US Govt Secretly Dosed People With Radiation During 50s-60s

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > C-SPAM > US Govt Secretly Dosed People With Radiation During 50s-60s

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Normally I'd agree that article threads are lame, but this is big enough to warrant its own thread.

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory/cold-war-radiation-testing-us-widespread-author-claims-50233516

quote:

Three members of Congress are demanding answers after a St. Louis scholar's new book revealed details of secret Cold War-era U.S. government testing in which countless unsuspecting people, including many children, pregnant women and minorities, were fed, sprayed or injected with radiation and other dangerous materials.

The health ramifications of the tests are unknown. Lisa Martino-Taylor, an associate professor of sociology at St. Louis Community College who wrote "Behind the Fog: How the U.S. Cold War Radiological Weapons Program Exposed Innocent Americans," acknowledged that tracing diseases like cancer to specific causes is difficult.

But three House Democrats who represent areas where testing occurred � William Lacy Clay of Missouri, Brad Sherman of California and Jim Cooper of Tennessee � said they were outraged by the revelations.

Martino-Taylor used Freedom of Information Act requests to obtain previously unreleased documents, including Army records. She also reviewed already public records and published articles. She told The Associated Press that she found that a small group of researchers, aided by leading academic institutions, worked to develop radiological weapons and later "combination weapons" using radioactive materials along with chemical or biological weapons.

Her book, published in August, was a follow-up to her 2012 dissertation, which found that the government conducted secret testing of zinc cadmium sulfide in a poor area of St. Louis in the 1950s and 1960s. The book focuses on the mid-1940s to the mid-1960s.

An Army spokeswoman declined to comment, but Martino-Taylor's 2012 report on testing in St. Louis was troubling enough to trigger an Army investigation. The investigation found no evidence that the St. Louis testing posed a health threat.

Martino-Taylor said the offensive radiological weapons program was a top priority for the government. Unknowing people in places throughout the U.S., as well as parts of England and Canada, were subjected to potentially deadly material through open-air spraying, ingestion and injection, Martino-Taylor said.

"They targeted the most vulnerable in society in most cases," Martino-Taylor said. "They targeted children. They targeted pregnant women in Nashville. People who were ill in hospitals. They targeted wards of the state. And they targeted minority populations."

The tests in Nashville in the late 1940s involved giving 820 poor and pregnant white women a mixture during their first pre-natal visit that included radioactive iron, Martino-Taylor said. The women were chosen without their knowledge. Blood tests were performed to determine how much radioactive iron had been absorbed by the mother, and the babies' blood was tested at birth. Similar tests were performed in Chicago and San Francisco, Martino-Taylor said.

Cooper's office plans to seek more information from the Army Legislative Liaison, said spokesman Chris Carroll.

"We are asking for details on the Pentagon's role, along with any cooperation by research institutions and other organizations," Carroll said. "These revelations are shocking, disturbing and painful."

In California, investigators created a radiation field inside a building at North Hollywood High School during a weekend in the fall of 1961, Martino-Taylor said. Similar testing was performed at the University of California, Los Angeles and at a Los Angeles Police Department building.

Sherman said he wants a survey of people who graduated from the school around the time of the testing to see if there was a higher incidence of illness, including cancer. He also said he will seek more information from the Department of Energy.

"What an incredibly stupid, reckless thing to do," said Sherman, whose district includes North Hollywood High School.

Among those who recall the testing is Mary Helen Brindell, 73. She was playing baseball in a St. Louis street in the mid-1950s when a squadron of green planes flew so low overhead that she could see the face of the lead pilot. Suddenly, the children were covered in a fine powdery substance that stuck to skin moistened by summer sweat.

Brindell has suffered from breast, thyroid, skin and uterine cancers. Her sister died of a rare form of esophageal cancer.

"I just want an explanation from the government," Brindell said. "Why would you do that to people?"

Clay said he was angered that Americans were used as "guinea pigs" for research.

"I join with my colleagues to demand the whole truth about this testing and I will reach out to my Missouri Delegation friends on the House Armed Services Committee for their help as well," Clay said in a statement.

St. Louis leaders were told at the time that the government was testing a smoke screen that could shield the city from aerial observation in case of Soviet attack. Evidence now shows radioactive material, not just zinc cadmium sulfide, was part of that spraying, Martino-Taylor said.

Doris Spates, 62, was born in 1955 on the 11th floor of the Pruitt-Igoe low-income high-rise where the Army sprayed material from the roof. Her father died suddenly three months after her birth. Four of her 11 siblings died from cancer at relatively young ages. She survived cervical cancer and suffers from skin and breathing problems.

"It makes me angry," Spates said. "It is wrong to do something like that to people who don't have any knowledge of it."

