The recent revelations that some 4,300 sailors were sprayed with nerve and biological agents in military tests demonstrates the U.S. government’s callous disregard for workers and farmers. The same sons and daughters of working people who are used as cannon fodder for imperialism’s wars have been used as guinea pigs to test the effectiveness of chemical and biological weapons on human beings.

The latest documents released by the Pentagon shed light on yet another example of the military and war industry’s treatment of working people. Some hundreds of thousands of other soldiers have been used in nuclear weapons testing. Uranium miners were never told of the hazards of their work and the protective measures they could take. Entire cities living downwind from nuclear testing were affected by fallout.

The government has responded to demands for compensation by those suffering from cancers, respiratory diseases, and damaged organs by doling out money through an eyedropper. Many people affected by ionized radiation, for example, must go through years of legal wrangling and bureaucratic paperwork to try to "prove" their illness or disability is a result of radiation exposure. Still, half of all claims are rejected. The Justice Department has established a similar compensation process for those who were sprayed with nerve gas and biological agents.

The labor movement should call on the government to grant immediate testing and full, unconditional medical coverage for all sailors subjected to chemical and biological weapons experiments. After being poisoned by the government, nobody should have to "prove" their case to receive benefits.

The same weapons Washington tests on working people at home have been used in massive doses abroad. The U.S. government remains the only one in the world to use atomic weapons against a population, bombing the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It has strafed Korea and Vietnam with napalm, carpet bombed Dresden, Germany, and killed tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians on the road from Kuwait City to Basra during the Gulf War.

As the social and economic crisis of capitalism unfolds, Washington is driven to use brute military force more often to protect its assets and maintain stability for further penetration of potential markets. To the ruling rich, working people at home are supposed to work hard to make profits for the boss. And when necessary, we are used as cannon fodder for their wars to protect those same profits.

As long as the imperialist system exists, the working class in the United States will be subjected to inhumane treatment, whether it be tests on soldiers, unsafe conditions of miners, or brutality at the hands of cops. The revelations once again point to the need to fight against the same imperialist system that has brutalized working people at home and abroad enough already.
 
 
Related article:
Washington admits testing chemical weapons on its troops  
 
 
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