The horrors of nuclear weapons testing

ABSTRACT

The closer you are to nuclear weapons, the more you are aware of their dangers. People today seem to have forgotten—if they ever knew—what a single nuclear weapon can do. Which, if nothing else, is something that atmospheric testing can accomplish: Remind everyone of what’s at stake. The inhabitants of the Marshall Islands, whose home was turned into a nuclear proving ground, have certainly never forgotten. Nor has the crew of a Japanese fishing vessel that strayed too close to the nuclear weapon test known as Bravo.

KEYWORDS:

• Nuclear weapons
• testing
• CTBT
• Marshall Islands
• Lucky Dragon
• Bravo test

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Additional information

Funding

This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Notes on contributors

Walter Pincus

Walter Pincus has been writing about nuclear weapons, nuclear testing, and national security for more than 60 years, first as a Washington Post reporter (where he was part of the team that won a Pulitzer prize in 2002) and more recently for the Cipher Brief website. He is the author of the 2021 book Blown to Hell: America’s Deadly Betrayal of the Marshall Islanders.