According to Martino-Taylor, other testing in Chicago; Berkeley, California; Rochester, New York; and Oak Ridge, Tennessee, involved injecting people with plutonium-239.

She said her book shines a light on the team of mostly young scientists tasked with developing radiological weapons. They worked in a closed world with virtually no input from anyone "who could say, 'This isn't right,' or put some sort of moral compass on it," she said.

She hopes her book prompts more people to investigate.

"We haven't gotten any answers so far," Martino-Taylor said. "I think there's a lot more to find out."

Learned all the right lessons from Operation Paperclip.

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:04

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# ? Apr 29, 2024 15:54

Duscat: Jan 4, 2009; Fun Shoe

this is kind of baffling, because for there to be any point to such experiments, you'd have to then collect data, which would involve frequent visits to the area and/or contact with the people

and the iron study sounds more like they were measuring the absorption and retention of iron, and it was only radiolabeled so they could do that

could be garbled in transmission i suppose

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:12

the bitcoin of weed: Nov 1, 2014

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:15

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Duscat posted:

this is kind of baffling, because for there to be any point to such experiments, you'd have to then collect data, which would involve frequent visits to the area and/or contact with the people

and the iron study sounds more like they were measuring the absorption and retention of iron, and it was only radiolabeled so they could do that

could be garbled in transmission i suppose

According to the article, that test was performed as part of the radiological weapons program.

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:22

Duscat: Jan 4, 2009; Fun Shoe

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

According to the article, that test was performed as part of the radiological weapons program.

oh yeah so it does, i guess that might explain why they were interested

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:25

Jose: Jul 24, 2007; Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster and writer

i for one am shocked that the government involved in the tuskugee experiment also just spread radiation everywhere to see the effect

america was a mistake

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:31

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Jose posted:

i for one am shocked that the government involved in the tuskugee experiment also just spread radiation everywhere to see the effect

america was a mistake

Aren't you curious about the testing they did in England?

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:35

Dairy Days: Dec 26, 2007

isn't this old news or is it blending together with all the other mkultra edgewood arsenal fuckery from the same era

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:36

Jose: Jul 24, 2007; Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster and writer

i guess there was at least a funny youtube video? i've never bothered to find out if this was real

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-rWnQphPdQ

also i guess now is as good a time as any to bring up radiation farms

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:38

Frijolero: Jan 24, 2009; by Nyc_Tattoo

We're like every terrible despotic regime we hate, except we have malls n poo poo.

Hey remember when the govt. coerced Puerto Rico into involuntarily sterilizing dozens of people? Yeah me neither. :allears:

# ? Oct 4, 2017 21:50

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Dairy Days posted:

isn't this old news or is it blending together with all the other mkultra edgewood arsenal fuckery from the same era

it's more the extent of the testing that wasn't previously known, plus the fact that they also tested on white women that makes it novel. apparently it's still not known exactly what the extent of experimentation was because of classified documents.

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:00

Calibanibal: Aug 25, 2015

uh i mean u already get dosed w/ radiation every day its called the SUN

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:11

jarofpiss: May 16, 2009

if they'd give us uhc they could get better data from giving us secret cancer

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:12

Bear Retrieval Unit: Nov 5, 2009; Mudslide Experiment

So chemtrails are real but they don't actually use planes to spread them.

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:12

jarofpiss: May 16, 2009

[quote="�Bear Retrieval Unit�" post="�477057667�"]
So chemtrails are real but they don�t actually use planes to spread them.
[/quote]

said some planes flew real low and dusted some lady

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:21

Victory Position: Mar 16, 2004

Duscat posted:

this is kind of baffling, because for there to be any point to such experiments, you'd have to then collect data, which would involve frequent visits to the area and/or contact with the people

nah, just check the obituaries and see who drops dead from horrifying cancers

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:29

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Yeah, if they were developing radiological weapons it'd be for combat use or assassinations. They'd want something that would kill people either immediately or within a few days, so long term study wouldn't be important.

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:31

Duscat: Jan 4, 2009; Fun Shoe

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

Yeah, if they were developing radiological weapons it'd be for combat use or assassinations. They'd want something that would kill people either immediately or within a few days, so long term study wouldn't be important.

yeah but you wouldn't test one by actually dropping one on your own population because that would have been unpopular back in those days

you'd use something low-level that doesn't actually kill anyone outright, but then you have the problem of having to go around taking dirt samples and asking people "hey can we have some of your blood"

but i guess those classified papers would answer that puzzle

# ? Oct 4, 2017 22:40

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Duscat posted:

yeah but you wouldn't test one by actually dropping one on your own population because that would have been unpopular back in those days

Tests like giving pregnant women radioactive iron could've been part of a test to see what kind of delivery mechanism is best for human physiology, and to see what effects it has on newborns. There was still a lot of research to be done about the way radiation works in the late-40s to early 60s.

