{"id":46387,"date":"2024-03-01T15:04:01","date_gmt":"2024-03-01T23:04:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/?p=46387"},"modified":"2024-03-01T15:04:01","modified_gmt":"2024-03-01T23:04:01","slug":"remembering-nuclear-victims-commemorating-70th-anniversary-of-the-us-largest-nuclear-blast","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.antiwar.com\/blog\/2024\/03\/01\/remembering-nuclear-victims-commemorating-70th-anniversary-of-the-us-largest-nuclear-blast\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering Nuclear Victims: Commemorating 70th Anniversary of the US Largest Nuclear Blast"},"content":{"rendered":"

Castle Bravo test<\/strong><\/p>\n

M<\/span>arch 1st<\/sup>\u00a0marks seventy years since the US used its biggest ever nuclear weapon \u2013 on Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. The bomb was 15 megatons, a thousand times more powerful than the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.\u00a0\u00a0On this day we acutely remember the victims of the Castle Bravo nuclear blast and all other victims of the nuclear era, which has brought untold pain, death and damage, affecting both people and the planet in profoundly destructive and damaging ways.<\/p>\n

Between 1946 and 1958 the US detonated 67 nuclear weapons in the Marshall Islands. The blasts vaporized whole islands, carved craters into the shallow lagoons and exiled hundreds of people from their homes. The Castle Bravo blast was the largest of all, sending\u00a0 Particulate and gaseous fallout<\/a>\u00a0around the entire planet.<\/p>\n

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Stopping the nuclear weapons tests<\/strong><\/p>\n

Concerned US citizens tried to stop the tests by contacting Congress, the President, the Press and by demonstrating on campuses and in the streets. They weren\u2019t successful through these conventional means, so in 1958 four Quakers bought a small sailboat, the Golden Rule<\/em>, and attempted to sail her right into the testing zone in the Marshall Islands.<\/p>\n

The crew of the\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em>\u00a0was arrested in Honolulu and could not continue. A second boat, the\u00a0Phoenix of Hiroshima<\/em>, took the baton and completed the sailed into the Marshall Islands, resulting in the arrest of the\u00a0Phoenix<\/em>\u00a0captain. The actions and arrests of these crews spurred a massive public outcry that finally led to the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em> also inspired the founding of Greenpeace in 1971, whose first mission was to sail to Amchitka Island, Alaska to stop nuclear weapons testing. The US Navy stopped Greenpeace, too. The nuclear bomb the group had come to stop was detonated, but the subsequent tests were canceled and the US stopped the entire Amchitka nuclear test program.<\/p>\n

Rongelap Relocation<\/strong><\/p>\n

Greenpeace and her vessel, the\u00a0Rainbow Warrior<\/em>, played an important role in the Marshall Islands in 1985 when Rongelap residents asked Greenpeace to help them relocate to a new home.\u00a0 Both Bikini and Enewetak\u2019s people were evacuated from their island homes prior to the nuclear tests, hoping to avoid radioactive fallout. But the inhabitants of Rongelap (150 kilometers away) were not so fortunate.\u00a0 Within four hours of the Castle Bravo explosion, fallout was settling on the island. A fine white ash landed on the heads and bare arms of people standing in the open. It dissolved into water supplies and drifted into houses.<\/p>\n

With double the usual miscarriages and other health problems caused by the Castle Bravo test, the people of Rongelap begged the US government to evacuate them.\u00a0\u00a0 But they were now human \u201cguinea pigs\u201d and US scientists wanted to study the effects of radiation on the population.<\/p>\n

Finally, in 1985, Greenpeace made three 180 km trips from Rongelap to Mejato (in the Kwajalein Atoll), taking 300 islanders to safety.<\/p>\n

New Relationships Built \u2013 Marshallese and the\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

The\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em>\u00a0disappeared from public view in 1958 and eventually sank in Humboldt Bay in far northern California in 2010.\u00a0 After a five-year rebuild, she was re-launched and returned to her anti-nuclear mission by Veterans For Peace.<\/p>\n

In 2016 when the\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em>\u00a0visited Portland, Oregon, we visited with a Marshallese group who built a traditional sailing canoe.\u00a0 Most people in and from the Marshall Islands have never heard of the\u00a0Golden Rule\u00a0<\/em>or\u00a0<\/em>the\u00a0Phoenix<\/em>\u00a0of Hiroshima.<\/em>\u00a0 However, when they hear the story, they are very excited that people attempted to help them all those years ago.<\/p>\n

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Kiana Juda-Angelo presented the Golden Rule Project with a Marshallese flag at our public presentation in Portland, Oregon in 2016.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Hawai\u2019i has one of the largest populations of Marshall Islanders in the U.S.\u00a0 It has been our pleasure to meet them and commemorate Nuclear Victims Remembrance Day in Honolulu in 2019.<\/p>\n

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The Golden Rule Sailboat<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

In 2022 as the Golden Rule sailed down the Mississippi River along the \u201cGreat Loop\u201d, we passed through Dubuque, Iowa, where there is a community of 800 or so Marshall Islanders. Veterans For Peace member Art Roche told them the story of the\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em>\u2019s 1958 voyage and that we were bringing the boat to Dubuque!\u00a0 They greeted us with leis and songs of sweet harmony in their traditional clothing.\u00a0 We enjoyed dancing, speeches and song for a whole weekend.<\/p>\n

The Marshall Islands and the United States today<\/strong><\/p>\n

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When the\u00a0Golden Rule<\/em>\u00a0was in New York City we met\u00a0\u00a0the Permanent UN Representative from the Republic of the Marshall Islands,\u00a0 Ambassador Amatlain Elizabeth Kabua.\u00a0 She explained that there were several issues that could be improved:<\/p>\n