ee Arts/Review Warning of ‘Chernobyl’ south of border NUCLEAR CULTURE: Living and Working in the World’s Largest Atomic Complex. By Paul Loeb. New Societies Publishers, Philadelphia. Paperback. $13.95. Available at Peoples Co-op Bookstore. Nuclear Culture by Paul Loeb is a shock- ing expose of the incredible lack of fore- thought or understanding by the American government and army when they began the production of nuclear warheads and the atom bomb. It is the story of the Hanford Nuclear Reserve in Washington state. A few months ago the public television program NOVA aired a terrifying documen- tary on the effects on the people and land surrounding the Hanford Nuclear Reserve, built in the 1940s. It brought to mind Paul Loeb’s book, first published in 1982, and subsequently pulled from the shelves for no given reason. It took the author three years to regain control of the rights, and is now in paperback, published by New Societies Publishers in Philadelphia. Loeb gives us a dramatic account of the Massacre commemorated Commemoration: The world reacted with horror almost one year ago when six Jesuit priests, their housekeeper and her daughter where found brutally murdered in El Sal- vador on Nov. 16. The priests, rectors of the university in San Salvador, the capital, were the victims of right-wing death squads linked to the Central American nation’s fascist govern- ment. The massacre took place during an offensive by the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front. SalvAide, a Canadian aid organ- ization, announces that the Christian Task Force on Central America is sponsoring an ecumenical service at St. Andrew’s Wesley United Church in Vancouver on Nov. 16, 7 p.m. They ask that participants bring a flashlight and umbrella for the public walk portion of the service. Among the guest speakers will be Lis- ando Perez, a Salvadoran on tour of Canada. Call 254-4468 or 875-9218. TV: The Seattle-based public television station KCTS airs a couple of features on the environment. On the Nova series is, “Can the elephant be saved?” conceming efforts to save the threatened African elephant from ivory poaching, the result of poverty and a population explosion. On Tues- day, Nov. 20, 7 p.m.; Wednesday, Noy. 21, noon; Friday, Nov. 23, 2 a.m. Closed-captioned. Also on is “After the warming”, in which jour- nalist James Burke “reports” from the year 2050 when people have survived the current global warming trend. On Wednesday, Nov. 21, 8 p.m.; Wed- nesday, Nov. 28, 3 a.m. In stereo and closed-captioned. KCTS also presents Homeland: Soviet Armenia/Washington State. Armenian-descended American film maker Stanley Odle and his son jour- ney to Soviet Armenia to talk with citizens there. Meanwhile, Soviet producer Alexander Andreev and his daughter explore the Washington por- tion of Skagit Valley. A co-production of The Homeland Project and Central Documentary Studio of Moscow. On Wednesday, Nov. 21, 10 p.m. 10 ¢ Pacific Tribune, November 12, 1990 lives of the people who produce nuclear warheads and the slow realization by some of them as to what they were producing, although most workers remained unaware of the danger. These nuclear reserves were set up as any other wartime industry. There were monitors to warn workers aboutradiation activity, but, Loeb says, “The explanations of radiation was usually limited to vague comparisons with x-rays.” In the early days, workers ac- tually cleaned up nuclear spills with buckets of soap and water. Blueprints were often completed just before each new system was to be built, and “the supervisors relayed their specifications through oral instruction or crude drawings.” Many tools were designed and operated by the mechanics themselves. Each job, Loeb says, “whether milling the graphite blocks, loading aluminum cloddings on the uranium fuel rods, creating radiation sensing instru- ments or designing remote control equip- ment to extract plutonium from fuel, chal- lenged the ingenuity, craftsmanship and skill of the working man.” Some workers designed and built these tools in their base- ments or garages. The various groups — construction lab- ourers, engineers, scientists — worked on their own. They were all prohibited from discussing their jobs. In fact, they were al- ways under observation by the FBI and mili- tary intelligence who listened in on long distant phone calls and opened mail. Loeb says, “less than a fifth of the workers knew the end product of their work, but most guessed it was bombs or muni- tions.” “As brilliant as it is disturbing. The dangers of banality that threaten our sanity and existence have rarely been so vividly portrayed.” }—Studs Terkel After the wartime effort, and the resulting bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the old nuclear reactors were left cold and ob- solete, and the nuclear waste disposed by them lay buried and bubbling in silos close to the Columbia River. Dangerous enough, but it was only the beginning of the U.S. nuclear build-up. With the coming of the Cold War, the United States government provided funds to build the largest nuclear complex in the world — this time, with far more sophistica- tion and equipment. The results of thes¢ efforts are making alarming headlines today. “Nuke Nightmare at Hanford, WA,” cried the Seattle Post Intelligence on July 15, 1990. An editorial warned: “Imagine an ut thinkable nightmare, a nuclear plant that spews vast quantities of radioactive iodine into the air, contaminating lands and people over part of three states; thousands of times more than Three Mile Island. An