Because the scientific
observers were the very scientists who designed the experiments, they
certainly understood the radiation risks as well as anyone could be
expected to. In this way, the cloud flythrough experiments exemplified the
ethic of researcher self-experimentation. As Pinson recalled in 1995, "If
you are going to do something like this and you think it's safe to do it,
then you shouldn't ask somebody else to do it. The way you convince
other people that at least you think it's all right, is do it yourself."[121]
The nonscientists were briefed and informed that the risks from their
radiation exposure would be minimal.[122] A pilot in the cloud-tracking
activities recalled one of the briefings: "The scientists line up at a briefing
session and tell you there's no danger if you will follow their instructions
carefully. In fact, they almost guarantee it."[123]
But many of the pilots seemed to have been neither worried at the
prospect of risk nor excited at the prospect of glory. Pinson, for
example, described the attitude of the pilot who flew his aircraft as
"matter of fact."[124] And at Operation Teapot, Captain Paul M.
Crumley, project officer for the early cloud penetrations, stated, "We
consider these flights routine. Neither the pilots nor observers are unduly
concerned over the fact that no one else has flown into an atomic cloud
so soon after detonation."[125]
Decontamination Experiments
In conjunction with the Teapot cloud flythrough experiment, the military
also conducted an experiment on ground crews "to determine how soon
these same aircraft could be reserviced and made ready to fly
again."[126] The Air Force used the contaminated aircraft from the early
cloud-penetration experiment.[127] The research sparked a debate
between the Air Force and the AEC over the costs and benefits of safety
measures, a debate that was itself resolved by further experimentation.
In one part of the "experimental procedure," personnel (the number
involved is not reported) rubbed their gloved hands over a contaminated
fuselage, and in another part "the bare hand was also rubbed over a
surface whose detailed contamination was known and a radioautograph
of the hand surfaces [was] made."[128] None of the "survey team"
exceeded the AEC's gamma exposure limit of 3.9 R.[129] Concluding
that aircraft did not need to be "washed down" or decontaminated after
they flew through the atomic clouds, Colonel William Kieffer, deputy
commander of the Air Force Special Weapons Center, proposed that
decontamination procedures be eliminated except in extreme
circumstances. This change in procedures might cause overexposures,
Kieffer wrote, but they would be acceptable as long as "dangerous"
dosages would be avoided.[130]
The proposal was not warmly received by the AEC. Los Alamos's
Thomas Shipman complained that the goal should be to reduce
exposures to zero.[131] Harold Plank, a Los Alamos scientist who was
in charge of the cloud-sampling project and who rode along on many of
the cloud-sampling missions, said, "Kieffer simply could not understand
the philosophy which regards every radiation exposure as injurious but
accepts minimum exposures for critical jobs."[132]
Kieffer suggested a compromise; test the proposal with only one or two
sampler aircraft.[133] Plank objected, but the AEC test manager
promised to "do everything possible to obtain a waiver of AEC operating
radiological safety requirements."[134] The Air Force carried out the
study during the 1957 Operation Plumbbob. An additional plane was
flown through the atomic clouds created by five "events" to determine the
hazard from the Air Force's proposed procedures.[135] The study
showed that decontamination would be necessary to prevent
overexposures at test sites.[136] In the end, the Air Force was
unsuccessful in its attempt to change the decontamination procedures for
sampler aircraft.
We do not know how the Air Force viewed this activity. Given that it did
not treat the cloud flythroughs as an experiment, it is unlikely that the Air
Force considered the ground personnel activity to be an experiment.
There is no record of what the ground personnel were told or whether
they were volunteers.
Chapter 10: The Bomb Tests: Questions of
Risk, Records, and Trust
In this chapter, the Advisory Committee reviewed six different activities
that were conducted in conjunction with bomb tests that today we would
consider research involving human subjects.[137] Only two of the
six--the "atomic effects experiments" conducted on officer volunteers and
the flashblindness experiments--were clearly treated as instances of
human research at the time. The six human research projects likely
included no more than 3,000 of the more than 200,000 people who were
present during the bomb tests.[138] Some of the research subjects,
perhaps as many as several hundred, were placed at greater risk of harm
than the other bomb-test participants who were not also research
subjects. However, most of the research subjects were not. At this point,
we turn to a consideration of several issues that affect all atomic veterans,
regardless of whether they were also research subjects. These include
how at the time the DOD and the AEC determined what exposures
would be permitted, issues of record keeping, and what is known today
about long-term risks and participation in the bomb tests.
