A lingering cloud - Atomic vets: 50 years later

[struggle4progress]

Frank X. Mullen Jr. RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL
Posted: 8/14/2005 01:50 am

In 1955, Peder B. Christiansen and about 350 other U.S. servicemen were ordered to stand on a desert ridge about five miles from an atomic bomb blast at the Nevada Test Site as part of what the Pentagon called an effort to dispel the “folklore and superstition” about atomic explosions and radiation hazards. <snip>

Christiansen is among the hundreds of thousands of soldiers and sailors deliberately exposed to radiation at atomic bomb tests in the Pacific, Nevada and elsewhere between 1945 and 1963. At the Nevada Test Site alone, about 100,000 soldiers, sailors, Marines and civilian employees took part in atomic battlefield exercises in the 1950s, according to the Department of Defense.

Some were observers placed as close as a half-mile from nuclear blasts. The troops marched through fallout, charged mushroom clouds, “assaulted” objectives at ground zero in helicopters, flew planes through radioactive dust and worked for hours or days a stone’s throw from the blast craters. It was practice for an atomic war that never came, an experiment to prove to soldiers they could safely operate on a nuclear battlefield, according to military documents. <snip>

“Getting help for atomic veterans is a tough proposition,”’ said Joseph R. Scamihorn, service officer for AMVETS in Reno, a regional agency that helps veterans apply for federal benefits. “Anything to do with exposure to radiation is complicated and (the Department of Veterans Affairs) is real slow. It takes years to process a claim and even then it may be denied. I’ve seen guys die before they even get an answer about benefits.” <snip>

http://www.rgj.com/news/stories/html/2005/08/14/106413.php?sps=&sch=&sp1=leader-courier&sp2=Leader-Courier&sp3=Fernley&sp5=theLeader-Courier.com&sp6=news&sp7=news_front

[Conservativesux]

1. Lots of A-bomb vets became sterile, leading childless lives and

destroyed marriages in the wake of the radiation levels they were exposed to. Then most of them eventually got sick and died from some form of cancer.

Thanks for taking care of our vets, Uncle :(