7 "Packaging" Chernobyl: The Manufacture of Meaning from a Transnational Ecological Disaster On Saturday April 26.1986. an unprecedented even! happened. A severe explosion tore apart a nuclear reactor at the Chernobyl atomic power station in the Ukraine, lulling two people and releasing fissionable materials Into (he environ m c n i. lne meanings attached to this event, however, remain complex, diverse, and contradictory. None oť them exists as such—they have had io be manufactured in both the East and west As they are produced, (he broader reception of such meanings is rarely clean or complete. Consequently; one might consider this chapter as an exercise in "product semantics." unwrapping some of (be thoughluDes manufactured into the packaging of Chernobyl as an ecological disaster. Against (he backdrop of fir«order events in the reactor itself and their ongoing secondary unplications for the economies and ecologies of Western and Eastern Europe, the meaning of Chernobyl has been coniin-uaUyJrecoiistnictcd by Moscow, die news media, ihc nuclear power industry, and the OECD nations io convey many other ihijd-ordcr ideological meantflgy In (his regard, Chernobyl is an excellent example of how "spectacles^, develop and_arc managed in advanced industrial societies. The spectacle." as Dcbord affirms. "Is not a coucction of images, but a (social relation among people, mediated by Images." A? it is produced, consumed, and reprôäuced a» rsoclll relalíônT^thc spectacle presents itself simultaneously as all of society, as part of society, and is an instrument of unification'' *) <->, When die west Gentian Greens claimed thai {^Chernobyl is E*cry-whcreTlhey ironically identified how nuclear disaster, both as an image and asglobal fallout patterns, does unify everyone in new social, political, and economic relations mediated by images. Although Chernobyl is everywhere, it has acquired different meanings in different places ic* suit the expectations of many different groups- How ihc images are presented IMJ Scrtrns of Power and received—or coded and decoded by corporate managers, in tmu :al experts, of state bureaucrats facing often resistant mass publics—renders spectacles like Chernobyl intrinsically political. In order to create consent, reaffirm legitimacy. underscore managerial prouc», or contain ma» protests, Chernobyl lud lo be reprocessed and repackaged In more urn-perproof containers lesl the concrete tomb over reactor no- 4 become the entire nuclear power industry's headstone. In the USSR, tin repackaging was done in the wrapping of glasnost. In the West its reprocessing was organized to deflect criticism from each OECD nations nuclear power industry as well as lo reflect the convent k« íal negative images of Soviet totalitarianism. In Ihc advanced industrial societies of North America. Japan. Western Europe, and Australasia, such ideologies arc generated continuously "from a mass of minor hypotheses: news, culture, city planning, advertising, mechanisms of conditioning and suggestion ready to serve any order. established or lo come."' in order to contain or channel mas» resistance to managerial control. This ideology usually speaks through the mass media in new mytlis and mythologies that abolish "the complexity of human acts." And "it gives them the simplicity of essences, it does away with all dialectics, with any going back beyond what is immediately visible, it organizes a world without contradictions because it is without depth."* Yet a great deal of effort must constantly be expended by corporate capital, agencies of the state, or technocratic experts to guarantee this "blissful clarity' in such new myths and to revitalise the larger ideology of technological progress that these mythologies (cgllimate. Thus far. the news of Chernobyl lias fit well within dic^mcchanisms of conditioning and suggestion'/in both the East and the Vest. State agencies and technocratic experts have redefined It in j)i> ihiC "cnnsjfrcducing this nuclear disaster to a tragic retelling of_thc myths of haust or the sorccrerfc apprentice-. Xcu&tveaii issue on ChcrmxTyt for example, slated. "So nuclear power turns out to hca bargain with the Devil." and "the Devil always sets his own fee."* According to these official fables. tli c post Hiroshima world has made a fateful wager: in order to enjoy the Immense but dark powers of the atom, nuclear society cither has made a pact with Mephisto for Its soul or it has created an evermore-threatening servant that can easily evade human control. Even General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev felt the need to repeat these myths when he claimed thai at Chernobyl 'for the first time ever, we have confronted in reality ulf sinister power of uncontrolled nuclear energy ~*1 nerelore. "in ihisyFaustian bargainTVs Ah in Weinberg claimsfTiumans m opting for nuclear energy, must pay the price of extraordinary icchnical vigilance if they are to avoid serious trouble."• ■ -tockaging- Chernobyl 18J Such mythologies arc quite useful: they can sioiplistically summarize the intrinsic complex! t y_of thťA^rnobyl cvcnS When causation is assigned tojhe Chernobyl reactor operators' or designers'TccruiicaTDlun-ders, ihc&sástcrcan be attributed to inept magicians, whorighdy paid their price of "serious trouble" for lacking 'tccJirucaTv^íuanceľ As a result, "the nuclear magic basically remains sound. On April J". 1986. ibr example, a Svw York Times editorial reaffirmed the myihs("Thc accident may reveal more about the Soviet Union dun the hazards" of_nuclcar j>owct~ľ~T>chuid the Chernobyl setback may lie deeper faults of a weak technology and industrial base*" Furthermore, sucn'mctua mythologies suggest tlut the immediate: image of Chernobyl can be taken as meaning something in n^clf without contradiction?' by reassuringly link', ing it up with existing mythologies"about the USSR as an industrul power.. All the correct myths shared by Western publics thereby are revalidated. The nuclear bargain is not flawed—the USSR is simply too weak for Mephisto: Chernobyl is only a setback, revealing nothing about the hazards of atomic energy; the deeper fault is in (Soviet) nun. who lacks a firm industrial base and strong technology; or Soviet nuclear sorcerers lack adequate magic, so their atomic apprentice ran amok. Moreover, the sorcerers apprentice was unleashed only In the USSR. Western nuclear sorcerers are much more crafty, just as a Los Angela Tlnurs story on April 30, 1986, claimed: "Minimum safety standards ... clearly have not been met in the Soviet Union, where most nuclear reactors—^apparently including the ill-fated plant at Chernobyl—do not haw