AEC and DOD Risk Analysis for Exposure at Bomb
Tests
In counseling human subject research at bomb tests, the Joint Panel on
the Medical Aspects of Atomic Warfare stated that the research had to
be performed under "safe conditions." What "safe" meant for all those
exposed, both experimental subjects and other military participants at the
bomb tests, was subject to arrangements between the AEC and the
DOD.[139] While the military, of course, is responsible for the safety of
its troops, the AEC had responsibility for the safe operation of the
Nevada and Pacific sites at which the weapons were tested. "Secrecy,"
summarized Barton Hacker, a DOE-sponsored historian of the bomb
tests, "so shrouded the test program . . . that such matters as worker
safety could not then emerge as subjects of public debate."[140]
As we have seen in the case of the cloud flythrough research, by the
mid-1950s the AEC and the Defense Department had arrived at a
method of operation through which waivers to the basic radiation safety
standards for the tests would be granted for particular activities. In the
early 1950s, in the context of the Desert Rock exercises, the AEC and
the DOD established the precedent for departure from the standards that
the AEC relied on for its own bomb-test work force.
At this time the AEC was the main source of expertise on radiation
effects. Its guidepost for its own workers (at the Nevada Test Site and
elsewhere) was the 3 R per thirteen-week standard established for
occupational risk by a private organization (the National Committee on
Radiation Protection). This level, it may be recalled from the debates on
nuclear airplane experimentation (discussed in chapter 8), was well
below that at which the experts assumed acute radiation effects, such as
would limit combat effectiveness, could occur.[141]
In 1951, the Los Alamos Laboratory, the AEC's right hand in weapons
test management, called on the Division of Biology and Medicine's
director, Shields Warren, for "official but unpublicized authority to permit
exposures up to 3.9r" for AEC test personnel.[142] Warren granted the
request, counseling that "this Division does not look lightly upon radiation
excesses."[143]
As we have seen, the DOD shortly thereafter determined to use the tests
for troop maneuvers and did so at Desert Rock I, keeping the troops at
seven miles distance during the detonation. In early 1952 the DOD asked
the AEC to endorse its request to station troops at Desert Rock IV as
close as 7,000 yards from ground zero (approximately four miles), far
closer than the seven-mile limit the AEC permitted its own test-site
personnel. The AEC's Division of Military Applications was willing to
concur. Shields Warren, however, dissented on grounds of safety.[144]
The dispute was settled when AEC Chairman Gordon Dean advised
DOD that "the Commission would enter no objection to stationing troops
at not less than 7000 yards from ground zero," provided that proper
precautions were taken.[145]
Even so, an internal review of the Desert Rock IV exercise by the
Division of Military Applications, generally supportive of DOD's request
for troop maneuvers, raised questions about the wisdom of deviation
from the AEC standard--and the potential for "delayed" casualties.[146]
Determined to proceed, DOD called for "a study to be made to
determine the minimum distance from ground zero that should be
permitted in a peacetime maneuver."[147] A December 1952 report
recommended that dosages for Army personnel be above the limit set by
the AEC for its personnel. The soldiers, by comparison with the AEC
personnel, would be exposed "very infrequently." The report summarized
the state of knowledge:
There is no known tolerance for nuclear radiation, that is,
there is no definite proof that even small doses of nuclear
radiations [sic] may not, in some way, be harmful to the
human body. On the other hand, there is no evidence to
indicate that, within certain limits, nuclear radiation has
injured personnel who have been exposed to it.[148]
In response to the DOD's proposal to assume full responsibility for
physical and radiological safety of troops and troop observers within the
Nevada Test Site, the AEC stated that general safety practice and
criteria at the Nevada Proving Grounds was, and must continue to be,
the responsibility of the AEC. The AEC did, however, "accept the
proposal that the DOD assume full responsibility for physical and
radiological safety of troops and all observers accompanying troops
within the maneuver areas assigned to Exercise Desert Rock V, including
establishment of a suitable safety criteria." The AEC further explained
that
The Atomic Energy Commission adopts this position in
recognition that doctrine on the tactical use of atomic
weapons, as well as the hazards which military personnel
are required to undergo during their training, must be
evaluated and determined by the Department of Defense.