# ? Oct 4, 2017 23:32

sleep with the vicious: Apr 2, 2010

This shocks me, shocks me, to see what's buried underneath, you stupid motherfuckers

# ? Oct 5, 2017 01:45

Dreddout: Oct 1, 2015; You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.

I don't think anyone itt is particularly shocked that the US did something evil, just baffled at why they did it

# ? Oct 5, 2017 03:06

Thundercracker: Jun 25, 2004; Proudly serving the Ruinous Powers since as a veteran of the long war.; College Slice

Dreddout posted:

I don't think anyone itt is particularly shocked that the US did something evil, just baffled at why they did it

We did snatch a bunch of Nazi scientists after WWII. I wouldn't be surprised if the science went as far as "Let's gently caress with these people and see what happens."

# ? Oct 5, 2017 03:21

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

Thundercracker posted:

We did snatch a bunch of Nazi scientists after WWII. I wouldn't be surprised if the science went as far as "Let's gently caress with these people and see what happens."

We also worked out deals with Japanese scientists to not prosecute them for war crimes in exchange for their research, but stuff like Unit 731 ended up being useless because they didn't control their human experimentation. Anyway, that kind of stuff can end up becoming accepted in your own culture once you've let it off the hook.

# ? Oct 5, 2017 03:59

logikv9: Mar 5, 2009; Ham Wrangler

Calibanibal posted:

uh i mean u already get dosed w/ radiation every day its called the SUN

# ? Oct 5, 2017 04:00

sullat: Jan 9, 2012

Thundercracker posted:

We did snatch a bunch of Nazi scientists after WWII. I wouldn't be surprised if the science went as far as "Let's gently caress with these people and see what happens."

The US is quite capable of developing its own home-grown mad scientists without help from the Nazis.

# ? Oct 5, 2017 04:10

Helsing: Aug 23, 2003; DON'T POST IN THE ELECTION THREAD UNLESS YOU JOE BIDEN

Senior military and intelligence figures in the US back then were talking about winning a nuclear exchange with the Soviet Union, including seriously contemplating what would be involved in a massive first strike. It's not surprising that the US military would have been interested in getting as much data as possible on the population level effects of radiation since this data would have been potentially useful for fighting a war.

# ? Oct 5, 2017 04:45

rudatron: May 31, 2011; by Fluffdaddy

Okay but literally chemtrailing your own people is a cruel and pointless way to do it

# ? Oct 5, 2017 05:55

got any sevens: Feb 9, 2013; by Cyrano4747

we want mutants

World War 4 will be fought with adamantium claws

# ? Oct 5, 2017 05:56

rudatron: May 31, 2011; by Fluffdaddy

Good scientific procedure involves answering limited questions one at a time in a controlled manner, throwing around radiation is really dumb science that smaller, controlled animal studies could have provided better answers to

# ? Oct 5, 2017 05:57

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

Duscat posted:

yeah but you wouldn't test one by actually dropping one on your own population because that would have been unpopular back in those days

you'd use something low-level that doesn't actually kill anyone outright, but then you have the problem of having to go around taking dirt samples and asking people "hey can we have some of your blood"

but i guess those classified papers would answer that puzzle

people didn't know that much about what radiation actually did back then, and the government just denies everything. as for getting blood tests, thats easy enough

the Tuskegee syphilis experiment monitored all its victim's by giving them free healthcare. whatever they needed, absolutely free from the study doctors...as long as no one told them about their syphilis or attempted to cure it. all so they could study how the disease progressed in black people (they already knew all about syphilis in general, they just wanted to see if it was different in non-whites)

dirt testing is even easier, just say it's environmental testing or something. no one was gonna ask questions back them, people still sorta trusted our basic institutions (for some reason)

# ? Oct 5, 2017 05:59

rudatron: May 31, 2011; by Fluffdaddy

Like forget the blatant massive human rights abuses for a moment

the other thing this says, is that the people ordering these abuses, didn't clearly know what they were doing, or why, they were just exploiting their ability to abuse power without consequences, ie they were in it for the self serving ego trip

# ? Oct 5, 2017 06:02

comedyblissoption: Mar 15, 2006

we chemtrailed some folks

# ? Oct 5, 2017 06:06

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

rudatron posted:

