Page 20 - CAMPAIGN Spring 2022

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CAMPAIGN Spring 2022
60th Anniversary of Operation Dominic
Monday 25 April signified the 60th anniversary of the first nuclear detonation in the region of Christmas Island of the Operation Dominic series, this series encompassed 24 nuclear detonations of varying size, over the next 78 days.
The first one, codenamed Adobe, was dropped from a USAF B-52 aircraft and had a yield of 190kt. To commemorate this event the Minister of Dunipace Parish Church, Rev Dr Jean Gallacher, agreed to include this in her Service on Sunday 24th April. After the Service there was a short ceremony at the War Memorial in the Church grounds when a wreath was laid by Mrs Helen Lax, the wife of John Lax a Dominic Veteran.
Josh Bushen University of South Wales
Operation Dominic and the International Veteran
My interest in nuclear history began with a desire to learn more about the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the end of the Second World War. This grew after reading Command and Control by Eric Schlosser, a book that outlines the security framework that emerged around nuclear weapons. In the third year of my undergraduate degree in History at the University of South Wales (USW), a module focusing on nuclear history allowed me to explore these interests further.
I also decided to write my dissertation on the viability of the independent British nuclear programme.
During the dissertation, I became particularly interested in Operation Dominic and the lives of the soldiers
who served in both this and other nuclear test operations. As a result, I decided to take the Dominic case study further and enrolled for a Master’s by Research, still at USW. As readers will be aware, Operation Dominic was distinctive in that it was the first and only time that the UK and US collaborated on an atmospheric nuclear test series.
Owing to these circumstances, I view UK veterans of Dominic in my thesis as ‘international veterans’: former soldiers whose service is implicated in both UK and US nuclear history.
The thesis will have two major sections. The first will focus on Operation Dominic’s significance for Anglo-American nuclear history, largely through the use of official
documents at the National Archives.
The second section of the thesis will focus on the experiences of Operation Dominic veterans, using interviews with veterans to grasp the personal impacts and repercussions of participation in atmospheric nuclear test operations. The second section will also try to unpack the issues Dominic raises for debates about compensation for British nuclear veterans, with veterans of this operation being eligible for compensation through the US’ Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA)1.
The UK government has also stated that veterans of Operation Dominic would not be eligible for medallic recognition from the British government if such a scheme existed for nuclear test veterans. This isolation from the wider group of British nuclear veterans has implications for the national identity and international status of Dominic veterans. I am looking forward to speaking in more detail to members of the nuclear veteran community as my studies progress.
Joshua Bushen