The Atomic Energy Commission has, however, established
safety limits. . . . We consider these limits to be realistic,
and further, are of the opinion that when they are exceeded
in any Operation, that Operation may become a hazardous
one. So that we may know in which particulars and by how
much these safety standards are being exceeded, we desire
that the Exercise Director transmit to the Test Manager a
copy of his Safety Plan. . . .[149]
For the spring 1953 Desert Rock V exercises, the DOD deemed the
permissible limit for the troops (for a test series) to be 6 R.[150] In the
case of the officer volunteers, a 10 R test limit was agreed to, with the
proviso that "it is not intended that these exposures result in any injury to
the selected individuals."[151] The Army's limit at Desert Rock was well
below the level understood to potentially cause acute effects and far
below the recommendation of Brigadier General James Cooney that the
military depart from the "infinitesimal" industrial and laboratory limits and
accept 100 roentgens for a single-exposure limit.[152] But the level was
not only higher than the AEC level but also above the 0.9 R per week
being urged by the British and Canadians, partners in U.S. testing.[153]
(The AEC itself objected that a 0.9 R-per-week limit would make testing
at Nevada impractical.)[154]
Interestingly, in 1952 the Navy, also faced with the need for
more-realistic training exercises, considered spraying radioactive
materials on ships during training exercises. The Navy's Bureau of
Medicine (BuMed) rejected the proposal. BuMed told the chief of naval
operations that while it "fully appreciates" the need for more "realistic
radiological defense training," it could not approve the use of
radioisotopes in a form other than "sealed sources commonly used in
basic training . . . since such use might produce an internal radiation
hazard serious enough to outweigh the advantages of area contamination
for training purposes."[155]
By the mid-1950s, AEC test health and safety staff were continually
concerned about radiation safety at the tests and the failure to reduce
them to a predictable and assuredly safe routine. "There are," Los
Alamos Health Division leader Thomas Shipman wrote to the AEC
Division of Biology and Medicine's Gordon Dunning in 1956, "two basic
facts . . . which must never be lost sight of. The first of these is that the
only good exposure is zero. . . . The second fact is that once the button
for a bomb detonation is pushed you have to live with the results no
matter what they are. . . ."[156] In fact, while the AEC had set a limit of
50 kilotons (more than twice the power of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki
bombs) for Nevada tests, this limit had already been exceeded by 10
kilotons in 1953.[157] "It is all very nice," Shipman wrote in another
1956 memorandum, "to have a well-meaning Task Force commander
who by a stroke of the pen can absolve our radiologic sins, but somehow
I do not believe that overexposures are washed away by edict."[158]
Shipman's comments illustrate an acute awareness among experts at the
center of the testing program of the real and continuing element of risk
and uncertainty in the attempt to define and control exposures at the
bomb tests.
The Aftermath of Crossroads: Confidential Record
Keeping to Evaluate Potential Liability Claims
In the midst of the Korean and Cold Wars, researchers and generals
were focused on the short-term effects of radiation, not effects that might
take place years later. Thus, the benefits from knowledge about the
bomb, or training of troops in its use, loomed large, and the risks from
long-term exposure likely seemed distant and small. Government officials
undertook to guard against acute radiation effects; the surviving
documentation indicates that they were remarkably successful. Of the
more than 200,000 service participants in the tests, available records
indicate that only about 1,200 received more than today's occupational
exposure limit of 5 rem, and the average exposure was below 1
rem.[159] But there was no certainty that lower exposures were risk
free.
During the summer of 1946, the contamination of ships at the Crossroads
tests put officials and medical experts on alert to the radiation risk posed
to participants at atomic bomb detonations. "[D]ifficult and expensive
medico legal problems," Crossroads medical director Stafford Warren
feared, "will probably occur if previously contaminated target ships are
'cleared' for constant occupancy or disposal as scrap."[160] A
"Medico-Legal Advisory Board" sought to deal with these
questions,[161] and the Navy created a research organization dedicated
to the study of decontamination and damage to ships.[162]
Concern for long-term liability stimulated by Crossroads led to more
steps to guard against the legal and public relations implications if service
personnel exposed to radiation filed disability claims.