containment structures of the sort that are almost universal outside Russia*'" However. io understand Chernobyl more fully dies« myths must be challenged and criiiciicd. The real complexity of human actions and the inherent contradictions in the world must be restored. Things never mean something by themselves. Instead, their Ideological and mythologicaJ packaging» arc revealed through attempt* io rauOrulůx the experience in question. Although this discussion cannot presume to disclose "what Chernobyl malty means." it will instead discuss bow it has been "packaged" to fit Into larger political agendas. THE CHERNOBYL ACCIDENT AND ITS AFTERMATH; THE EVENTS In February 1986. Soviet Life featured an article on (he growing nuclear power station at Chernobyl, where six massive Russian Graphite Moder-alcd Channel Tube (RBMK) nuclear reactors ultimately would generate six megawatt* (MW) of electricity- The Ukrainian Republic Power Minister. Vital! Sklyarov said that of the four reactors already on line, the odds of a meltdown are one in 10,000 years," and that despite these odds. is. Servern ofPuuvr planí engineering designs guaranteed elm "die environment Is abto securely protected."' A month later, however, a local resident. LyubOv Ko-valcvska. «rote in Lttemtuma Ukmlna that word on the Chernobyl power station suffered from a "low ()uallty of design and costing documentation," "defectiNC material.'' "lack oť organization," "weakened discipline and rcsponsibdUyT and "a large number of unresolved problems.",0 The Soviet RBMK-typc reactor employs graphite as its moderator and uses boiling water as a coolant by circulating it through the core to extra« heat At the clo*c of 1985, the USSR had 27* gigawatis (GW) of operational nuclear capacity; 15 6 0* of this national capacity was generated by 28 RBMK-typc reactors, while 7 units more with 8.1 (;w of capacity were under construction and 8 more with 10.6 G*" were in the planning siagcM Chernobyl no. -t was one of fourteen operating RBMK-1000-tlass reactors. All KBMK reactors arc direct derivations of the ones at the USSR's first nuclear station at Obninsk (commissioned in 1954) and the six plutonium producing units (made operational from l'J58 to 1964) in Troitsk." For this reason, Moscow does not export its RBMK units because weapons-grade plutonium is one of their immediate byproducts." Even so. Soviet authorities considered the Chernobyl atomic power station on the Pripyal River one of their safest plants. They argued that the RBMK's graphite n»odcratk>n. which enables refueling vs iihoui shutting down and also disperses fissionable material into more than one thousand primary circuits, "increases the safety of the reactor system" and that "a serious loss of coolanl accident Is practically impossible." " Unfortunately, Lyubov Kovalcvskas on-site warnings proved mote prophetic than the official mythologies repeated by Vitall Sklyarov or Boris Scmcnov in touting the ultimate safety of the Chernobyl power station. The world s worst nuclear accident, then, was th? product of a poorly conducted reactor operations test «aged on April 25-26, 1986, during the planned decommissioning of Chernobyl's reactor no. 4 for maintenance a similar test was staged in 1984 but proved inconclusive because of inadequate electrical equipment'1 According to the official Soviet report to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, this second experiment was to have tested how long the plant's steam turbines would generate electricity after being cut off from their steam supply The test s goals were to show that ihc turbines Could produce enough power to keep the station's safely Systems operational."' Yet in conducting these experiments, the plant's technicians, as the official review of the accident found, "were not adequately prepared for the tests, and were not aware of the possible dangers" '* As a result, normal operating protocols were purposely ignored or overridden In staging the test, Chernobyl's operators committed six ma' -ňKkaging- Cbemobyl 185 \ot errors that collectively and progressively contributed to catasrrophr-Flrst, they needlesjh- switched off the reactors cmcrficncy core cooling system, which did no» cause the accident but aggravated Its consequences second, m response to a grid control instniciion, they incorrectly set í power regulator that then dropped the reactors power output drastically-. The output stabilized at í point too low for the tot. Fearing burcaucralic reprimands for botching a test that could not be repealed foe at least an enure year, the operators frantically «icd to boost the reactors output In their attempt they violated operational rules for the reactors control rod settings by pulling out all but six to eight rods from the core, even though plant norms dictated that thirty should be lb«: norm and that fifteen was the minimum lo maintain control. This third mistake boosted power but led to their fourth mistake: With the reactor's output increasing, the operators turned on two extra cooling watcf pumps as pan of the test program. This action radically altered the cqui' librium of water and steam in the circuit, destabilizing the reactor: Fifth in response to these ftucruauons in steam and water levels, they blocked the automatic shutdown system for the reactor. Now they started their cxpcrimcnl—and committed their sixth and last mistake. They turned off the last Mfccy systems, which should have engaged when the turbines were shut down '• After these actions were taken, the reactor essentially was running by «self without any outside control.'* Recognizing the crisis, the operators dropped the scram rods into the cure- The rods fell, but did not completely scat because of heat distortion- In Ihc ensuing power surge. Output rose lrom 7 percent to several hundred percent over normal levels in seconds as part of the core wem "prompt 0111031.' Two explosions bk-w off the reactor • one thousand-ton, sieel-and-concrete containment lid, and tumbled a two hundred-ton refueling crane into the core, which destroyed many cooling circuits. With its containment barriers destroyed, the reactor's fuel rod cladding broke down, generating rrydrogai in the steam thai exploded into fire Over thirty fires broke out all over the reactor complcS. and the reactors graphite core also caught fire. Within minutes, reactor no. 4's core cracked open, its coolant flow was interrupted, the reactor building roof collapsed, and an intense graphite fire spewed deadly radioactive isotopes into the atmosphere.'0 From April 26 lo May 11. 