The Asia-Pacific Journal | Japan Focus Volume 17 | Issue 17 | Number 4 | Article ID 5309 | Sep 01, 2019

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Bikini Atoll Is Not A Beer: Pacific Islanders Speak Out

Laray Polk

Banner outside the Manhattan ProjectBeer Company, a brewery operating in awarehouse space in Dallas, Texas. Ataproom is coming soon. (Photo: LarayPolk)

Pacific Islanders are speaking out after aTexas-based company, the Manhattan ProjectBeer Co, named one of its handcrafted beers,Bikini Atoll. Based on news coverage andresponses on social media, people around theworld are listening. An online petition(https://www.change.org/p/jeff-bezos-stop-the-sale-of-manhattan-project-bikini-atoll-beer-at-whole-foods) asks CEO Jeff Bezos and otherdistributors to stop selling Bikini Atoll. Itcurrently has 6,000 signatures. On Aug. 15, theMarshall Islands National Nuclear Commission(NNC) released an off icial statement(http://inkstickmedia.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Manhattan-Project-Beer-Companys-Release-of-_Bikini-Atoll-Beer_.-.pdf) calling onthe Manhattan Project “to engage in dialoguewith the people of Bikini to hear directly fromcommunity members about their reactions to

their product.”

NNC’s attempt at outreach and media attentionin major outlets (Time, Vice, AP, Navy Times,Honolulu Civil Beat) appears to have had noimpact on the company’s decision to shut downthe conversation. On Aug. 13, the ManhattanP r o j e c t p o s t e d a s t a t e m e n t(https://twitter.com/mpbeerco?lang=en) onsocial media to say it will not move off thename . I t a l so con ta ins a somewhatcontradictory claim. The company says thatthrough its brand and naming, it is “creatingawareness of the wider impacts andimplications of the United States’s (sic) nuclearresearch programs and the pivotal moment inworld history that is often forgotten.” Forexiled Bikinians, and others living in theMarshall Islands, it’s doubtful that “the widerimpacts and implications” of the ManhattanProject or its successor, Operation Crossroads,will ever be forgotten. Between 1946 and 1958,the U.S. military conducted 67 nuclear tests inthe Marshall Islands.

In an open letter addressed to one of thecompany’s co-founders, Marshall IslandsHealth and Human Services Secretary JackNiedenthal made the following appeal: “As anation, the people of the Marshall Islands haveone of the highest cancer rates in the world, allof our families can tell a personal cancer storythat often times can be traced directly to thenuclear testing…On their behalf, and on behalfof the people of the Marshall Islands, I highlyencourage you to discard this ill-conceivedproduct forever, and moreover, I believe youneed to issue a public apology to our people.”

Niedenthal confirmed by email that the

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company has not responded to his letter of Aug.15.

Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Thered box indicates the location of thepermanent mile-wide crater created by theCastle Bravo shot on March 1, 1954.D e n o t a t i o n o f t h e 1 5 - m e g a t o nthermonuclear device (H-bomb) had anexplosive yield equivalent to 1,000Hiroshimas. Radioact ive fa l loutcontaminated the Marshallese people andtheir islands, 23 Japanese fishermen, and28 American military personnel. (Map:NOAA)

The Manhattan Project’s continued refusal tolisten to what Pacific Islanders have to sayraises several questions. First, is the companylegitimately engaged in building awarenessthrough its nuclear-based nomenclature or isthis mostly a marketing ploy? Second, if it’s thelatter, what types of cultural conditioningmight account for its unwillingness to listenand learn from people who live with theconsequences of U.S. nuclear testing? Theanswer to the first question can be ascertainedby comparing the company’s stated intent withits marketing materials posted online.

The Power to Name

According to the company’s website, “summersat the pool” inspired the beer named BikiniAtoll. Elsewhere on the site, Bikini Atoll isinterchangeably handled as a beer; a place; anda possible tourist destination.

Screenshot from the company’s website(s.v. “Beer Menu”).

The illustration above, minus the colorswatches, appears on the beer can for thecompany’s product , Bikini Atol l .Screenshot from the company’s website(s.v. “Blog”).

One poster-size illustration on the website’sblog (not shown) features a photograph of abeer, Landsat imagery, and the words,“Welcome to the Beautiful Islands of Bikini.”The same phrase appears on a sign posted onthe actual Bikini Atoll, though the “welcome”

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comes with a warning. Below the salutation isstenciled, “50 Years of Bravo Bomb.” Bravo isthe H-bomb detonated in 1954 that created apermanent mile-wide crater in Bikini’snorthwestern reef.

Sign on Bikini Atoll, “Welcome to theBeautiful Islands of Bikini.” (Photo: RonVan Oers/UNESCO)

On the webpage “Our Story,” the companyexplains how it arrived at its peculiarnomenclature: “The group decided to formalizeunder the name Manhattan Project, given ourcreative, collaborative, experimental, andscientific approach to beer making (not tomention the plethora of cool beer names likeHalf-Life and Superfortress).”