In the fall of 1946, General Paul Hawley, administrator of the Veterans
Administration, "became deeply concerned about the problems that
atomic energy might create for the Veterans Administration due to the
fact that the Armed Services were so actively engaged in matters of
atomic energy."[163] In August 1947 Hawley met with representatives of
the surgeon general's offices of the military services and the Public Health
Service.[164] The meeting was also attended by former Manhattan
Project chief General Leslie Groves,[165] (Groves reportedly was "very
much afraid of claims being instituted by men who participated in the
Bikini tests.")[166] An advisory committee was created, which included
Stafford Warren and Hymer Friedell, Warren's deputy on the Manhattan
Project medical team. The committee was given the name "Central
Advisory Committee," as "it was not desired to publicize the fact that the
Veterans Administration might have any problems in connection with
atomic medicine, especially the fact that there might be problems in
connection with alleged service-connected disability claims."[167]
The committee recommended the creation of an "Atomic Medicine
Division" of the VA to handle "atomic medicine matters" and a
radioisotope section to "implement a Radioisotope Program."[168] The
committee further recommended that "for the time being, the existence of
the Atomic Medicine Division be classified as 'confidential' and that
publicity be given instead to the existence of a Radioisotope
Program."[169]
This history is contained in a 1952 report presented by Dr. George Lyon
to the National Research Council.[170] The 1952 report records that
"General Hawley took affirmative actions on these recommendations and
it was in the manner described that the Radioisotope Program was
initiated in the Fall of 1947."[171] Lyon, who had worked with Stafford
Warren at Crossroads, was appointed special assistant to the VA's chief
medical director for atomic medicine, and through 1959 served in a
variety of roles relating to the VA's atomic medicine activities. Dr. Lyon's
1952 report recounts that he was present at the August 1947 meeting
and involved in the deliberations of the Central Advisory Committee, as
well as subsequent developments.[172]
Working with the VA and the Defense Department, we sought to retrieve
what information could be located regarding the Atomic Medicine
Division and any secret record keeping in anticipation of potential
veterans' claims from radiation overexposures. Among the documents
found was a Confidential August 1952 letter to the attention of Dr. Lyon,
in which the Defense Department called for comment on the Army's
proposal to "eliminate the requirement for maintaining detailed statistical
records of radiological exposures received by the Army personnel."[173]
The requirement, the letter recorded, "was originally conceived as being
necessary to protect the government's interest in case any large number
of veterans should attempt to bring suit against the government based on
a real or imagined exposure to nuclear radiations during an atomic
war."[174]
In 1959 Dr. Lyon was recommended for a VA "Exceptional Service
Award."[175] In a memo from the VA chief medical director to the VA
administrator, Dr. Lyon's work on both the publicized and confidential
programs was the first of many items for which Dr. Lyon was
commended. Following a recitation of the 1947 developments similar to
those stated by Dr. Lyon in his 1952 report, the memo explained:
It was felt unwise to publicize unduly the probable adverse
effects of exposure to radioactive materials. The use of
nuclear energy at this time was so sensitive that unfavorable
reaction might have jeopardized future developments in the
field . . . [Dr. Lyon] maintained records of classified nature
emanating from the AEC and the Armed Forces Special
Weapons Project which were essential to proper evaluation
of claims of radiation injury brought against VA by former
members of the Armed Forces engaged in the Manhattan
project.[176]
The Advisory Committee has been unable to recover or identify the
precise records that were referred to in the documents that have now
come to light. An investigation by the VA inspector general concluded
that the feared claims from Crossroads did not materialize and that the
confidential Atomic Medicine Division was not activated.[177] However,
the investigation did not shed light on the specific identity of the records
that were kept by Dr. Lyon, as cited in the 1959 memo on behalf of his
commendation.[178]While mystery still remains, the documentation that
has been retrieved indicates that prior to the atomic testing conducted in
the 1950's, the government and its radiation experts had strong concern
for the possibility that radiation risk borne by servicemen might bear
longer-term consequences.
Looking Back: Accounting for the Long-Term Risks
Civilians, a UCLA psychologist observed during a 1949 NEPA meeting
convened to consider the psychology of radiation effects, question
"whether the medical group have actually discovered thus far all the
effects of radiation on human beings . . . that is going to be one of the
most insidious things to combat. . . ."[179] "[W]hen you talk about
probable delayed effects possible, unknown, and so forth," Dr. Sells, of
the Air Force, asked, "what is the proper evaluation of the ethical
question as to how to treat the possible or probable unknown
effects?"[180] While not answering the question, he observed that
"certainly we can create more anxiety by being scientifically scrupulous
than if we simply treated these matters as we are inclined to treat other
matters in our every-day life."[181]
This may have been the case following Crossroads. "Now we are very
much interested in long-term effects," a military participant in a 1950
meeting of the DOD Committee on Medical Sciences stated, "but when
you start thinking militarily of this, if men are going out on these missions
anyway, a high percentage is not coming back, the fact that you may get
cancer 20 years later is just of no significance to us."[182]
Decades following the 1946 Crossroads tests, researchers began to
study the longer-term effects of the bomb on test participants.