1986, the Soviet regime struggled to douse the disastrous radioactive fire* and protect the remaining three reactors at die Chernobyl complex. Within hours, the population of Pripyat and the immediately surrounding countryside within 2.5 kilometers (20,000 and 26.000 persons, respectively) was mobilized for evacuation. The authorities began evacuating a ten-kilometer zone around the plant on Sun- 1K6 Stnvns o/lltutr day. April 27. On May 3. a much broader zone within 30 kilometers of die reactor was evacuated, inc luding over 30.00Q people from Chernobyl itself." By May 6. more Üian 95.000 persons (and over 17.000 cattle) had been relocated." A fleet of military hclicojncrs and teams of scientists—both under the guidance of Yevgeny \elikov; vice-president of the Soviet Academy of Sciences—look charge of containing the dangerous graphite fire in reactor no. 4. From April 29 to May 13, 1986, over live thousand tons i>f boron, lead. sand, clay, and dolomite were dropped by helicopter to quench the tire." To contain the damaged reactor permanently, cleanup teams tunneled underneath reactor no. 4 (o lay a concrete foundation for an immense new enclosure structure, or "tomb." ■Web was built around the entire reactor complex This building will serve as a high-level radioactive waste dump for many centuries to come. The ultimate costs of the Chernobyl accident are hard to quantify accurately Beyond the 31 "prompt deaths* (2 immediately and 29 more slowly, through March 1987) and the hospitaliza t km of nearly 300 people with radiation sickness, "estimates" and "projections"" come into play. In direct cash terms, Chernobyl is believed to have cost the USSR over »3 billion.1* By 1988, the cost of the cleanup had risen to »13 billion. Agricultural production has been disrupted and prime farm land contaminated across the western USSR. Vegetables in Kiev were tested after the accident and found to haw thirteen times the level of radiation at which they should have been destroyed. In Byelorussia, check» in Go-mclskaya showed that 40 percent of the meat. 30 percent of the milk. 15 percent of green vegetables, and 90 percent of all ttsh exceeded radiation standards. International conversion formulas suggest that 30,000 to 50,000 additional people in European Russia and 3.000 people in Western Europe will die of cancers due to Chernobyl radiation." Similarly, 2.000 to 15,000 mutations and genetic diseases arc forecast to develop per million lne births over the next generation.™ And around the world in the aftermath of Chernobyl, the whole nuclear power industry was called into question, if ordy tor a few months. Yugoslavia dropped its plans to build a second nuclear power station at Prcvlaka; Mexico delayed operations even longer at its troubled laguna \erdc plant; and the Philippines mothballcd a nearly completed reactor in Bataan.*" Global output from pressurized water (PWR) and boiling water (BwR) reactors dropped 15 percent in 1986 as nuclear utility managers sought to play it safe after the accident Undoubtedly, current and future reactor costs will rise from new regulatory oversights prompted by Chernobyl. At this juncture, however, one must move from the actual events at Chernobyl and their immediate aftermath into the ideological rcpackag- -Rickagtng- Chernobyl 187 ing of Chernobyl in the USSR and abroad This detailed technical account of the accident itself only came to light four months later in a voluminous official report made by Moscow to the International Atomic Energy Agency-1- By that time, most media attention had shifted elsewhere The official story only could wrap another layer of meaning around the many other ideological packages already set out for display in the global mediascape ■PACXAGDvG" CHrJtNOßYL IN THE EAST AND WEST .Nuclear accidents have happened before, but always in bureaucratically enforced sccrccy'w In October 1957, Great Britain's graphite-moderated WindsciJc no. 1 pile caught fire, spreading radiation but causing no et-plosion or immediate deaths During the winter of 1957-58, a radioactive waste dump apparently overheated and exploded like a volcano outside the pi u ionium-prod u c ing Soviet city of Kyshtym in the Ural Mountains A vast area w'as devastated, and many people «ere killed and injured In January I96I. three technicians were killed in the Sl-1 mili-i.iry reactor in Idaho after incorrectly manipulating its control rods. During October 1966, the experimental Fermi no. I breeder reactor in Detroit partially melted down, forcing it to be decommissioned. And in March 1979, Three Mile Island (TMI l unit 2 lost its coolant due to equip-ment malfunction and operaior errors and experienced a partial meltdown with some radioactivity release Chernobyl no. 4. however, was the first reactor in a disaster 10 breach it» containment structures and actually spew large amounts of radioac-tivity into the environment (üp to 3 percent of its ßssionable matcrialsj A» ibc reactor fire spread dangerous isotope* downwind, sensors in Sweden triggered the alert. Once detected, the global media all turned on Chernobyl in order 10 produce ideologically appropriate images and mythically correct infonnaiion (or popular rcceplion worldwide. The TMI crisis of I9~9 now guarantees that whaf could have been concealed in the 1950s and 19609 would now be put on niyixiically limited display in both the USSR and the world. The substantive meaning* and spectacular forms of Chernobyl, therefore, were generated by Geiger counters, meteorological models- fallout dispersion tables, radioactivity sensors, expert opinions, half-life charts, television camcrar, news organization special reports, ham radio intercepts, and LÁMAVÍ; SPOT, or KH-11 satellite photos. From thi* mosaic, the USSR, (he media, the international nuclear power industry, and the leadership of the OECD nations tabri-caled their ideological packagings of Chernobyl. 