THE NOME NUGGET
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W. A. and EMILY BOUCHER...Editors
Entered as second class matter October 14, 1943, at the postoffir**
at Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
" i
Friday, August 15, 1947
i
Hiroshima !
(Rocky Mountain News)
HIROSHIMA WAS ATOMIZED on Aug. 6. 1945. On
the second anniversary of instantaneous death to cities, |
iet’s take stock of the atom age.
Is it an irony that, of all things in this world of high
prices, the stuff that snuffed out a city and blew us all
into a new is getting cheaper? Total destruction will be
on the bargain counter soon.
This is almost the anniversary of the sale of a pinch
of white powder which some day may mean life to mil
lions. On Aug. 2, 1946, the Manhattan (atom bomb) pro
ject first sold this powder to a medical institute. It is
called Carbon 14. All living processes involve the chem
istry of compounded carbon. You‘re made of it, mostly.1
So is everything that lives.
Researchers now can “tag” (make radioactive) car
bon which tissues will absorb, and can trace its behav
ior. The men working with it believe knowledge possi
bly may be won which some day will be more important
than the discovery of fission itself—if we live to see it.1
A millicurie of Carbon 14 cost about $400 last August.
Present price, $50 Radioactive phosphorus, used in
other medical experiments, is down to $1 a millicurie. |
Radioactive sulphur is only $37. It’s used to study one of
the vitamins.
There s a lot of other stuff out of our bomb plants.)
Radioactive iron is now available. That helped find a'
good blood preservative for blood banks. Remember
those blood banks? That brings us around to war again.
Dr. J. R. Oppenheimer, one of the great scientists who
put the atom bomb together, says ordinary explosives
cost us about $10 a pound, f. o. b. the enemy. That’s
50,000 tons for one billion dollars. “It seems certain,”
he says, “that (with atom bombs) such costs might be:
several hundred times less, possibly even a thousand
times less.”
A dollar’s worth of atom bombs did $300 worth of
damage, figures Gen. “Hap” Arnold, wartime chief of
the Army Air Force, and the best TNT bombs could do
was $50.
Well, which will win—life, or death?
The little people everywhere are hardly aware of it,
despite all that has been said and written, but the atom
bomb race is on. Russia has stuck the United Nations on
dead center because she, won’t let an international au
thority have the power to inspect Soviet atom plants.
We insist on inspection anywhere before turning over
our technique to international authority. And it’s only a
question of time until the whole world knows what we
know, anyhow.
During the war, a refugee told us, “You don’t under
stand, here in America; you see, you are the only ones
who do not cringe at an airplane overhead. You don’t
see the urgency.”
He was only worried about ordinary bombs.
In Japan, all but a few thousand of sad survivors who
would cringe from their direct experience with atomic
power, have died. The others mourn. Today, in America,
the average citizen is probably more aware of its poten
tial terror than any citizen in the world, yet he probably
thinks less of it as a menace to him than, say, polio or
the Jap beetle.
No people now cringe from it, for the stunned horror
and sense of urgency after Hiroshima have been dulled
by millions of words droned out in diplomatic confer
ence rooms. Worse, millions of people behind the iron
curtain never even hear the truth of what is said there.
So the danger grows.
We can only hope that our government’s efforts to
curb this weapon will succeed. Our country has made its
share of mistakes, but we can be proud of its efforts. For
no other nation in history ever made so magnificent a
gesture as ours when it offered to limit our sovereignty
and to share this terrible power for the security and
welfare of mankind. We only asked that all other nations
do likewise.
Russia still refuses.
So the race at the dawn of the atom age is not between
our bomb and their bomb. The race is between enlight
enment and trust, or darkness and despair. The whole
world must not forget Hiroshima for, as the philosopher
Santayana said, “Those who cannot remember the past
?re condemned to repeat it.”
Let Poland Blame Herself
(The Denver Post)
POLAND HAS EXPRESSED amazement at the
United States decision to halt grain shipments to that
country, and believes the American step unjust toward
an allied country that suffered so much during the war.
