THE ATOM: Polite Complaint

Politely, the leading citizens of the Marshall Islands began their petition to the United Nations with a bow: "We have found the American administration [of the Pacific Trust Territory] by far the most agreeable one in our memory."* Then came the point: would the Americans please stop experimenting "with lethal weapons" in the Marshalls, or at least take a few more precautions?

Some of the inhabitants of the two little atolls of Rongelap and Utirik, caught accidentally in a rain of radioactive coral dust from the March 1 H-bomb test (TIME, March 22), were showing distressing symptoms—" lowering...

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