188 Semnu ofPuutT In Ure East In ihc USSR, on one level Chernobyl enabled Moscow 10 rcllemie ihe common Faustian myths of icchnical progress of ■Humanity Tragically Trapped by lis Own Runaway Technology:"' General Sccreury Gorbachev's May 14, 1986. address clearly was guided by such myths in «t-plaining to the world and the USSR one meaning of Chernobyl. On another level, however, Chernobyl served Gorbachev by expressing his break with lire cultural and political stagnation of ihc Brezhnev era. U is unclear whether Gorbachev chose lhi\ glasnost for himself or whether Ihe crisis forced glasnost upon him. Süll, Chernobyl was eventually packaged in Moscow: first, as a subüc sign of cleaning out the Brezhnev era bureaucracy; and second, as an indicator of Gorbachev1* commitment to frankness, openness, and effective publicity Neither one of diese packaging strategics has been easy to follow, The traditional prc|udicc favoring secrecy and the pracúce of misinforming higher organs still prevails throughout the Soviet state in the wake of Chernobyl. Deputy Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers. B. Y Shchcrbina. reported on national Soviet television Uiat the information received in Moscow "was not the same that we obtained when we were in the area" and that "local experts had not made a correct assessment of the accident."» .Vorwshs V M. Falin told Der Spiegel interviewers that "the first reports from the Chernobyl nuclear power plant were incomplete and ultimately turned out to be incorrect" and that "the first objective, detailed information came in before the Monday meeting of the Politburo" two days later*1 At that meeting Gorbachev apparently ran into considerable resistance from members of the Rilitburo. Roy Med-vedcv maintains, "Gorbachev tried to assert a policy of lucidity and correct informaUon within die fWitburo___He was backed only by (V1.] \brocnikOY, chairman of the Russian Republic Council of Ministers, and |KGB head. Y M.] Chebrikov. whereas die rest apparently wanted a containment of information."" Gorbachev prevailed only when the scale of the accident and Western inquiries about it made a cover-up essentially impossible. Although Gorbachev did not dirccdy criticize Chernobyl's management by local officials in his May 1-t address, Atrtdcr reported on June 15 that the pany organization at the Chernobyl site was "sharply condemned* by the local territorial apparatus." The plant director and chief engineer woe discharged for irresponsibility, inefficiency, poor discipline, and inadequate leadership, while the shift supervisors and plant foremen were described as being on the run. This administrative purge conünued up ihc Itnc in the Ukrainian party apparatus throughout 1986, Tliercforc, Moscow shifted ihc blame fur the accident, die delay in cvac- 'tockagtng-Chernobyl 189 nation*, inefficient relief reports, and tardiness in reporting the accident for three days onto die Biezhncvitc old regime in the local and regional pany apparatus. Ini» concern with cleaning house and punishing lax workers was affirmed the following spring, and ihe policy of glasnost his conünued since the accident In March 1987. the chairman of the State Cornmitlec for Atomic Energy of ihe USSR told a visiting Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) dclcgaüon lhat the persons responsible for Chernobyl would be put on trial soon in Kiev14 Members of the delegation also visited the Chernobyl power station and were shown its operating units and the two under construction or development. But glasnost was not total: the team learned some minor details, byt basically the NRC delegation was told "nothing really new- since Vienna.-" Nevertheless, ** the Economist noted, Chernobyl gave Gorbachev a unique opportunity Already one year in office by April 1986. be had not changed Soviet society very dramatically: "Yet if he wants a new stick with which to bully his more cautious colleagues into reforming faster. Chernobyl has given it to him. Using it will be risky Not using it means courting greater failures in the future. That is ihc Chernobyl choice, and Mr Gorbachevs chance."** In seeking lo package Chernobyl at home and abroad in die new look of glasnost. Gorbachev has been somewhat more successful- During his May 1•) speech he stressed the "accuracy" of Soviet accident reports versus the ■veritable pack of lies" in the Western press and official commentary while he portrayed his regimes open press policies on the Chernobyl disaster as relatively more frank and truthful, Gorbachev noted how it was overshadowed1 by fatóc Western reports of "thousands of casualücs. mass graves of the dead, desolate Kiev that the entire land of Ihe Ukraine lias been poisoned."-'' At the same time, he linked Chernobyl to the dancer of nuclear arms, calling for a summit with President Reagan to negotiate a icst moratorium and announcing a continuation of suspended Sonet nuclear testing." By lashing back at overdrawxi Wsitem criticism, Gorbachev sought to cast the USSR in the most favorable light as an honest, open, great power wrestling with the unknown mysteries and sinister forces of nuclear energy He recounted why the accident happened, admitting to 13 deaths and 299 hospitalized casualties. He also emphasized thai Soviet scientists had contained the threat and wvre capable of meeting the formidable technical challenges ahead To prove he was serious about glasnost. Gorbachev apparently approved greater access to Chernobyl for the Soviet press, permitting unprecedented on-site interviews, dramatic close-up TV footage of reactor no. i, and critical reporting on the local authorities' response to the crisis, in the process, glasnost has perhaps hidden as much as it has revealed. 190 Screens of Power Like Khnwhdicy Gorbachev might be moving: much i«o fast, alienating and threatening die Moscow bureaucracy, which can effectively throttle the practice of gIasnost-w The haste premise of nuclearization is not being challenged, nor have reporters questioned the Politburo »bout the USSKs previous atomic accidents, like the disaster at Kyshtym. The whole truth about radiation and its effects has not been told. Instead, glasnost has developed as an amalgam of self-criticism and sclf-praisf made from the traditional idioms of collective strength and Soviet nationalism. Glasnost was used here to expose the corruption of the few for the progress of the many, but reaffirm the heroic, self-sacrincing spirit of individual Soviel citizens when faced with ''""gfT In packaging Chernobyl, the USSR stressed its ■proRrcssivcncss'* as a ration, fearlessly facing Dew technological frontiers with a new international opwmcss. Even though U failed miserably to warn or assist its Eastern European allies and Western European neighbors in coping wuli Chemobyls nuclear and economic fallout, the USSR has gotten away with lis negligence—perhaps because these inconsiderate behaviors were almost "expected" from Moscow Gorbachev» packaging, to a degree, has pinned this aspect of Chernobyl on "the old regime,'' while he hoids out. (he much mote promising image of himself and Raisa spurring tlie Soviet Union toward a more open, image-driven future of prosperity, reform, and peace. Overall, it seems to be working. The Western press has been quite favorable toward Gorbachev'* program. At times, the Western media luve even suggested that the general secretary with his stylish new pizazz surpasses Americas "Great Communicator" In the USSR, as Gorbachev's apparent successes at restructuring the party and state structures illustrate, glasnost also seems to be overcoming some of the intelligentsia's disaffection with the regime, giving them a reason to Contribute to Gorbachevs badly needed new plans for playing technological catch-up with the West. Despite the negative aftershocks from the Crisis, Chernobyl clearly has produced some positive fallout for the international Image-makers in Moscow. In lbe West In the OECD nations, Chernobyl also acquired mythic dimensions As Newswctk asserted. 