In 1980 the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported a cluster of 9
leukemias among the 3,224 (then identified) participants of shot Smoky
at the Nevada Test Site in 1957.[183] A later report[184] increased the
count of leukemias to 10 compared with 4.0 expected on the basis of
U.S. rates, but found no excess cancers at other anatomical sites (the
total observed was 112, compared with 117.5 expected). The Smoky
test was the highest-yield tower shot ever conducted at the Nevada Test
Site; however, the measured doses for the Smoky participants as a group
were too low to explain the excess. Whether this cluster represents a
random event, an underestimation of the doses for the few participants
who got leukemia, or some other explanation remains unclear.
In light of the CDC research, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS)
thereafter undertook an enlarged study of five series of nuclear tests
totaling 46,186 (then identified) participants.[185] The 1985 NAS report
confirmed the excess of leukemia at the Smoky test but found no such
excess at any of the test series (as opposed to individual tests) and no
consistent pattern of excesses at other cancer sites. Later, however, the
NAS study was found to be flawed by the inclusion of 4,500 individuals
who had never participated and the exclusion of 15,000 individuals who
had participated in one or more of the five series, as well as
incompleteness of dosimetry.[186]
The belated discovery that thousands of test participants had been
misidentified punctuated the deficiencies in record creation and record
keeping faced by those who seek to reconstruct, at many years' remove,
the exposures of participants at the tests.
Documents long available, and those newly retrieved by the Committee,
provide further basis for concern about the data gathering at test series in
which human subject research took place. At the 1953 Upshot Knothole
series, which included the Desert Rock V HumRRO research, 1994
DOD data show that only 2,282 of the 17,062 participants are known to
have been issued film badges to serve as personal dosimeters.[187] At
Desert Rock V, the Army surgeon general's policy that one-time
exposure need not be reported led to a determination that maneuver
troop units would be issued one film badge per platoon, and observers
would be issued one per bus.[188] An AFSWP memo recorded that the
Radiological Safety Organization did not have enough pocket dosimeters
for efficient operation.[189] A recently declassified DOD memo records
that "[a]lthough film badges on the officer volunteers [at Desert Rock V]
indicated an average gamma dose of 14 roentgens, best information
available suggests that the true dose was probably 24 rem initial gamma
plus neutron radiation."[190]
In a 1995 report, the Institute of Medicine found that the dose estimates
that were proposed for use in the NAS follow-up study were unsuitable
for epidemiologic purposes, but concluded that it would be feasible to
develop a dose-reconstruction system that could be used for this
purpose. Nonetheless, there are some further studies that are of direct
relevance.[191]
Recently, Watanabe et al.[192] studied mortality among 8,554 Navy
veterans who had participated in Operation Hardtack 1 at the Pacific
Proving Grounds in 1958. This is, to date, the only study of U.S.
veterans to include a control group of unexposed military veterans.
Overall, the participant group had a 10 percent higher mortality rate, but
the cancer excess was significant only for the combined category of
digestive organs (66 deaths compared with 44.9 expected, a 47 percent
increase). On average, the radiation doses were low (mean 388 mrem),
but among the 1,094 men with doses greater than 1 rem, there was a 42
percent excess of all cancers. No categories of cancer sites showed a
significant excess or clear dose-response relationship, but the number of
deaths in any category was small.
Two sets of foreign atomic veterans have been studied. In a study of 954
Canadian participants,[193] no differences with matched controls were
found, but only very large effects would have been detectable in such a
small study. In contrast, a large study of British participants of test
programs in Australia found higher rates of leukemia and multiple
myeloma than in a matched control group (28 vs. 6).[194] However, the
cancer rates among the exposed veterans were only slightly higher than
expected based on national rates, whereas those in the control group
were much lower than expected, and there was no dose-response
relationship. No excess was found at any other cancer site. Although the
difference between the exposed and unexposed groups was quite
significant, the interpretation of this result is unclear. Does it mean that for
some unknown reason, soldiers are less likely than the general population
to get cancer (the "healthy soldier effect," which is usually not thought to
be so large for cancer), or is it an indication of some unexplained
methodological bias? This point has never been resolved.
These observed effects need to be put in the context of what might
reasonably be expected based on current understanding of low-dose
radiation risks and the doses the atomic veterans are thought to have
received. Approximately 220,000 military personnel participated in at
least one nuclear test. The film badges for those monitored (thought to be
roughly representative of all participants) average 600 mrem.[195] As
summarized in "The Basics of Radiation Science" section of the
Introduction, the consensus among scientific experts is that the lifetime
risk of fatal cancer due to radiation is approximately 8 per 10,000
person-rem. On this basis, one might anticipate approximately 106
excess cancer deaths attributable to participation in the nuclear tests. Not
only is this a number with considerable uncertainty, it is small in
comparison with the total of about 48,000 cancer deaths that are
eventually anticipated in this population.