Taken as a whole, the marketing materials tipthe balance in favor of style over substance.While the name Bikini Atoll is tantalizing,especially when paired with images of atropical paradise as seen from space, whatsorts of associations would be stirred if thecompany had named its beer “Chernobyl” or“Fukushima?” Rhetorical questions along theselines can go on forever once trapped in thelogic of nuclear-based nomenclature. Thesecond question, in regard to culturalconditioning, is far more difficult to analyze

because it requires a willingness to penetratefamiliar narratives that have historically beentold defensively.

Manufacturing the Atomic Age

Since the beginning of the U.S. nuclearprogram—an era often referred to by itsmanufactured name, the “atomic age”—generations in the U.S. have grown up in adesensitized (and desensitizing) culture as itconcerns the real and ominous threats ofnuclear war and prolonged testing. Some of theconditioning is intentional, and akin to socialengineering. Other conditioning can beattributed to the casual consumption of an“atomic aesthetic” found in low- to high-browillustration; nomenclature; automobile andfurniture design; household goods and apparel;tourist attractions, cartoons, and so on.

It is hard to say where one form of conditioningbegins and the other ends.

The ubiquitous image of an atom, for example,did not originate from design culture, but froma structural model developed by Niels Bohr, thefounder of atomic physics. Bohr helped developnuclear weapons at Los Alamos then warnedthe world post-detonation, “We are in acompletely new situation that cannot beresolved by war.”

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Bohr’s atomic structure assimilated intologos. The top image is a screenshot fromthe museum’s website. Among themuseum’s “best-known artifacts” arereplicas of Little Boy and Fat Man. Thebottom image shows the company’s use ofa beer bottle as the atom’s nucleus.(Photo: Laray Polk)

Nuclear Positivity

One place to look for engineered conditioningis in the “messianic word-pictures” of WilliamL. Laurence, a science reporter for the NewYork Times. In the spring of 1945 Gen. LeslieGroves, director of the Manhattan Project,enlisted Laurence as “a special consultant.”Groves wanted “a journalist with the credibilityof the Times to shape America’s first learningsabout the bomb.” Laurence agreed to infuse hisregularly published articles with a particularslant, as well as write press releases for theU.S. Government.1

In this dual role, he didn’t disappoint. He wasthe only reporter to have access to Los Alamos,the scientists, and the Trinity detonation. Hedescribed the mushroom cloud from the Trinityblast as “a gigantic Statue of Liberty, its armraised to the sky, symbolizing the birth of newfreedom for man.” His purple prose, whichoften included biblical references, could bedescribed as “nuclear positivity.” That is,finding the sunny side of A-bombs by focusingon the scientific genius of individuals and“present[ ing] uranium as a fr iend tomankind.” 2

Laurence’s influence can be detected in Pres.

Harry S. Truman’s speech delivered sixteenhours after the bomb dropped on Hiroshima: “Itis an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of thebasic power of the universe. The force fromwhich the sun draws its power has been loosedagainst those who brought war to the FarEast.”

Geographical Remoteness

U.S. nuclear testing conducted in remote areasof the Pacific Ocean represents another form ofconditioning, mainly because it creates physicaland psychological distance from the destructivepower of nuclear weapons. And, of greatestconsequence, it has the potential to isolatep e o p l e s u f f e r i n g f r o m r a d i a t i o npoisoning—indigenous populations and U.S.servicemen alike—from the world’s view and byextension, the world’s concern.

Remote areas with small populations weretargeted for testing by design. A few weeksa f t e r t h e U . S . d r o p p e d b o m b s o nJapan—Hiroshima, Aug. 6, and Nagasaki, Aug.9—plans were already underway for nucleartesting, this time under the purview of theNavy. As early as October, officers in theNavy’s new OP-06 Office of Special Weapons“just took out dozens of maps and startedlooking for remote sites.”3

Site selection had to meet certain criteria. TheAtomic Energy Commission (AEC) toldCongress “tests should be held overseas until itcould be established more definitely thatcontinental detonations would not endangerthe public health and safety.” Sites also had tobe a U.S.-controlled territory and in a climaticzone with “predictable winds and free fromstorms and cold temperatures.” According toVice Adm. Blandy,“It was important the localpopulation be small and co-operative so thatthey could be moved to a new location with aminimum of trouble.”4

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U.S. military planners selected Bikini Atoll onDec. 21, 1945.5

Medical Misinformation

A n o t h e r f o r m o f c o n d i t i o n i n g , o rdesensitization, can be attributed to the U.S.legacy of secrecy and medical misinformationthat developed in tandem with the nuclearweapons program. This legacy began shortlyafter the bombs were dropped on Hiroshimaand Nagasaki, as the “U.S. military movedquickly to squelch all news of radioactivity.”6

