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New documentation has come to light which suggests that the British government concealed evidence that personnel involved in the UK’s nuclear-testing programme in the Pacific Ocean in the 1950s and 1960s were at risk from radiation damage.
For decades, nuclear-testing veterans have been fighting for compensation from the UK government; so far, they have been unsuccessful (see MHM 144). Now, a 2014 report has been exposed, compiled by whistleblowers at the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE), which re-examined the original 1957-1958 records from Operation Grapple, the nuclear-testing programme in the Pacific at Malden Island and Kiritimati (Christmas Island). It identified readings that showed signs of possible fallout in areas inhabited by troops, as well as significantly elevated levels of radiation in fish caught after nuclear tests. This is particularly noteworthy as many of the troops were eating seafood regularly.
These details, with other data, were absent from the 1993 AWE report that has been used as the main reference, including in several judicial proceedings. The 2014 report was passed to the MOD, which was then in middle of a High Court war pensions claim by veterans and their families, but the court was never told about the potentially revolutionary data regarding increased radiation in fish, and the case was ruled against the veterans.
An MOD spokesman described the 2014 report as an ‘unfinished draft’, which was ‘not a formal company record’ for either the AWE or MOD. However, Susie Boniface, an investigative journalist who has been involved in the veterans’ campaign for 20 years, argues that ‘these new documents provide compelling evidence that the British government cursed its troops with the lifelong horrors of radiation, and repeatedly covered it up’.
Lawyers acting for the veterans have made an official criminal complaint and this new data is being considered as part of an ongoing police investigation into allegations of misconduct over the withholding of medical information behind national security.
Text: Amy Brunskill / Image: Wikimedia Commons, public domain