Such a small overall excess would be virtually impossible to detect by
epidemiologic methods. In some subgroups, however, the relative
increase above normal cancer rates could be large enough to be
detectable. Leukemia, for example, is proportionally much more
radiosensitive than other cancers and the largest excess occurs fairly soon
after exposure, when natural rates are low. Focusing on those with
highest exposure would also enhance the relative increase, albeit with
many fewer people at risk. The Defense Nuclear Agency estimates that
about 1,200 veterans received more than 5 rem (mean 8.1 rem).[196]
On this basis, about eight excess cancer deaths would be anticipated.
These factors may have contributed to the observed leukemia excess
among participants of shot Smoky, for example.
Although these numbers represent the best estimate currently available of
the expected cancer excess, there are uncertainties in both the real
exposures received by the participants and the magnitude of the
low-dose risk. As described in "The Basics of Radiation Science"
section, there is roughly a 1.4 uncertainty in the low-dose radiation risk
coefficient simply due to random variation in the available epidemiologic
data, with additional uncertainties of unknown magnitude about model
specification, variation among studies, extrapolation across time and
between populations, unmeasured confounders, and so on. These
uncertainties are hotly contested, although the majority of radiation
scientists believe the figures quoted above are unlikely to be seriously in
error. If low-dose radiation risks were indeed substantially higher than
this, then there would be a serious discrepancy to explain with the effects
actually observed at higher doses. The uncertainties in the doses received
by participants are perhaps more substantial, but given the limitations in
the dosimetry and record keeping, it may be difficult ever to resolve
them.
As is clear from the epidemiologic data available today, there is no
consistent pattern in increased cancer risk among atomic veterans,
although there are a number of suggestive findings, most notably the
excesses of leukemia among shot Smoky and British test participants, the
causes of which are still unclear. The low recorded doses, the small size
of the expected excesses, and problems in record keeping and dosimetry
make it very difficult to resolve whether atomic veterans as a group are at
substantially elevated cancer risk and whether any such excess can be
attributed to their radiation exposures. The Advisory Committee debated
at some length the merits of further epidemiologic studies and concluded
that the decisions to conduct such studies should be made by other
appropriately constituted bodies of experts.
Looking Back: The Legacy of Distrust
The chain of events set in motion by the CDC research, and renewed
interest in the fate of the "atomic vets," led to congressional enactment of
legislation that provides veterans exposed at atmospheric tests with the
opportunity to obtain compensation for injury related to radiation
exposure.
The Veterans Dioxin and Radiation Exposure Compensation Standards
Act of 1984 provides for claims for compensation for radiation-related
disabilities for veterans exposed at atmospheric tests. The Radiation
Exposed Veterans Compensation Act of 1988 provides that a veteran
who was exposed to radiation at a designated event and develops a
designated disease may be entitled to benefits without having to prove
causation.[197]
Notwithstanding the passage of this legislation, the Committee heard from
many atomic veterans, and their widows, who complained that the
records that were created and maintained by the government--records
on which veterans' claims may stand or fall--were inadequate, missing, or
wrong.[198] Atomic veterans also stated that the laws and rules do not
adequately reflect the kinds of illnesses that may be caused by radiation,
that they do not provide for veterans who were exposed to radiation in
settings other than atmospheric tests, and that the practical difficulties--in
time and resources--of pursuing their rights under the laws are often
excessive. The Committee heard from many who told of the time,
expense, and difficulty of getting information on the full circumstances of
bomb-test exposures. They told of their continued efforts, over the
course of the years, to reconcile what they have learned from government
sources with that which they have been told by other test participants,
that which they recovered from the private letters of test participants to
family members, and their own further research.
For numerous atomic veterans, the testimony was not simply that the
bomb tests themselves had been large experiments, but that they had
been put at risk in the absence of planning to gather the data and perform
the follow-up studies needed to ensure that the risks of the unknown,
however small, would be measured and adequately accounted for.
Chapter 10: Conclusion
The story of human research conducted in connection with nuclear
weapons tests illustrates the difficult questions that are raised when
human research is conducted in an occupational setting, especially a
setting, such as the military, where exposure to risk is often part of the
job. The story illustrates that it may often be difficult to discern whether
or not an activity is a human experiment. By the same token, it also
illustrates the importance of guarding participants against unnecessary
risks, whether or not the activity is a human experiment.
