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Presidential probers have found "smoking gun"
documents showing the government often improperly made secret its
reports about radiation tests.
It classified many of them as secret not just because of national
security concerns - as it told the public - but for fear of lawsuits
from victims, bad publicity or having such research halted.
Documents also show the public or government workers were sometimes
deliberately misled - such as an instance when some workers were not
told by government doctors that they were sick or that the diseases
were likely caused by radiation.
And the officials who created such secrecy were the same people who
recommended that the government adopt public policies generally
condemning secrecy in scientific work.
The Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments - formed by
President Clinton to evaluate the ethics of Cold War tests - released
such documents from several agencies Thursday.
Many of the tests it is reviewing occurred in Utah. Dugway Proving
Ground was the site of 74 known or suspected radiological weapons
tests. And nuclear bomb tests in Nevada occurred only when the wind
would blow fallout toward Utah.
Smoking guns
"Some of these documents come as close to a smoking gun as you can
get," Dan Guttman, executive director of the committee, told the
Deseret News.
He noted that the government for years claimed it classified reports
on such tests only to protect national security. It also said early
scientists did not realize how dangerous radiation was, which could
explain why many people were exposed to it.
"These documents show that was not always the case," Guttman said.
"They did know it was dangerous. There were discussions about it at
the highest levels. And documents were classified for worry about
insurance claims, lawsuits and bad publicity."
An example is an April 17, 1947, letter from the Atomic Energy
Commission to a researcher.
"It is desired that no document be released which refers to
experiments with humans and might have adverse effect on public
opinion or result in legal suits. Documents covering such work field
(sic) should be classified `secret,'" Col. O.G. Haywood Jr. wrote.
The Atomic Energy Commission even formed an insurance division that
screened data to help prevent release of anything that might lead to
claims or lawsuits. And public-relations officials were consulted to
help guard against bad publicity.
Insurance officers censor
An example was a 1947 report on two people who had been given
plutonium. Documents show a series of reviewers said it presented no
national security threat and was releasable under all guidelines at
the time.
But an insurance official wrote that the results - showing the people
may have been exposed without their knowledge - would open up the
government "to a devastating lawsuit which would, through its
attendant publicity, have far-reaching results."
The document had originally been unclassified, but after such comments
was reclassified as restricted."
In a similar situation - where scientific reviewers recommended
release of a study on uranium exposure - a public relations official
wrote that it "would be unwise because it reflects hospitalization of
certain personnel and possibly could have an effect on certain
lawsuits." It was also restricted.
Declassification officers censor
Declassification officers - not just insurance or public relations
officials - also began looking for public relations problems when
deciding whether to release documents.
Maj. Richard T. Batson, an AEC declassification officer, wrote about a
uranium study in 1947, "These documents may involve matters
prejudicial to the best interests of the Atomic Energy Commission in
that experiments with humans are involved. . . . We are, therefore,
asking that the documents be reclassified as `restricted.'"
Likewise, declassification officials recommended against release of a
study that showed tolerance levels for radiation exposure by
government workers may have been too low.
"We can see the possibility of a shattering effect on the morale of
the employees if they became aware that there was substantial reason
to question the standards of safety under which they are working," the
officers wrote in a Dec. 19, 1948 memo.
They added, "In the hands of labor unions the results of this study
would add substance to demands for extra-hazardous pay" and that it
"might increase the number of claims of occupational injury due to
radiation and place a powerful weapon in the hands of a plaintiff's
attorney."
Scientists censor, too
Scientists themselves also recommended against release when they
foresaw such problems.
Dr. Albert D. Holland Jr., an AEC medical officer, urged that a report
about exposure to radioactive zirconium not be released "since it
specifically involves experimental human therapeutics. Further, after
reviewing the paper as written carefully, it appears almost impossible
to rewrite it in an acceptable manner, which would not jeopardize our
public relations."
Another time, Holland didn't object to data released about a human
experiment - only because "purportedly the human work was done in the
Department of Medicine of the University of Chicago" and not directly
by government doctors.
Another doctor, Robert S. Stone of the University of California, wrote
in an Oct. 6, 1948, letter recommended solving any threat of lawsuit
from a study of X-rays on terminally ill patients by removing all
reference to them - including their initials.
"With the initials removed, there will be no means by which the
patients can ever connect themselves up with the report," he wrote.
Even secret illness
A July 25, 1945, document shows government doctors were also keeping
secret from some Oak Ridge, Tenn., laboratory workers the fact they
were sick with kidney disease and other problems, which they suspected
may have been caused by radiation exposure.
The memo to legal officers asked if doctors were under ethical, moral
or legal obligation to warn workers that they suffered such illnesses.
It added, "The employees must necessarily be rotated out and not
permitted to resume further exposure. In frequent instances no other
type of employment is available. Claim and litigation will necessarily
flow from the circumstances outlined."
In another case of misleading someone, documents mention that
residents were told that collection of animal fluid and human urine
downwind from atomic bomb tests was for "nutritional" studies, when it
was actually for fallout studies.
Documents also show that not only were human radiation tests often
kept secret, so were those involving animals. "It was felt that,
because of anti-vivisection sentiment (on using animals), release of
such information would be detrimental to the testing program," a 1952
Defense Nuclear Agency history said.
Two-faced
Many of the scientists and other officers - including Haywood, Stone
and Holland - who secretly advocated not releasing many studies pushed
for public policies encouraging as much disclosure as possible.
A review board thanked them and others by name for their help in 1947
for helping propose a public policy that "secrecy in scientific
research is distasteful and in the long run is contrary to the best
interests of scientific progress."
It added, "The Board of Review recommends that in so far as it is
compatible with national security, secrecy in the field of biological
and medical research be avoided."
Chemical, germ tests, too?
Such actions about secrecy may not have been limited just to radiation
research. The committee unearthed a similar document about chemical
and biological weapons testing, too.
A Sept. 3, 1952, memo from the Joint Chiefs of Staff asked for arms of
the military to ensure "that all published articles stemming from the
BW (biological warfare) or CW (chemical warfare) research and
development programs are disassociated from anything which might
connect them with U.S. military endeavor."
In other words, scientists involved with chemical or germ warfare
could at that time write publicly about findings only if they could
eliminate all references to the warfare studies.
Of course, much of that testing also occurred at Utah's Dugway Proving
Ground.
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