Documents released by the Pentagon May 23 show that Washington used nerve gas and biological agents in experiments conducted from 1964 to 1968.

Agents were sprayed on ships and crews in six different experiments, the reports reveal, to gauge how quickly the poisons would disperse and to test the effectiveness of protective gear and decontamination procedures. The tests used sarin, a nerve agent, VX, a nerve gas, and staphylococcal enterotoxin B, a biological toxin.

According to Pentagon records, the tests, known as Project Shipboard Hazard and Defense, were carried out on at least 4,300 military personnel. Michael Kilpatrick, a medical official in the office of the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, said, "When you read the overarching plans for the testing, people were to be protected. But when we get to the individual reports, we do not see things like informed consent or individual protection. We don’t have the records for what, if any, protection was given to people."

In a 1964 test named Flower Drum Phase I, conducted off the coast of Hawaii, officials had sarin and a chemical simulant sprayed onto a ship and into its ventilation system while the crew wore various levels of protection. In phase 2, VX gas was sprayed onto a barge to examine the effectiveness of the ship’s wash-down system and other decontamination measures.

One test, named "Fearless Johnny," was carried out southwest of Honolulu in 1965. The George Eastman, a Navy cargo ship, was sprayed with VX nerve gas and a simulant to "evaluate the magnitude of exterior and interior contamination levels."

Sarin gas and the VX nerve agent are highly lethal. VX gas penetrates the skin and lungs to disrupt the body’s nervous system and stop breathing. Exposure in small quantities causes death.  
 
Germs sprayed onto tugs
Another experiment, Deseret Test Center Test 69-32, took place in Hawaii in 1969. Two germs, Serratia marcescens and Escherichia coli, were sprayed onto five tugs from military aircraft. Serratia marcescens is an opportunistic pathogen that causes infections of the endocardium, blood, wounds, and urinary and respiratory tracts.

Since September 2000 the Department of Veterans Affairs has notified only 622 of the 4,300 veterans who were used as human guinea pigs and exposed to deadly, and in many cases carcinogenic, agents. Those who are still alive and are informed that they were part of the testing will still have to prove that any medical problems or disabilities are a direct result of exposure. This is the same requirement the government uses in the cases of uranium miners and with soldiers exposed to nuclear radiation.

The government has given no guarantee of how long the process will take or what kind of treatment will be provided under the notoriously poor care of the Veteran Administration. In St. Petersburg, Florida, for example, 4,429 veterans are scheduled for their first doctor’s appointment through the Veteran Administration (VA) in October 2005.

The tests are part of a long list of lethal military activities carried out by the armed services against U.S. soldiers. According to the National Association of Atomic Veterans, more than 382,000 troops and civilians were exposed to hazardous levels of ionizing radiation through more than 200 atmospheric atomic and nuclear weapons tests from 1945 to 1963. An additional 195,000 troops were part of the occupation and cleanup of Hiroshima and Nagasaki after Washington dropped atomic bombs on those cities. A VA report explains that "troops, ships, and various types of equipment were placed from several hundred yards to several miles from the center of each [nuclear] detonation. On many occasions military personnel performed maneuvers in and around ground zeros without protective clothing or respiratory devices."

Another 600,000 workers employed by the nuclear weapons industry since the 1940s are covered by the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), passed in 1990. The act was established to provide compensation to former uranium miners, soldiers, and people living downwind from test sites who were exposed to radiation. In more than a decade the Justice Department has approved just 3,907 claims, denied 3,587, and left 3,160 still pending. In 2000 the government allowed RECA to run out of funds, and started issuing IOUs to miners whose claims had been approved. Workers in Colorado and New Mexico organized protests and lawsuits to demand compensation awards and full funding for the program.
 
 
Related article:
U.S. chemical weapons tests  
 
 
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