amount comparable to that of the disaster at Chet nobyl. In fact, the editorial noted, “The & timates are that many civilians near this nightmare disaster absorbed far mole radioactive contamination in their thyroids than those living near Chemobyl.” This editorial lambasted the U.S. govetl- ment for intentionally withholding informa tion from the American public. “How may have died as the result of this secrecy?” the writer asked. The anger and reaction of the Americal ‘ public finally forced Energy Secretaty James D. Watkins to admit that, “The doses of radiation by the Hanford Weapons Plant in the 1940s and 1950s were high enough to cause illness in the civilian population.” “Cleanup Is Now Hanford’s Mission,” headlined The Seattle Northwest news- paper, July 12, 1990. The article estimated that cleanup will cost $57 billion dollars and will take more than 30 years. The questions Loeb asked and the worly he felt regarding the resulting dangers of this nuclear project are now, in 1990 being ex- posed. It is little wonder that his book was taken off the shelves in 1982. — Jonnie Rankin Mandela gives S.A. backgrounder NELSON MANDELA. Speeches 1990. Pathfinder Press, New York. $6.50. Paperback. 74 pages. Available at People’s Co-op Bookstore. African National Congress deputy presi- dent Nelson Mandela discusses a number of pressing tasks facing the anti-apartheid struggle throughout the seven speeches and one letter in anew booklet, Nelson Mandela: Speeches 1990, from the U.S. publisher Pathfinder Press. Perhaps the major one is getting the mes- sage through to the South African govern- ment that it must negotiate with the repre- sentative African National Congress (ANC) and its allies in the mass democratic move- ment. In his speech last Feb. 11 in front of the Cape Town city hall following his release from jail, Mandela observed: “Negotiations on the dismantling of apartheid will have to address the overwhelming demand of our people for a democratic, non-racial and unitary South Africa. There must be an end to white monopoly on political power and a fundamental restructuring of our political and economic systems to ensure that the inequalities of apartheid are addressed and our society thoroughly democratized.” In his July, 1989 letter to former president P.W. Botha, Mandela cited “two central is- sues which will have to be addressed at such a parley: the demand for majority rule in a unitary state; secondly, the concern of white South Africans over this demand, as well as the insistence of whites on structural guaran- tees that majority rule will not mean dom- ination of the white minority by blacks.” In an April 30, 1990 speech before the South African Youth Congress, the ANC deputy president stressed that negotiations were not the be-all-and-end-all and that pressures on the apartheid system would continue in other forms. “Our major weapon of struggle against apartheid oppression and the exploitation is our people organised into mass formations of the democratic movement. This is achieved by politically organising our people,” Mandela remarked at the Home- coming Rally in Soweto. In his presentation Mandela also touched on the long-standing central plank of the ANC program: that South Africa belongs to all, whether they be black, white, East Indian or Asian, and all should have a say in how it is run and in the current reconstruction process. “Many whites in this country are joining the ANC because they have come to realise that itis the policy of the ANC which ensures racial peace and harmony in this country. We would appeal to whites to reject all efforts which are being made by the right wing to polarise our population. We would like to assure our white brothers and sisters ... that they have nothing to fear from our policy,” Mandela said at the South African Youth Congress. ~ While Mandela was in prison, a deep- seated debate arose within the ANC leader- ship over the participation of white South Africans, particularly those within the South African Communist Party (SACP) in the organization. The majority position was that they had aright to be there and many of those who disagreed were either booted out or resigned, forming other groups like the Pan African Congress. However Mandela makes it clear that the ANC is not itself communist nor dominated by the SACP. In his letter to Botha, Mandela explains why the ANC rejected the South African government’s demand that the congress dis- associate itself from the SACP. “Coopera- tion between the ANC and the South A frican Communist Party goes back to the early Twenties and has always been, and still is, strictly limited to the struggle against racial oppression and for a just society .... We regard such a demand as a purely divisive government strategy. It is in fact a call on us to commit suicide.” Mandela also cites the many mass based organizations in the democratic movement. And regarding the internecine township vio- lence that has intensified recently, Mandela offers an olive branch: “ ... we extend the hand of peace to Inkatha and hope that it might one day be possible for us to share a platform with its leader, Chief Mangosuthu Gathsha Buthelezi.” This collection of Mandela’s 1990 speeches is timely and helps the internation- al community understand what’s going on in South Africa. It couldn’t have come from a better person at this stage. — Norman Faria WORKERS’ BENEVOLENT ASSOCIATION nN 595 Pritchard Avenue, Winnipeg, Man., R2W 2K4 A progressive, fraternal society in Canada operating since 1922, offers insurance protection at a minimum cost.