1 he disaster has exposed glaring weaknesses in the Soviet system: its backward technology, its sloppy safety standards, its inability to adnilt failure."*0 Thus, the accident was used, fira, to assign fresh sources of meaning to die commonly circulated images of the USSR as a barbaric slave suit with little regard for human life and. second, as new evidence of the Soviet Union's continuing backwardness as an industrial power. -liukaglng- Chernobyl 191 Moscow did Hide to forestall these interpretations. The hrst admission of an accident was not made until two day» after the reactor explosion, and then the Radio Moscow report from TASS only stated: -Measures are being taken to eliminate consequences of the accident. Aid is being given to those affected. A government commission has been set up."'" On April 29. ÜK "Vreraya" evening news program reported two deaths, a portion of the reactor building destroyed, and the evacuation of Prtpyat The following day TASS denied Western reports of massive casualties, and not until May 4 (when aim clips shot from a helicopter Indicated the limited extent of severe damages at Chernobyl) did Moscow broadcast convincing miagcs on "Vrcrnya" u On May 6, Pmvda published con'prchensivc coverage of the accident and its aftermath; however, the Soviet government also stated in a news conference. "In our opinion, there was no direct threat to the population cither of our own areas which arc tar enough away ... or foreign countries* despite an increase in background radiation levels.4' The next day TASS reported "a negligible portion of small radioactive particles was also disiriputcd together with airflows over large disrances and fell on the territory of Poland, Romania, and of a number of Scandinavian countries. Here J slight increase in background radioactivity was observed, likewise not a danger to the populatiofL"44 In tact, Byalistock and Wegorzcw in Poland recorded radiauoi» levels 1,500 to 1,700 time» greater than normal background levels. Special iodine solutions were distributed to the nomenklatura of the PĽW V (Polish United Workers Party) on April 28~29, 1986.« 10 counteract uV radioactive iodine 131 in the Chernobyl fallout. In Stockholm on April 28— 29, the level of iodine 131 was measured at 10 bccquerels per cubic meter of air. while on the Swedish coast they were monitored at 190 bccquerels per cubic meter.40 On Gotland Island, 40,000 bccquerels per square meter of grass were monitored, and level* of 8,000 per square meter were found in Great Britain. Throughout Europe, large stocks of vegetables, fruit, and milk were dot roved for weeks to prevent more radiation from entering human food supplies.*7 Still, a Soviet overview of the crisis was not given until Gorbachevs address on May 14 during the "Vrcrnya" broadcast. By that lime, the United States and the OECD nations had already assigned the usual meanings to the USSR, using Chernobyl as additional proof. Following a UPI report, for example, the American media claimed a death toll figure of # least two thousand SunUarty, Secretary of State George Shultz said that be bet ten dollars that the deaths were far in execs» of tlit- two initially reported by Moscow. Kenneth AdclmaH. head of the US. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, also decried Soviet 192 Semeni ofťouvr causualty reports, calling litem "frankly preposterous."*■ In the seesaw of superpower arms negotiations, the accident was also portrayed as meaning that Washington could not trust Moscow to verify nuclear trcaiics because of the Soviets' inadequate disclosures about Chernobyl- A May 1 Sew for* Times editorial argued: "Ciorbachcv cannot win conl»dcncc in his pledges to reduce nuclear weapons ü* he forfeits his neighbor's trust over the peaceful uses of nuclear energy"'* President Reagan also used Chernobyl to cast doubt on Soviet credibility at the Tokyo economic summit, while Time reported one American offical to have said: "Imagine what they do to national security items if they handle themselves like this with just a civilian power plant.'"*0 In a similar vein, the london Sundav Times asked editorially. "Who would trust the Soviet Union to allow proper vcrificauon of its nuclear missile sites when il does not even tdl it* own citizens of a fatal accident in one of its own nuclear power stations?-- The image of the USSR as a totalitarian monolith with little regard for Individual human life gained Iresh momentum in the Chernobyl afterglow. Although Soviet government, military, and party leaders displayed great concern for the focal citizens of Pripyat and Chernobyl and despite the way individual firemen, technicians, and liclicoptcr pilots displavcd incredible bravery and selflessness in containing the reactor fire, the bureaucratic confusion between Kiev and Moscow practically vcriocd the cynical Western packaging of Chernobyl. The Soviet Union surely deserves no praise for its handling of Chernobyl. As Hoffman concludes. "Any government, socialist or capitalist, that withholds from its citizens information about the dangers of nuclear energy or fails to help citizens protect themselves before and after a nuclear accident at home or abroad diminishes its legitimacy and cflcc-uvenessľ" Nevertheless, as Bernstein recounts, when it comes to US. nuclear Information policies—from the Manhattan Project to TMI— Americans must recognize that "(heir own government, at various levels, has sometimes suppressed infotmatkm and deceived its own citizens about the safety and purposes of the US nuclear program." M Chernobyl also was employed as a fresh citation to the Soviet Union's deepening technological backwardness By Ibcsday. April 29, Soviel government officials were asking Sweden and West Germany for advice on fighting graphite fires." Two Mest German robots were dispatched to explore the reactor, and with Armand Hammers aid, an American doctor named Robert Gale, a UCLA bone marrow transplant specialist, was dispatched to Moscow to help Chernobyl's victims" Moreover. White House press spokesman Larry Speakcs announced that poor Soviet design and engineering were at fault in the crisis. To forestall comparisons with US- reactors, he assured the world that "ours are quite different from die TUuhigwg-CbrmoftyJ 19J vi%ict system and have a number of redundant safety systems built in.