Human experiments at atomic bomb tests were undertaken by the
military, which had a long tradition of requiring voluntary consent from
participants in biomedical experiments. The need for written consent in
experiments related to atomic, biological, and chemical warfare was
clearly stated in the secretary of defense's 1953 memorandum. That
memorandum also required the approval in writing of the appropriate
service secretary and precluded experiments that did not adhere to its
further requirements. The 1953 memorandum, however, does not appear
to have been transmitted to those involved in human research at bomb
tests, although the tenet of voluntary consent was followed in some cases.
In addition to consent, the 1953 memorandum contained other significant
ethical requirements, including that research be reasonably likely to
produce useful scientific results and that proper precautions be taken to
minimize risk.
The bomb-test research illustrates the significance of the position that bad
science is bad ethics. Unless a research project is scientifically defensible,
there is no justification for imposing on human subjects even minimal risk
or inconvenience. For example, the DOD's biomedical advisers
advocated the conduct of psychological and physiological research on
troops participating in bomb tests with an awareness that the likelihood of
scientifically useful results was small and that the effort would be part of a
larger exercise in indoctrination and training. Having done so, they had an
obligation to at least review continued research efforts to determine if the
research design was developing useful information. In the case of the
psychological and physiological testing, the evidence indicates that early
results showed that the research design was not likely to produce useful
scientific information, if only because the military, the researchers, and
perhaps even the subjects did not view the setting as sufficiently realistic.
At the same time, this question of ethics and science is irrelevant if the
HumRRO activities did not entail research involving human subjects. An
activity that has a poor research design would not be an ethical human
experiment. However, the same activity might be ethical if conducted as a
training activity whose essential purpose is to provide reassurance.
Similarly, to the extent that research was intended solely to provide
reassurance, ethical questions arise that might not be present if the activity
were not experimental.
Just what makes something an instance of research involving human
subjects? The answer to this question is not discoverable; instead, it is
fashioned by people in particular contexts for particular purposes. Today,
we would likely consider all the activities reviewed in the first part of this
chapter--the HumRRO testing, the "atomic effects experiment," the
flashblindness experiments, the cloud flythroughs, and the protective
clothing and decontamination tests--to be cases of research involving
human subjects to which the current federal regulations and the current
rules of research ethics would apply. Some of these activities are,
nevertheless, more paradigmatically instances of human research than
others. Depending on the context, for example, the protective clothing
and decontamination tests might be considered within the normal course
of duty for military personnel.
One of the reasons it is important to be able to distinguish research
involving human subjects from other activities is that military policy clearly
states that service personnel may not be ordered to be human subjects.
In contrast to much else in military service, participation in research is a
discretionary activity that service personnel are permitted under military
policy and federal regulation to refuse. Thus, in the military as elsewhere,
human subjects are supposed to be volunteers whose valid consent has
been obtained.
Human subject research is not the only activity in the military, however,
for which consent is a requirement. The military also often asks for
volunteers in settings where the risk is unusually great. For example, the
testing of equipment may often be hazardous, may involve the use of
volunteers, but may not be considered human research. Thus, in the case
of test pilots, there may be significant risk, volunteers may be called for,
but the activity might not be considered research with human subjects
and thus would not be thought subject to human use research regulations.
Conversely, a requirement of consent may not necessarily mean that
subjects have some measure of control over the risks to which they are
to be exposed. Even under today's rules, informed consent in the
HumRRO tests would be limited to the psychological and physiological
testing, and not required for participation in the bomb test itself.
Whether the activity is research involving human subjects or an unusually
risky assignment that is not considered human subject research, how free
are military personnel to accept or refuse offers (as opposed to orders)
put to them? Dr. Crawford, when asked to comment in 1994 on consent
in his HumRRO research, responded by observing that "military service
people generally do what they're asked to do, told to do." He was
speaking of an army that included many conscripts; today's all-volunteer
military is doubtless different in many respects that bear on questions of
voluntariness. Nevertheless, the culture of the military, with its emphasis
not only on following orders but on the willingness to take risks in the
interests of the nation, surely influences and in some circumstances may
restrict how service personnel respond to such offers.
Because in the military volunteering is often seen as a matter of duty and
honor, and the boundaries between experimental and occupational
activities may not be clear, the importance of minimizing risk emerges as
a central concern. Above all, the activities discussed in this chapter
confirm that the ethical requirement that risks to service personnel be
minimized should not depend on whether an activity is characterized as
an experiment or occupational. In the case of the atomic veterans, the
risks run were usually no different for those who were subjects of
research and those who were not.
