The nuclear age began with the atomic bomb developed by the U.S. to “win” the war with Japan. The real reason the U.S. dropped the bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was to scare the USSR and establish the U.S. as top dog imperialist. There were over two thousand experimental atomic bomb tests by the U.S and other countries competing in the nuclear arms race. The atmospheric fallout polluted the entire world with plutonium and other radioactive chemicals.
There are 600 USEPA Superfund sites on former or current U.S. military sites and another 734 superfund sites that are non-military. A superfund site is considered so polluted that it is dangerous to human health and must be cleaned up. The military accepts the illnesses and deaths caused by the environmental pollution at their superfund sites as necessary for the national defense. The U.S. military enforces U.S. imperialism and it is not subject to any scrutiny either politically or legally. It cannot be sued due to “sovereign” immunity.
Most of these superfund sites have not been cleaned up because it is too costly (for the capitalists). The lives lost or ruined by the pollution are falsely written off as unavoidable. The truth is that these waste sites exist because the military is focused on weapons and destruction. They don’t follow any anti-pollution regulations, are exempt from lawsuits and can hide behind national security.
Many of these sites are contaminated with radioactive waste from atomic bomb testing, plutonium production and ongoing use of nuclear-powered naval vessels. The damage done is never compensated and health care costs are left up to the victims. And government agencies constantly lie about environmental pollution and health effects
These horrors are illustrated by the Hanford Plutonium factory in southeastern Washington state. It is an abandoned factory where plutonium for atomic bombs were made. The site is huge (½ the size of Rhode Island). The location was confiscated by the U.S. government in 1942, pushing out five indigenous tribes and hundreds of farmers to put 11,000 workers in place to make plutonium.
Plutonium is the most-deadly of all radioactive substances. It has a 24,000-year half-life in the environment. The workers at Hanford (and the children and spouses) have been dying and suffering from uncontrolled exposure to the radiation. The U.S. government refuses to compensate the victims and their health care has driven many into bankruptcy.
Hanford is just one site of horror. The Santa Susana, California, atomic reactor experimental facility operated for the Department of Energy by private companies has caused an epidemic of child leukemia and brain cancer in nearby residents.
Imperialism poisons workers
Hunter’s Point Naval shipyard in San Francisco has poisoned the neighbors who suffer from high rates of cancer and birth defects, and shortened life expectancy. Radiation was spread in the community when radioactive ships used in atomic bomb testing in the west Pacific were decontaminated in the 1940’s and 1950’s. Originally, poisoned workers and residents were all Black, but subsequently the community has become ethnically diverse. All this is business as usual for the U.S. military.
Recently the U.S. Congress admitted that Camp Lejeune in North Carolina had poisoned thousands of marines and their families because of pollution in their water supply. The contamination had been known for decades but the U.S. government refused to clean it up, or compensate, and provide medical care for the cancer and other diseases caused by the pollution.
Many communities have fought back against environmental pollution and environmental racism. If this has raised its ugly head in your community, fight back against the racist polluters!
There have been millions of victims of military pollution. These victims are the inevitable casualties of endless war to protect and extend the imperial goals of U.S. capitalism. The answer to these injustices is communism. The imperialist U.S. government cares no more about its citizens’ health and survival than they do about the rest of the world’s working class. We are all expendable. The sickness and death caused by the capitalists’ perpetual need for more profits and power must be eradicated by communist revolution.