Like forget the blatant massive human rights abuses for a moment

the other thing this says, is that the people ordering these abuses, didn't clearly know what they were doing, or why, they were just exploiting their ability to abuse power without consequences, ie they were in it for the self serving ego trip

and also because they wanted to know things and didn't want to let ethics get in the way

there were also a lot of smaller, more controlled studies. for example, finding people who had terminal diseases and injecting them with levels if plutonium thought to be lethal (without their knowledge or consent, naturally)

except it turned out that one of their test subjects had been misdiagnosed, and his "terminal cancer" was actually just a very severe ulcer. not only did they not tell him about his plutonium injection, they didn't even tell him that he never had cancer. saying that they wanted to study his "miraculous recovery" from cancer was the pretext they used to keep monitoring him after he was released from the hospital

# ? Oct 5, 2017 06:25

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

These sort of things are even possible because society accepts the dubious notion that there are things the government has to keep secret from the public for the sake of national security, which is the big open door into stupid poo poo like Operation Condor, the CIA smuggling cocaine into the United States, or human experimentation without informed consent that involves literally poisoning the public.

# ? Oct 5, 2017 06:39

comedyblissoption: Mar 15, 2006

this thread briefly made me wonder if im the crazy person and alex jones is the sane one but wooh im back in reality land hopefully

# ? Oct 5, 2017 06:43

rudatron: May 31, 2011; by Fluffdaddy

Pener Kropoopkin posted:

These sort of things are even possible because society accepts the dubious notion that there are things the government has to keep secret from the public for the sake of national security, which is the big open door into stupid poo poo like Operation Condor, the CIA smuggling cocaine into the United States, or human experimentation without informed consent that involves literally poisoning the public.

but there are legitimate reasons for secrecy, it's just that those legitimate reasons form like 5% of all the things that are actually kept out of public view, with like 95% of it either been illegal poo poo, unethical poo poo, or gotta-save-my-own-rear end poo poo

# ? Oct 5, 2017 12:31

FactsAreUseless: Feb 16, 2011

comedyblissoption posted:

this thread briefly made me wonder if im the crazy person and alex jones is the sane one but wooh im back in reality land hopefully

What makes conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones so effective is that the U.S. has legitimately done a bunch of crazy poo poo that sounds like conspiracy theories. MK Ultra, basically every single thing we did in the South America during the Cold War, Iran-Contra, every single thing about J. Edgar Hoover and the Dulles brothers, we sent pallets of cash to Iraq that vanished (this isn't even a conspiracy, just a baffling fuckup), the CIA sold cocaine to fund arms trade, the Tuskegee experiment, etc. etc. It all sounds exactly like the made-up theories, just with different nouns. The only difference is it's proven history.

America has done some completely nuts stuff, so how hard is it to believe a few more?

# ? Oct 5, 2017 12:34

Pener Kropoopkin: Jan 30, 2013

rudatron posted:

but there are legitimate reasons for secrecy, it's just that those legitimate reasons form like 5% of all the things that are actually kept out of public view, with like 95% of it either been illegal poo poo, unethical poo poo, or gotta-save-my-own-rear end poo poo

It's actually impossible to know if anything the government does in secret has an actual utility. Because it's secret.

# ? Oct 5, 2017 12:46

Main Paineframe: Oct 27, 2010

FactsAreUseless posted:

What makes conspiracy theorists like Alex Jones so effective is that the U.S. has legitimately done a bunch of crazy poo poo that sounds like conspiracy theories. MK Ultra, basically every single thing we did in the South America during the Cold War, Iran-Contra, every single thing about J. Edgar Hoover and the Dulles brothers, we sent pallets of cash to Iraq that vanished (this isn't even a conspiracy, just a baffling fuckup), the CIA sold cocaine to fund arms trade, the Tuskegee experiment, etc. etc. It all sounds exactly like the made-up theories, just with different nouns. The only difference is it's proven history.

America has done some completely nuts stuff, so how hard is it to believe a few more?

Not just America, either. For example, the Mexican government did some straight-up false flag poo poo in the 60s, including having government forces secretly shoot at riot police and soldiers in order to induce them to massacre protesters.

Conspiracy theories are effective because the public trust in institutions has broken down, and those institutions certainly earned that breakdown.

# ? Oct 5, 2017 13:41

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# ? Apr 29, 2024 15:54

walgreenslatino: Jun 2, 2015; Lipstick Apathy

Zinc cadmium sulfide doesn't make people sick.
They literally dumped it over the entire country in 1957 and 1958, so I'm not sure why this would be a causative agent in a St. Louis woman's cancer but not everyone elses.

As for the other stuff, the article was really vague. "Investigators created a radiation field inside a building at North Hollywood High School during a weekend in the fall of 1961" Well its a weekend, so nobody was in the school, and its not like the effects of a radiation field would linger. I'm not sure how harmful the injected isotopes of iron are.

Obviously there was not informed consent in any of this and it was unethical. I hate to be the skeptic, it's not like they're not capable of it. Is there a link to her dissertation or something?

# ? Oct 5, 2017 18:22

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