One of the first targets of censorship was anAustralian reporter, Wilfred Burchett. U.S.off icers expelled him from Japan andconfiscated all of his photographs, though hedid manage the publication of one story(https://hibakushastories.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/The-Atomic-Plague.pdf) abroad. Itwas published in the London Daily Express onSept. 5, 1945. It is an exceptionally potent storybecause Burchett walked the streets ofHiroshima, interviewed Japanese doctors, andvisited hospital wards where he saw peopledying who had no visible injuries. His storybegins with a single sentence: “I Write This asa Warning to the World.”7

Groves expressed fear about on-the-groundreporting in a telephone conversation on Aug.25. He told a physician at the Oak RidgeHospital that news airing on Radio Tokyo hadthe potential to generate sympathy for theJapanese people. The physician advised him to“get some big-wig to put a counter-statement inthe paper.”8

Less than three weeks later, a report byWilliam L. Laurence appeared on the frontpage of the Times. His main source of expertopinion is Groves, representing the U.S. Army.Near the end of the report, under the heading,“Foe’s Propaganda at Work,” Groves cast doubton the Japanese claim that “people died from

radiations.” If true, he remarked, “the numberwas very small.”9

“Where Next?”

Two months after the U.S. detonation of theCastle Bravo hydrogen bomb at Bikini Atoll, theMarsha l lese peop le sent a pet i t ion(https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/nukevault/ebb459/docs/doc%2010A%20%20Marshall%20Islands%20petition%20dec%20files%2050-54%20(1).pdf) to the UN: “We, the Marshallese people feelthat we must follow the dictates of ourconsciences to bring forth this urgent plea tothe United Nations.” The lethal effects of theBravo test, the petition explains, “have alreadytouched the inhabitants of two of the atolls inthe Marshalls, namely, Rongelap and Uterik,who are now suffering in various degrees from‘lowering of the blood count,’ burns, nauseaand the falling off of hair from the head, andwhose complete recovery no one can promisewith any certainty.”

The Marshallese weren’t only fearful of thedeadly weapons; they were concerned about“the increasing number of people who areremoved from their land.” This passageexpresses why:

Ultimately, it would take international efforts tounderstand what had gone wrong with theBravo test, and what health impacts were to beexpected. The work of Japanese scientists(https://apjjf.org/2019/17/Okuaki.html) and acollaboration between Joseph Rotblat andYasushi Nishiwaki brought to light an accurateassessment of radioactive fallout from the test,which in turn instigated an international effortto ban the hydrogen bomb and above groundtesting. Rotblat, it should be noted, was the

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only scientist to walk away from the ManhattanProject.10

Concluding Thoughts

The people of the Marshall Islands are notstrangers to the legacy of secrecy and medicalmisinformation associated with U.S. nucleartesting, and their letters to the ManhattanProject Beer Co. are merely the most recent(and least consequential) expression offrustration in a prolonged campaign to havetheir voices heard. If the Manhattan Projectwere to decide to change course in naming itsbeer after Bikini Atoll, it would be a smallgesture of goodwill with big dividends.Otherwise, the company is perpetuating afamiliar pattern consistent with nuclearcolonialism.

Between 1946 and 1958, the U.S. militaryconducted 67 nuclear tests in the MarshallIslands. The U.S. conducted 23 of thesetests at Bikini Atoll, and 44 near EnewetakAtoll. The image above shows the first 10seconds of the Baker test, detonated at a3.5 mile distance off Bikini Atoll. (NARA,Still Pictures Unit, Record Group 374-ANT,box 5, folder 23 “Detonation”)

Laray Polk is an American writer and artist. In 2013, she co-authored a book with NoamChomsky, Nuclear War and Environmental Catastrophe (Seven Stories Press). The title hasbeen translated into Spanish, French, Turkish, Italian, and Japanese(http://www.kadensha.net/books/2014/201406hukuzatsukasurusyakai.html) (Kodensha).

Notes1 Tom Zoellner, Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World (New York:Viking, 2009), 84-87.2 Ibid., 80-81. According to Zoellner, Laurence did more “than anyone in history to presenturanium as a friend to mankind” through his two jobs as “stenographer for the WarDepartment” and “top science reporter for the nation’s most influential newspaper.”3 Jonathan M. Weisgall, Operation Crossroads: The Atomic Tests at Bikini Atoll (Maryland:Naval Institute Press, 1994), 32.4 Ibid., 31.5 Ibid., 329. See “Bikini won out,” n. 45, ch. 3, 329.6 Zoellner, 90.7 Ibid., 89-90.8 Download the complete transcript of the telephone conversation between Gen. Groves and

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Lt. Col. Rea here (https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NSAEBB/NSAEBB162/76.pdf).9 William L. Laurence, “U.S. Atom Bomb Site Belies Tokyo Tales: Tests on New Mexico RangeConfirm That Blast, and Not Radiation, Took Toll,” New York Times, September 12, 1945.10 Laray Polk, “Lucky Dragon,” CounterPunch, April 5, 2007.