Last month the government announced that grain
shipments would be stopped, because other countries
need the food more, and that Poland could expect only
to rely on private relief agencies for free food.
Polish spokesmen in Warsaw said that Polish workers
will go “undernourished” for another year because of
the American decision. In other countries, unless grain
is prbvided, many will not only be undernourished, but
they will starve.
The Poles are not starving. If they were they would
have accepted tha Marshall Plan for revitalization of
Europe and joint utilization of resources. Instead, they
rejected that plan, as did other nations in the Soviet
sphere of influence.
fTh e Poles claim need of one million tons of grain. At
the same time the Soviet Union is expecting a bumper
harvest and should be able to supply them. But the Poles
still feel that they should get aid from the United States.
They believe that they were rejected for political rea
sons—because they refused to accept the Marshall plan
and because they have consistently assumed a non-co
operative attitude .toward the United States.
It is a difficult question. Many American liberals,
Henry Wallace among them, believe that the United
States should serve as the world’s free bread basket,
without attaching any political strings. To do so the
United States would be dissipating its own resources to
fatten aggressor nations.
The Marshall plan was formulated to make best use
of American resources, for the government has found
that piecemeal relief policies of the past have been in
effective. Secretary Marshall proposed that Europe take
stock of its potential, and that the United States would
help out in filling deficiencies.
The Polish government has shown that it do^s no'
want any part of a general rehabilitation plan for Eu
rope. The Poles are not willing to contribute any of their
resources for the good of all European countries. Still
two FOR THE PRICE OF ONE
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i they believe, that they should be
given favored treatment. If the
Polish people were starving it
. would be a different story. But
: they are not, and the immediate
ravages of war have been repair- *
ed.
Since the Polish government
ha? proved that it does not want
to aid in rehabilitation of Europe,
since it has shown that it prefers
to string along in the isolationist
Soviet sphere, the United States
has taken a proper step in elimin
ating aid.
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THE RUSSIANS WOULDN'T
GET IT
We talk of those Russians being
difficult to understand. But there
are some things they would never
be able to understand about us.
They just would not get it. The
way we argued and fussed over
the labor bill Congress passed, for
example. Then when the bill be
came law, we all settled down to
see if we can abide by it. That’s
what our totalitarian neighbors
cannot understand.
This is what we call majority
rule, through the elected repre
sentatives of the people. This idea
prevails all the way up to the
President. When the labor bill was
before Congress he denounced it.
When it was passed by Congress
he vetoed it. But when it was
passed over his veto he immediate
ly announced that he would do his
best to enforce it. Thinks do not
go like this in the totalitarian
countries. Such questions would
never be placed before the people
in the first place. Regardless ot *
everything else the will of the dic
tator would prevail.
Labor Shows Spirit
Organized labor, in its attitude
toward the Taft-Hartley Bill, has
demonstrated the manner in which
the “people’s mandate' is accepted
in a land where laws are deter
mined by the will of the majority,
where all minorities are respected.
The bill was the most controversial
legislation to come up in years.
Much feeling was developed. Lob
bying was everywhere.
Yet, when the labor bill became
law, and when the P esident had
stated that he’d sincerely e.U'orca
it and not sabotage the law. the
top leaders of labor affirmed there
would be no general protest strikes.
Rightly, they declared they would
test it in the courts, where laws
should be tested. If the legislation
is in error, time will tell. In the
true American tradition of fairness
and justice, labor and management
alike are awaiting the proving and
testing of the new law.
The Way It Works
Now, I would like to say that
the whole nation’s economy is t ie
direct result of this sort of thing.
We may not like the decision of the
majority, but we go along and
make it work. We bank on the
majority being right. We are will
ing to let the majority, through
our elected representatives, write
the laws.
Most historians agree this is
the best kind of government thal
civilization has yet developed
Naturally, it cannot be as fast
moving, nor as aggressive, as th«
dictatorships and monarchies. In
our kind of set-up, people ar«
given credit for being able to think
for themselves. Facts are easy t<
get hold of. Viewpoints may bi