As it proclaimed some success in prying open secrets about Cold War radiation tests, a presidential commission complained Friday that the military and Energy Department are still blocking the release of many key documents.
That makes it difficult to determine, for example, how many radiation weapons tests occurred in Utah and how dangerous they were, said Ruth Faden, chairwoman of the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments.That came as the group issued its half-way progress report. President Clinton formed the committee six months ago for a yearlong study into whether such tests hurt unsuspecting Americans. He ordered specific review of some tests at Dugway Proving Ground in Utah.
"While we've had great success in opening up information about our past, we still have some significant roadblocks," said Faden, a Johns Hopkins University ethicist. "One significant roadblock is material that continues to be classified."
Faden complained agencies continue to fight release of many documents - including some about radiation weapons tests such as those at Dugway - "maintaining that they have to be classified for national security purposes."
She said some committee members have gained security clearances to view such material - but only to determine what is available to help fight to declassify essential documents.
"We are not interested in information that only the committee can see. This is an openness committee," she said.
On top of classification problems, Faden said many other key unclassified documents have either been destroyed or lost through the years.
As an example of the problems, the commission this week asked the Deseret News for documents it had obtained that revealed the Air Force conducted what amounted to eight intentional meltdowns of small nuclear reactors in Utah in 1959.
The committee had been unable so far to obtain such data - despite requests. The newspaper obtained them through Freedom of Information Act requests.
The newspaper also earlier provided other documents it had - but which the committee had not yet received - about several Dugway tests that exploded and scattered radioactive material.
Faden said the committee has created a data base of at least 400 radiation experiments that involved humans - but has indications that thousands more may have been conducted.
Exactly how many occurred? "Frankly, we don't know the answer yet," Faden said.
How dangerous or ethical were they? "In a lot of cases we can't yet - and in some cases may never - have the kind of detailed information that would allow us to draw such evaluations," Faden said.
But she added she hopes the next six months of work by her committee will answer many of the questions and create resources to allow others to also pursue such information.
"The doors have been opened. This is a major accomplishment," she said.
She added her group has helped identify far more experiments than were know about previously.
Dan Guttman, executive director of the committee, said, for example, when the committee was ordered, only six experiments had been identified at Dugway where radioactive munitions were exploded and scattered to the wind.
The Deseret News later found 27 more. Then the military released documents requested by the committee, Rep. Karen Shepherd, D-Utah, and Sen. Bob Bennett, R-Utah, that revealed an additional 35 - for a total, so far, of 68.
"We're not sure, but we think they ended in the 1952-53 period, although that's not completely clear," Guttman said.
Other radiation experiments affecting Utahns that are being studied by the committee include the Dugway meltdown tests; tests of nuclear-powered rockets upwind in Nevada; exploding and scattering plutonium in Nevada; and whether atmospheric tests of atomic bombs in Nevada may have been sometimes designed to also measure radiation effects on unsuspecting people downwind.
The group is also looking at medical tests that intentionally gave substances such as plutonium to unsuspecting people.
Faden said documents reviewed so far also indicate that "in the late '40s and early '50s, at the highest reaches of government - at the Department of Defense and also the Atomic Energy Commission - there were active debates about whether to do" such tests and whether to seek informed consent.
"The conventional wisdom prior to the committee's investigation was that there was very little such active discussion and government dialogue," Faden said.
"Perhaps the most important thing is that we know that there were developed (safety) policies by the Department of Defense and also by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and we have reason to believe that at least in some instances these policies were not followed," she said.
"If we can give you why that happened, then that will empower us to action in the future to reduce the likelihood that will happen again," Faden said.