In the interest of science, they say!

Radio Bikini (1988, Documentary)

In the interest of science they say....

The above is a trailer of a series nuclear bomb blasts (2 of them) in Bikini Atoll in the Pacific Ocean in the summer of 1946. I saw the full version of it over the Sundance channel recently. And it left a bad after taste.

After the success of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the US and its allies decided that there was a dire need to learn more about this deadly weapon, hence was born Operation Crossroads to test the catastrophic effects of the A-bomb.

The film starts with the actual footage of transmission of propaganda radio from Bikini Atoll. it paints a very cheery picture of the army and the locals gaily enjoying the sea, sun and the outdoors. The visitors managed to convince the Bikinian leader, Kilon Bauno, to coax his people to uproot themselves from their homeland to the Marshall Islands for the purpose of the experiment. The inhabitants never ever returned home to their homeland as it was finally deemed worthless for cultivation and potentially harmless for human inhabitants later. The events of the operations were narrated through the experience of a former American serviceman, John Smitherman who was very sick during time of the documentary shooting and succumbed shortly afterwards due to cancer.
The days leading to the blast off was met with opposition by the American public and the Soviet Union. With the touch of American diplomacy and propaganda, everything proceeded as planned.

Man checked for
radioactivity hours
after an atomic blast
at Bikini

5 war ships with various animals and experiment materials were strategically around the intended site of blasts. Tonnes of film rolls were shipped in to immortalize the event. The navy crew viewed the whole event from a distance wearing only protective goggles; no protective suits or shoes!
The footage shown after the mushroom cloud was not a pleasant one.
The steel war ships were riddled with hole and the metal aboard were twisted around like coil wire. The sheep on board were roasted, some miraculously were still alive but very very sick. The technicians were seen aboard were the clucking Geiger-Mueller counters. The soldier attire and even their bodies tested positive in the counter. They were still seen swimming and washing using the sea water.
The later part of the film suggested, but did not admit, that atomic power should only be used for peace on Earth, not to destroy Earth.

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