*" Even "hough such claims were somewhat false, numerous Western experts came forward to assure the public that the Soviet reactor was antiquated, poorly designed, and lacked a cootamme« structure, m Donald Regan's assessment. Soviet Industrial backwardness was to blame, and not atomic energy itself: "Nuclear power is a good thing for the f*^1!- of many nations, including our own—we shouldn't throw out the baby with the bath water and condemn all nuclear power plants because of this"** To reinforce this picture of Soviet industrial inefficiency and incompetence, the Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) of the OECD met twebe days after Chernobyl to assess its meaning for the West. They concluded that the NEA should study how to improve cooperation in future nuclear accidents, but thai the designs of Western reactor types were quite superior to Soviet designs (Soviet reactors could not even be licensed in the West). Therefore, no reconsideration of OECD nuclear energy programs was necessary. Since 50 percent of Western Europe*, 16 percent of the United States', and 20 percent of Japans electricity is nuclear-generated, the Tokyo economic summit affirmed the OECD's Joint support of "properly managed" Western nuclear power.'" Time boldly concluded that the key difference between East and West on nuclear energy was political: "The US. industry operates in an open society; subject to laws that give the public considerable say over where nuclear plants arc located and some Input as to when and even if they will go into operation. The same cannot be said of the Soviet Union, where the government makes all such decisions without consulting the public."*" This, of course, will be news to many American nuclear activists fighfir*g the Diablo Canyon, Seabrook. or Palo verde units. The American media, in particular, actively participated in packaging Chernobyl In terms of Soviet callousness and backwardness. In its typical style, the New >brfe Past ran headlines (lifted from a New Jersey Ukrainian-language weekly) that bellowed "mass (Wave—15,000 reported buried in Nuke Disposal Site."** More reputable news operations did not do much better. For days—on the basis of an unconfirmed report from Kiev—UPI. AR N&C. ABC CBS, The Sew York Times, and The Mushing-ton Post used the figure of 2,000 deaths, with varying degrees of qualification, in reporting on Chernobyl. When put in context with official Soviet reports of 2 to 31 deaths, these reports implicitly "exposed" the USSR as the lying, untrustworthy dictatorship it had always been. For most of the week following the accident, news reports consistently overestimated casualitics. claimed two or even more reactors might be on fire, and suggested the rescue and cleanup were going very slowly. Reports of Western aid—like the West German robots, Swedish technical 194 Screens ofľou ir consultants, and ihc American buitc marrow transplant team—were also highlighted lo stress ihe Soviet Union's technical inabilities in coping with the disaster. Yci, beyond buying SPOT or LANDSaT photos for visual confirmation oí their dire dispatches, mo« news organizations relied on Western spokesmen and official handouts for most or their copy rather than any on-the-spot reporting. This tendency undoubtedly was accentuated by the unusual press access lo official spokesmen afforded by President Reagan* Far East tour leading into the Tokyo summit Overall, as Dorman and llirsch observe, "the initial Soviet statements turned out to be largely coficct on a number of significant concerns—for example, the number of casualties, the number of reactor* on fire, and whether or not the fire had been con-uined—while those of die Reagan Administration, which were taken by journalist* at face value, proved not to be.-*0 The American press also was remarkably slow about correcting its earlier sensational and inaccurate packaging of Chernobyl. By May 19, 1986. The New York limes and The mill Street Journal ran stories reporting that the USSR had built substantial containment structures In lis reactors and that American complacency about lis own reactor designs was unwarranted, > passive silence aboui the real disorder undcrgirding nuclcarizcd societies. Still, such ideological campaigns arc not easy, nor are they guaranteed co pros« successful Images of reassurance must be presented directly enough for mass publics to coproduce their own afliniiations of nuclear energy after considering the various trade-dels and the allure of Its high technology Images are manufactured, but the terms of their consumption or the nature of their reception arc often Incomplete. Chernobyl is so shocking because it is the unlikely statistical improbability suddenly become an Immediately real, transnational, ecological disaster, u starkly contradicts images of technical precision and positive cost-benefit com-parisioris with coal, oil, or gas consumption that the nuclear power industry usually packages into its image advertising the catastrophic meltdown that had been predicted to happen only once in ten thousand years look place less than ten years after tlie first unit at the Chernobyl power station came on line. (In fact, the entire RBMK system probably had only 250 reactor years of operation.) In certain respects, the ideological rc-proccsstngs of Chernobyl by the USSR, the Western media, the leadership of the OECD nations, and the Western nuclear power industry were interconnected. Each of them, working in its own fashion, sought to reaffirm the legitimacy of high technology and the authority of technological competence from an episode of high-tech disaster and clear technological incompetence. Chernobyl flashed "uammission interruption." "technical difficulties," or "broadcast interference" across the screens of power. It had lo be repackaged as a warning to everyone "not to adjust their sets." Those with access, competence, and control of the codes were stalling those without access, competence, or code command, reassuring them "to remain calm and await further instructions" rather than increase their resistance. Despite their best efforts, the nature of the reception of these images is open to question, given the growing resistance to nuclear power and nuclear weaponry For the ecological opposition. Chernobyl sc t veil well as the fulfillment of its dire prophecies of nuclear disaster in deadly fact--* As the explosion spread dangerous isotopes across the entire Northern Hemisphere. Chernobyl seemed to revitalise the anti-nuclear movement throughout North America. Western Europe, and Japan, but especially in West Germany.