Talk:Project Chariot

Untitled
Should be moved to "Project Chariot." 209.112.196.40 (talk) 22:30, 12 April 2008 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Carlsontemple.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 02:44, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 23 August 2021 and 3 December 2021. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): 14nissanaltimas.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 02:44, 18 January 2022 (UTC)

thank goodness...
Would it be helpful to note more explicitly that this did not in fact happen? squibix (talk)  02:19, 30 January 2013 (UTC)

Rename: Project Chariot
It has been proposed on this page for several years that the article be renamed Project Chariot, as its subject is termed in most discussions and in AEC/DOE documents. I will do so in a few days if there are no objections. Dankarl (talk) 05:40, 6 December 2013 (UTC)
 * DoneDankarl (talk) 04:19, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Purpose
The statement that "no practical use of such a harbor was ever identified." is false. A harbor there would have useful for exploiting Alaska's coal reserves. Edward Teller announced at a news conference "A study commissioned by LRL [now LLNL] had shown that the area contained 'the highest quality of proven coal deposits in Alaska,' Teller said. He claimed Alaska's 'black diamonds can pay off better than its gold ever did or will.'" ('Project Chariot: How Alaska Escaped Nuclear Excavation', Dan O'Neill, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Dec. 1989, p30)

Moreover, Chariot was to server as a demonstration project. The results of which would have allowed other projects to be planned.

21:52, 20 February 2014 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Pulu (talk • contribs)

"...a few scientists engaged in environmental studies"
...under AEC contract, and a handful of conservationists. This looks to me like a vague, if not derogatory, comment. This should be re-written in a more appropriate way, with references included; or deleted altogether. Seneika (talk) 15:04, 8 June 2014 (UTC)
 * The comment is accurate as far as it goes. I am not in a position to expand it due to not having source material at hand (for instance, names and employers of the scientists).  As I understand it AEC issued a contract to UAF, which assigned and/or recruited scientists.  Their eventual opposition cost some their jobs. Dankarl (talk) 22:49, 9 June 2014 (UTC)

Lichen
The article refers to lichen as "a tundra plant". Lichen is not a plant and it comes in numerous different species (c. 20 000) which are found in many other environments besides the tundra. In the words of Wikipedia's own article on the subject, "A lichen is a composite organism that emerges from algae or cyanobacteria (or both) living among filaments of a fungus in a mutually beneficial (symbiotic) relationship". In other words, lichens are symbiants, neither partner of which belongs to the plant kingdom.--Jarmo K. (talk) 19:21, 9 January 2015 (UTC)
 * The parenthetical was meant to clarify what a lichen is (far anyone not familiar). I kinda doubt "algal/cyanobacterial/fungal symbiot" would be helpful in that regard. I've removed the problematic text and added a wikilink to do the job. - Sum mer PhD  (talk) 20:01, 9 January 2015 (UTC)

Confusion
I am confused with the dating on the information used on the Project Chariot, somewhere during the years, 1952 was mentioned, also, the small radiative material was released to see how long the radio-active would remain. Unfortunately, some of the participants may have exposed, and some died of lukemnia. This is based on listening to someone who was involved with the project. [comment 02:24, 22 September 2016‎ 66.58.251.1 (talk)‎ moved from main article page by Dankarl (talk) 15:21, 24 September 2016 (UTC)]
 * Plowshare started in 1958 []. There was certainly earlier nuclear testing. As far as I am aware the only US 1952 test was at Enewetak Atoll and I am not aware of any earlier tests in Alaska. Dankarl (talk) 15:44, 24 September 2016 (UTC)

Eskimos to Alaska Natives
Changed use of term "Inupiat Eskimo(s)" to "Inupiat Alaska Natives" in two cases, left "Eskimo" in Firecracker Boys citation title. I did this because the term, as agreed upon through committee by I believe Alaska Federation of Natives, "Alaska Native peoples" is the legally, culturally, etc correct term, whereas "Eskimo" has quite a history of bad. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.178.89.12 (talk) 01:13, 15 November 2019 (UTC)

Davis et al reference and final paragraph of history section
This paragraph has been deleted and restored recently over differing assessments of its reliability. I have wondered about this item since it was added and tried just now to sort it out, with no success. The Davis et al book exists, It discusses Project Chariot. O'Neill does not cite it even though it predates his work. and their title seems intended to be provocative. I would like to know who Davis et al cite for the assertion, and in what setting and circumstances the repurposing was proposed. Google books does not shoe enough excerpts to verify the contention or find the source Davis et al used. I cant find a copy for sale or Amazon or listed on Google. And my access to our local University Library is still cut off by Covid. In the meantime. I add a qualifier "According to Robert Davis and co-workers,.....Dankarl (talk) 03:49, 27 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Thank for you looking into this. I checked the book out from my university library (and no longer live near a university), so I can't check their sources for the claim. I appreciate you leaving it in the article with the qualification until it can be explored more thoroughly, as I recognize it is fairly explosive. Owen (talk) 23:09, 27 November 2021 (UTC)
 * Actually, scratch this. I wrote up notes from this book! The one citation that I can find is an April 1962 Harpers' article by "Brookes and Foote". It appears to be available here by subscription . I also have numerous quotes providing considerable detail regarding the claim. Owen (talk) 23:15, 27 November 2021 (UTC)

The Davis book is not a credible source on Project Chariot
Regarding the Project Chariot article and the source, “The Genocide Machine in Canada,” by Davis, Robert; Shor, Ira; Zannis, Mark (1973):

This may be a duplicate message. Forgive me, I am totally unfamiliar with Wikipedia processes for editing and communication.

