Vets in atomic tests riled by offer

Vets in atomic tests riled by offer

$24,000 payout called federal election ploy
Jason Fekete, Calgary Herald
Published: Wednesday, September 03, 2008
After decades of pressuring for compensation, Canada's "atomic veterans" -- about 900 soldiers who were deployed at atomic-bomb test sites half a century ago -- will be eligible for a special payment of $24,000.

The payment, announced Tuesday, was quickly labelled "a joke" by the association representing the remaining veterans and their widows -- some of whom have filed a class-action lawsuit against the government -- and called an "election ploy" on the eve of an expected federal campaign.

The Atomic Veterans Recognition Program will offer $24,000 "ex-gratia" payments to about 700 eligible Canadian military veterans and technology workers who participated in nuclear weapons tests for the United States and United Kingdom between 1946 and 1963.


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Font:****It will also compensate about 200 military personnel who helped in the decontamination of the Chalk River, Ont., nuclear reactor following two accidents in the 1950s.

"It's a recognition that is long deserved and long overdue," Defence Minister Peter MacKay told a luncheon of military and defence experts in Calgary.

"Until now, the participants have received no recognition for their dangerous assignments in the service of Canada," added MacKay, who said he expects as many as 1,000 payments could be made to veterans and their estates.

The Harper government announced the money on the eve of an expected election call this week, and as a class-action lawsuit by atomic veterans and their widows, against Ottawa, continues through the courts.

Balzac resident Jim Huntley, spokesman for the Canadian Atomic Veterans Association, said the compensation offer falls short of what's needed for the hundreds of veterans and their families who've already died, and others who continue to suffer through subsequent health problems such as cancer.

"It's a joke," said Huntley, a 69-year-old atomic veteran who participated in six nuclear bomb tests in the Nevada desert.

Members of the association were deployed in trenches as close as 1,000 metres to ground zero.

Huntley has said previously that, of the 40 soldiers in his unit, 18 have died of cancer, while another five suffer from it.

Eight of the soldiers' children reportedly had birth defects.

"We were sent there without knowing . . . guinea pigs -- that's what we were," Huntley said last winter.

The veterans had been seeking compensation of $150,000 per survivor.

They noted the U.S. government decided in the 1980s to pay $75,000 to veterans who developed any of more than a dozen types of ailments, mainly cancers.

"If you think that $24,000," Huntley said Tuesday, pausing, "I'm not telling my association not to accept the money, but I don't think it will stop the class-action lawsuit."

The veterans have been battling for compensation and recognition for the last five decades through both Conservative and Liberal governments. Their case was bolstered in 2007 when a Defence Department report determined that an estimated 900 Canadian military personnel were exposed to radiation during atomic tests and during a reactor mishap at Chalk River, Ont., during the 1950s.

In early 2007, then-defence minister Gordon O'Connor and Gen. Rick Hillier, chief of the defence staff at the time, met with some veterans and promised their cases would be swiftly dealt with. In August of that year, shortly before he was removed from the portfolio, O'Connor said a compensation package was almost complete.

A few months later, MacKay assured Parliament he was working on the matter and that something would soon be done for the veterans.

The federal government's offer is a slap in the face to those who've been fighting for decades for some recognition and financial compensation, argued Bob Bergen, an expert who's written extensively on atomic veterans.


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Font:****The government essentially took the soldiers out to the Nevada desert and had them "stand there" for not just one nuclear bomb, but several blasts, he said.

"To see them come up with $24,000 now is a drop in the bucket compared to what these guys should have been getting years and years ago," said Bergen, a fellow at the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies at the University of Calgary.

"These guys did this in the service of their country and they got the shaft."

jfekete@theherald.canwest.com

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The only comments I can think of is this is the same paltry amount they gave the veterans used in chemical weapons experiments at Gagetown, the same experiments that were also done at Porton Downs, England which has also compensated the british test subjects, the only nation to ignore the veterans used in these type of experiments is the United States, Operation SHAD/112, Fort Detrick Operation Whitecoat and the 7120 men of Edgewood Arsenal Maryland from 1941 thru 1975 have been ignored, the US should be ashamed of itself.

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