^0 By mid-May 1986. West German protesters were clashing violently with police at the Wackersdorf site of Bonn's new nuclear-waste reprocessing plant."7 Their concern* are very real: in addition to -/bckaglng" Chernobyl 199 being sandwiched between the heavily nuclcarizcd Soviet Union and Prance. West Germany operates twenty reactors within its territory, and another eighteen are within one hundred kilometers of Its borders.*" When a Chernobyl-style thirty-kilometer evacuation zone is placet] over West Gcrmanys five major northern and southern nuclear plants, the ma-jur cities of Bremerhaven, Hamburg. Mainz, Darmstadt, Worms, Ludwigs halen. Mannheim. Karlsruhe, Stuttgart, Heidelberg. Heilbronn. Würzburg, and Schweinrun fall directly into a high-risk zone." It is not at all surprising, then, that «est German Greens first recognized that Chernobyl is everywhere, nor that z Der Spiegel poll showed that only 29 percent of West German* supported building new nuclear plants verms 69 percent against in mid-May 1986.*° Similarly one year after Chernobyl. the W'orldwaich Institute claimed the accident was the final blow needed to "collapse in country after country" the existing "pro-nuclear consensus." •' hor the advocates of nuclear power, Chernobyl is simply another (albeit quite serious) variety of industrial accident, which actually took less lives in one event than most coal mining accidents, hydroelectric dam failures, or ordinary pollution from fossil fuels. Many shrugged it off, pointing out that the Bhopal chemical plant disaster, for example, was "much worse" in terms of human deaths. This"naturalization" of nuclear disaster seems to be one of Chernobyl's worst legacies. After tht accident, many tough-minded exponents of nuclear power flatly announced that "within 30 yean an accident like Chernobyl or Three Mile Island might be happening every year, "We will get used to them, and newspapers will report them on page 37."w A poll of American nuclear scientists in April 1987 revealed that 77 percent saw a Chemobyl-scalc nuclear accident as improbable, 82 percent saw US. reactors as safer after Chernobyl, and 66 percent saw US. reactors as quite safe overall.»' Apparently, the image advertising of Chernobyl, like most expensive advertising campaigns, simply reinforced already existing attitudes, providing new reasons for individuals to continue to hold onto their anti-nuclear or pro-nuclear stance. These reactions among many nuclear scientists-, however, even among those opposed to nuclear power, still run down mythological track». Nuclear power here is reduced to a "complex technological system" that is -inherently fallible" l>ccausc of the complexity, scale, ccnorallzation. hierarchy, or Inaccessibility of the control systems needed to manage them."" In mythic form, once again, as Mephisto or the sorcerer's apprentice. "Technology" looms over "Man and Society" as a sinister threat. In tact, these control systems' attributes arc not facts of nature, nor should their failure be regarded as natural; instead, they are the result of 200 Scnv'iS of Power the purposive creations oí peculiar bureaucratic structures In Ihc state sector or corporate sector of ihc superpowers. Abstract naturalized forces, like fallibility, complexity, hierarchy, centralization, inaccessibility, and scale arc. in fact, very political and totally artificial traits. They express die specific social relations of production embodied in the USSR by the State Committee for Utilization of Atomic tower, the Ministry of Medium Machine Budding, the Ministry of tower and Electrification, and the Ministry of tower Machine Building, and in lbe US. by the Department of Defense, tbc Department of Energy, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and vartou» private nuclear utilities. Nuclear power and its flaws arc not naturally necessary: They have simply become political necessities as nuclear power has become a vital means of production for states with these bureaucratic relitions of nuclear production. This military/political connection to the superpower state is essential. It is what the packaging of peaceful nuclear power continually obscures. Although no one has sob cd the intrinsic dangers of the nuclear fuel cycle or the problems posed by nuclear waste, safe reactors are feasible. The West German modular high-temperature gas reactor (MHTGR) and the Swedish-designed process-inherent, ultimately safe reactor (PIUS) seem to overcome the instabilities of current PW'R, BW'R, or RBMK designs"* But their technolog)- originated in civilian design bureaus in the smaller, non-nuclear nations of Vest Germany and Sweden. Most existing reactors are based upon much older US. or Soviet military designs. Nuclear power reactors using the PV'R systems favored in the Viest are derived from naval technologies firs* do-eloped to power nuclear submarines. Likewise, nuclear reactors employing the Soviet RBMK technology are based upon plutonium production units for atomic bomb manufacture. Nuclear power advocates mystify and obscure the real sources of fallibility behind complex technologies by blaming it on the technology itself. To a very significant extent, nuclear power generation was initiated in the 1950s as a partial atonement by nuclear weaponry designers for first using the atom for war To compensate for Hiroshima, they sought to legitimate their work by turning nuclear energy to peaceful purposes such as generating electricity for peacetime consumption. The technolog»*, In turn, is simply a material product of the overly complex and inherently fallible military .scientific bureaucracies that initially produced and managed it. If the handmill creates societies with feudal lords and the steam mill leads to societies with industrial capitalists, then it would appear that the nuclear power stations at Chernobyl and TMI follow from societies with the Ministries fur Medium Machine Building. Power Ma- 'lUckaging- Chernobyl 201 chine Building, and Defense, a» well as the Departments of Defense and Energy. Given these power-producing technologies' original roots in weapons production and their less than meticulous management by Urge complex bureaucracies, the nuclear accidents at Chernobyl and TM1 arc not hard to understand. Nuclear energy, at the bottom line, is essential for these bureaucracies because it makes possible the nuclear powers of the su-perpowcr state. The tendency among nuclear power supporters, in turn, to naturalize tremendous nuclear disaster ordy reflects, in a distorted form, the disaster of superpower states naturalizing nuclear supports for their tremendous power. In the end, the mythologisis of nuclear energy in both the East and the West hair had to repackage Chernobyl rrrythi-caily in such Ideological terms as humankind's saga of "no price is too high" to have nuclear power. Vet the deeper realities of Chernobyl belie all of its packaging and call the ultimate myths of nuclear energy into open question—the safe, clean source of energy too cheap lo meter is finally shown to be a dangerous, diny kind of power with costs too immense to measure. NOTES I.Guy Delx)ra.5oc^r/o/l6r5^iM/retrolt Red & Black. 