The military took precautions, with great success, to preclude exposure
to radiation at levels that might produce acute effects. However,
bomb-test participants were exposed to lesser, long-term risks without
adequate provision for (l) the creation and maintenance of records that
might be needed, in retrospect, to determine the precise measure of risks
to which military personnel were exposed; (2) the tracking of those
exposed to risk, so that follow-up and assurance, as needed, could be
efficiently undertaken.
It might be argued that, at the time, there was no awareness of a potential
for long-term risk, or that the potential was understood to be nonexistent.
But, while the possibility of long-term risk from low exposures was seen
as low, it was not seen as nonexistent. Following the 1946 Crossroads
tests, officials and experts connected with the DOD, AEC, and VA
thought action was needed to collect data in secret to evaluate potential
disability claims.
Since the bomb tests, the Defense Department has come to recognize the
importance of providing for an independent risk assessment when service
personnel may be exposed to new weapons--regardless of whether the
exposure is classed as experimental or occupational.[199]
However, for the numerous atomic veterans (and their family members)
who spoke to the Committee, a continuing source of distress is not
simply that the government put service personnel at risk but that, having
undertaken to do so, the government did not undertake to collect the
data and perform the follow-up that might provide them knowledge and
comfort in later years. The Advisory Committee agrees. When the nation
exposes servicemen and women to hazardous substances, there is an
obligation to keep appropriate records of both the exposures and the
long-term medical outcomes.
From listening to those who appeared before us, and from reflection on
the laws that are already in effect, the Committee came to appreciate that
there are several reasons record keeping is important. First, those who
served, and their widows and surviving family members, have a great
interest in knowing the facts of service-related exposures. We repeatedly
heard from veterans and family members whose inquiries into the
circumstances and details of exposures has spanned many years.
Second, information may provide basis for scientific analysis that may
shed light on the relation between exposure to risk and subsequent
disability or disease. Third, where disability or disease appears to be a
possible result of exposure, data are needed to provide the basis for a
fair and efficient system of remedies.
The experience of the bomb-test participants indicates that several
different kinds of records or data should be of use. First, of course, there
are data about the exposure of individual service personnel to particular
potential hazards. In the case of the atomic bomb tests, the potential that
radiation would be a hazard was, of course, obvious. In addition,
radiation is a phenomenon that is almost uniquely susceptible to
measurement. In other settings faced by service personnel, the precise
nature of the hazard may not be easily anticipated or, even if anticipated,
readily measurable. Second, there are data concerning the location of
service personnel. In the case of the bomb tests, as we have seen, data
on the identity and location of all test participants (so that their position in
relation to the putative hazard can be retrospectively reconstructed, if
need be) were not readily available. Even if the hazard cannot be
anticipated, such data can be useful in later efforts to reconstruct the
nature of the hazard and its effect. Third, the maintenance of complete
medical records, including linkages where multiple sets of records exist, is
essential. Records suitable for use in epidemiologic studies of long-term
medical consequences of military actions would be valuable for both
medical science and service members.
But having heard from many atomic vets and their family members, the
Advisory Committee does not believe that, but for the inadequate record
keeping and lack of follow-up, there would be no anger or
disappointment among atomic veterans and their families. The real
offense to many is the belief that the risk was unacceptable and that they
or their loved ones may suffer illness unnecessarily as a consequence.
Proper attention to record keeping should provide some basis for gaining
and assuring the trust of those who are exposed to risk in the future and,
perhaps, scientific results that may be of real value to them, but it is
hardly a guarantee against perceptions of abuse or unfairness.
If nothing else, our experience makes us appreciate the difference
between technical, analytic data and the reality of the human experience.
The available data, as we have discussed, indicate that the average
amount of radiation to which bomb-test participants were exposed was
low. But those who believe they have suffered as a consequence of these
exposures do not believe these risks to have been as slight as the data
indicate. When we review this decades later, we rely on numbers; the
atomic veterans and their family members who have appeared before the
Committee associate, in a "cause and effect" way, the exposure with
some kind of result that they have personally experienced or witnessed.
The emotions and concerns expressed to the Committee by these citizens
(and those downwind from atomic tests and intentional releases) were
very, very real. Both the public and the scientific community must
understand that, when data indicate that risks are low, the risks are not
necessarily zero; and it is possible for a rare event to occur. The risk
analysis may only indicate that it is unlikely that such events will occur
with significant frequency or probability.
Compliments of the U.S. Department of Energy