After my deletion of the Davis, et al, claims was restored, I ordered the book via inter-library loan and read the scant 8 pages and the few endnotes devoted to Chariot. I have it before me as I write. The work is neither scholarly nor journalistically professional, in my opinion. It contains errors. The authors present extravagant claims that are simply not documented; the damning rhetoric amounts to conjecture and leaps of faith.

The authors place the Chariot blast site on "the northeast coast of Alaska." Of course, it was to be on the northWEST coast. They place Point Hope on the Bering Sea coast. It is on the Chukchi Sea coast. The area is said to be "virtually ice-locked the year round." In fact, the ice was gone for about a quarter of the year in those days (longer, these days). The authors refer to Don Foote as "Donald," which was not his name. They contrast Alaska with "the Continental US," as if Alaska was not part of the US or belonged to some other continent. Small errors, perhaps, but indicative of the authors' lack of rigor with factual material.

Page 143 In the very first sentence, the authors claim to know that the entire Chariot program was "an adventure in public relations," aimed at correcting the bomb's "bad image." It is a serious allegation, and it is offered without any evidentiary support. (I think there is plenty of evidence that PR was at least one of the AEC'S objectives with Chariot, but these authors present none.)

Page 144 The claim is made that, "apart from a few businessmen, people were not very aware of what the project entailed." The faculty of the University of Alaska and Alaska’s cadre of conservationists were far more aware of Chariot than the business community.

Page 145 The authors write: "When the commission found that business wouldn't buy the project, it decided to turn the bomb into a scientific experiment of cold-blooded, detached cruelty." The claim is as inflammatory as it is unsupported. Apparently, it is conjecture.

The authors argue that the "true nature of this experiment" was to "put the people in deliberate and carefully calculated jeopardy." For evidence, the authors quote the AEC's own final report on the environmental studies, published years after Chariot was abandoned. If the AEC was so attuned to public relations (which they were), why would they clumsily incriminate themselves in their own publication? In any case, I see nothing incriminating in the passage quoted as support; it outlines the environmental studies, which appropriately included studies of man's activities, namely Foote and Saario's work (both were fierce Chariot critics, both highly concerned with the Native people's welfare).

Page 146 "The evidence shows that the AEC was trying to measure the size of bomb necessary to render a population dependent." There is no footnote at the end of that extraordinary sentence. No evidence is offered. Yet Wikipedia uncritically passes the claim along.

The plan, according to the authors, was mainly "(1) the disruption of the normal hunting and foraging patterns [of the Native people]; (2) The radioactive contamination of the local food chain rendering it dangerous..." Source? None. The authors' conjecture derives from that fact that the site selected by AEC for the detonation was near traditional food sources for the Native people, mainly caribou. Yet the people’s degree of dependence on this area for food was only determined by Foote's work AFTER the AEC had already indicated its preference for the Ogotoruk Creek site and had begun surveys there.

Page 147 "The evidence seems to indicate that the research goal was to determine the most disruptive time [to fire the shot]." This conjecture follows from the fact that the AEC preferred a spring detonation. It is true that the people depended on caribou from this area at this time (per Foote's work). But correlation does not prove causation. There are other reasons that might (and I think did) influence AEC in favoring a spring detonation: increased daylight for post-shot diagnostics, moderate temps for field work, the presence of snow and sea ice to hold fallout such that some of it might degrade before mixing further with terrestrial and marine systems.

Page 148 "...the Environmental Studies Program was designed precisely to measure the disruptive effects of a nuclear explosion on the food chain." Again, no footnote here, no supporting evidence.

Page 149 "None of the official reports of the AEC lists this radiation [via lichen to caribou to man] phenomenon as a deterrent to Project Chariot." I don't have the 1966 volume in front of me now, but I believe Pruitt's report did so. He certainly did write up and submit this very concern (it may have been edited out of the final, I can't remember), but he was fired from the University of Alaska for raising this exact concern.

Page 150 "The AEC devised the blast with cold calculation to release just the proper dose of radiation." As evidence, a paragraph is quoted wherein the AEC states that it would make sense to measure body burdens of local people both before and after any detonation. I think it is fair to argue that this would have amounted to experimentation on human beings, which would be wrong and illegal without their informed consent. But even if the authors were to design an experiment that they felt would deliver zero harm to subjects, they should include a control group base line, as well as post-event measurements, to prove or disprove their expectations. In any case, there's nothing here suggesting AEC calculated "just the proper dose of radiation" to deliver to the people.

Page 151 "While some call such programs 'ecocide,' we believe that a more appropriate term is 'environmental genocide.'" The authors may "believe" their claims, which they launch like salvos from a dreadnaught, but those claims don’t amount to much more than smoke and flash. Meanwhile, there are plenty of actual examples of the AEC's cavalier, patronizing, disrespectful, and even illegal behavior toward the Inupiat people of northwest Alaska. They are usefully documented in other works.

The Davis book's few pages on Project Chariot provide an example of advocacy journalism at its most disappointing, where rhetorical flourish and indignation, however justified, stand in for actual investigative work. The paragraph sourced to Davis obliterates the credibility of Wikipedia’s Project Chariot article. It should be deleted because its claims are dubious, unsubstantiated, and totally absent from thoroughgoing and credible published work.AlfonsoLuhan (talk) 19:14, 19 January 2022 (UTC)


 * This treatment seems rather thorough. As I do not have access to the primary source myself, deferring to those who may have missed this (@Dankarl @Owen @Pachu Kannan).  In the interim, I have marked the source as Template:Unreliable fringe source, as the source appears sufficient to satisfy the criteria as such.  Top5a (talk) 16:37, 3 February 2022 (UTC)