1983), no. £ 2. Raoul VcneJgan. Tbt Revolution of Everyday Life (Londoa: Left Bank Books^ebel Press). 12- J Roland Barthes, "Myth Today," in TheBarthes Reader, cd Susan Soma» (New York. Hill and Wang. 1?82) 132. 4. L Maru et íl. TbercS a Price to be Paid for Atomic Energy, and It Could be a High One,-Aeuiuw* May 12.1986.40-41.44.49. 5.J. GrecmvaJd. J O Jackson, and N. Traver, "Gorbachev Goes on the Offensive." Time. May 26. 1986. 32-33- 6. Alvin Weinberg. "A Nuclear Power Advocate Reflects on Chernobyl," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 42. no. ľ (1986): 57. 7. "Cherriob>1iOmer Cloud." 72irA)r»>b»* rim« April 30.1986, A17.AI9. a Cited in William A- Dorman and Daniel Hirsch. -Ihc US Media's Slaní,"Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 42, no 7(1986)-. 56. 9- See M. Ryslsky, The Nuclear Power Industry in the Ukraine," Soviet life (February. 1986>& 10. Lyubov Kovalcvska, The Decision» of the 27th Congress Being Put into Action—It b No Private Matter." Litenuuma Ukrnina. March 27. 1986. Cited in Daily Report Soviet Union 3, no. 87 (May 6. 1986> 51-53. 11 -Latest Five-Year Plan Confirms Soviel AmbtUons." Nuclear Engineering International 31. no. 3« (1986> 25. 202 Street i s ofľouvr 12. Gordon Thompson, "»'hal Happened at Reactor Four." Bulletin <•/Atomic Scientists 12. no "(1986» 26 1 * N|gd Ebnvfcfj. et «L. Cbtmobyl Tbe End of lbe Sucleesr Dream (New York Vintage. 19861 90. Also sec David R. Marples, Cbemobyl and .Suclear Pourr in me USSR (New York. Si. Martini Press.. 1986). 1-35. 14. Boris Senxnov, The Nuclear Power Industry in ihc Soviet Union," International Atomic Energy Agency Bulletin 25. no. 2 (1983): 47-59. 15. »'alter C Psiicrson. "llvcrnobyL Vom Bui Not First.- Bulletin of the AtomicSctenlUU 42, DO. 7( 1986). »4. 16. Ibid 17. Hawfces et aL, 99 18. Ibid, 99-102 19. Thompson. "Whai Happened ai Rcacior Four." 27-29- 20. Waller C Patterson, "Chernobyl—The Official Story." Bulletin of tbe Atomic Scientists 42. no. 9 (1986> 35 21. Herbert Adams, "How Radiation Victims Süßer." Bulletin of tbe Atomic Scientists 42. no. 7 (I986> 13- 22. Hawkes el aL, 13- 23. B»kL. 174-75. 24. Ibid, iii 25. Ibid., 209-10. Sec also Thomas von Hippel and Thomas Cochran. "Estimating Long Term Health Meets." Bulletin of tbe Atomic Scientists 42. no. 7 (19bo>23-24.andMarplc».CI>enM**/iim/jVucinirAay."7hť.Veif'lbr*nntfx May 1.1986. A26. 50. J. Greenwald. D Aikman. and N Tnrver. 'More Fallout From Chernobyl,-Time, May 19. 1986, 44-46. 51. Hoffman, -Nuclear Deception." 56. 52. Bernstein. "Nuclear Deception Ihc US. Record," 40. 53- See Greenwald ct aL, Time. May 12. 1986. 41; R, B. Cullen. I Barnathan, and M_ Miller. "A Fearful Flight from Chernobyl, Soviet Candor Sparks New Health Concerns," .Veus-üv** May 19. 1986. 36-38; and J. Taguabuc. 'Request for Tech-nical Help Cul Shon,- Tbe.Sew York Times. May 1. 1986, AlO. 54. Cullen. Bamaihan, and Miller. SeuiuevJc. May 19. 1986. 36-38. and Greenwald, AÜtmann. and Traver, Time. 44—46. 55. Greenwald ct al. Time. Miy 12. 1986, 43- 56. Ilawkes ct al, 161 57. Fischer. "The inicrnaisonal Response- 47-48. 58. Greemvald ei al.. Time, May 12. 1986. 59- 59. P McGrath. 'Did ihc Media Hv-pc Chernobyl?.- towmv** May 26. 1986. 31. 60. Dorman and Hirsch, The US. Media's Slant," 55. 61. Greenwald, Jackson, and Traver. Tim« May 26. 1986. 32. McGrath. .Veiii* u«vfc May 26, 198b, 31; and S. Diamond. "Chernobyl Design Found to Include Safely Plans,- Tbe Sew York Times. May 19.1966.A1.A6. 62. Greenwald ci aL. Time. May 12. 1986,43- 63- "Nuclear Energy: Is America Being Left Behind?.' Seusweeb. April 28, 1986,62. MH Serpens o/rXiwer 64. Alomic Industrial řOfum. Inc., "Multiple Harriet CooUlnmcni Significant Dincrenccs Between US-Soriet KcnV>n~ AIF Background Inf a I[May. 1986). 1-3. 65. Domun and Hirsch. "The U.S. Medial Reaction." 55. 66. Hauke* ci aL, 16. 67. Grcenwald ci al.. f"** May 12, 1986.59. 68. Hawkcsct al. 163-64 69. Daniel Ford, Tbe Cull oflbe Atom Tbe Secret fapers oftheAtomic Energy Commission, rev ed. (N*w Vorlt Simon and Schmier, 198tX I93-208. 70. Grcenwald. Jackson, and Travcr, Time, May 26. 1986. 33- 71. AnneB. Fisher ami e*»cr Bnrc. "N^iclcar B«»rr afler a*en»r^'l.-/torfune I13.no. II (1986): 130'32; and Pcier FVtre. "What Welch Wrought at GE,"rbr-Mwllin 1(1986): 43-47. 72. R. Gilettc. "No Clear Cm' I ink. Chernobyl Seen as Reminder lo US. on Safety," Tbe Los Angeles 7l»m AprU 27.1967, 1. 9. 73 ibtd 74. Ibtd- 75- Richard Rudolph and Scott Ridley. *0»rmobylS Challenge lo AnU-Nuclear AcüiisaC Kadlcal Amerita 20. dos. 2, 3(1986> 7-21. 76. Grcenwald. Aikman. and Travcr, 77m« May 19. 1986, 44-46; ton Hippel and Cochran, 'F.Mimating Long-ierm Health EOccts," 18-24 77. "'Wie sie ilirc Wut loswerden ,..| D*C 'ťlingstschlachľ von Wackctsdorf: bruule Chaoten, kopflose Polixisten." Der Spiegel May 26. 1986. 105. 108-09. 78. "In Tschernobyl, 'fine glühend aiiiic Zone." Der Spiegel May 19, 1986, 128-29. 133-35; "So wie die Hiroschima-Bombe." Tschernobyl: Ein Katastrophe fiudicSow)ctUnioa'0**"*P"«'i May 5. 1986.136-39. 79. "Die Sache hat uns kalt erwischt,"DerSpiegel May 12. 1986. 19-20. 80. "Neue Mehrheil für Aussteig: Splegel-l'mlngc über Tschernobyl und die Deutschen." D*rJpfcffrt May 12. 1986. 28, 30. J2. 81. Worldwatdi InstilUte, "Reassessing Nuclear Power: The Fallout born Chernobyl." Worlduatcb/nsriluie KepoeUMitcii. 1986). I. 82. Hawkes et »1.213. 83 S. R. Lichter. "Was Cbemob>'l Fonent or Anomaly?" Tbe Wall Slreet Journal April 29.1987. 30. 84. "From the Etüiae*? Bulletin of tbe Atomic Scientists 42, no. 7 (1986): 2. 85. Bernstein, "Nudca* Deception: The U5 Record." 40-43; R- L Hudson. "East. West Move toward Safer Reactors but Eiperts Warn More Must Be Done." Tbe Wall Sired journal April 23. 1987. 28; and M. D. Lemonick. "A Chernobyl-Proof Reactor.- Time Jur,-21 1986.60 Ihr Soviet Union »l*> backed expanded research into "safe nuclear reactor" designs by the IAEA during the summer of 1986.*ecMaiples.Crspi™^'/imdAWtaarA>u*»'ini&*ifÖit 179.