Nuclear Tsunami

Richard Krooth is visiting scholar at the University of California, Santa Cruz.Morris Edelson is writer, editor and publisher in Houston, Texas.Hiroshi Fukurai is professor of sociology and legal studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

• Table of ContentsPart I: Roots—U.S. Psychological Warfare Strategies & Propaganda Campaigns In Japan Chapter 1: Most Nuclear-Feared Populations to the Atomic EnthusiastPart II: Nuclear FalloutChapter 2: Trial by Sea, Trial by FireChapter 3: Invisible BulletsChapter 4: Ignoring Risks to Species LifeChapter 5: Mission Impossible: All About Nuclear ReactorsChapter 6: Hubris and the Meta-WorldPart III: In The MaelstromChapter 7: Fail-Safe Fails AgainChapter 8: Radiation Without EndChapter 9: Nature as Nuclear Trash BinChapter 10: Can Anyone Ever Pay?Chapter 11: Returning—on Shaken FeetChapter 12: Popular Rights versus Corporate PowerChapter 13: Who is in Charge Here?Chapter 14: Making a Nation Safe for ProfitsChapter 15: Futures Unknown

Rather than a dispassionate public policy treatment of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the three authors of this book have written an impassioned denunciation of the decision makers responsible for the event. Understandable moral outrage drives a discussion that hits every major aspect of the tragedy, from the public relations campaign that convinced many Japanese to accept nuclear electric power production reactors less than a decade after Hiroshima and Nagasaki, to the irresponsible nuclear reactor design and location decisions by Tokyo Electric Power Company, to involvement of organized crime syndicate labor subcontractors in the cleanup operations at the Fukushima site. Some of the most interesting material in the book describes the relationship between conservative media mogul and nuclear power enthusiast Matsutaro Shoriki and the CIA. The authors detail the cozy relationship between the nuclear industry and the government and the bumbling response of Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s cabinet. The government’s insistence on dealing with the disaster primarily as a public opinion problem rather than a public health problem, including official prevarication about the magnitude of the risks to health of radioactive contamination, comes in for scathing attack. Summing Up: Recommended. All readership levels.