The Cost of the Cold War: A Nations Generation

Entry #6: The Cost of the Cold War: A Nations Generation

\On my way up to Colorado to visit some relatives I made it past Flagstaff  and into the start of the Navajo Nation, when I started to notice quite a few concrete caps embedded into the ground, and quite a few open holes around it as well. Finally I decided to pull over and take a closer look at one of them, and as I had expected it was a mine, quite a common sight in Arizona; however, upon closer inspection I soon realized that it was a Uranium mine and little did I know that uranium mines on the Navajo Nation have had a dark history spanning all the way back into the 1940's .
After the second world war the demand for uranium by the Federal government took off and the atomic energy commission declared that it would be the sole purchaser of uranium in the U.S. Yet instead of mining it themselves they leased it to contractors and soon over 1000 mines had been created on the Navajo Nation through leasing the land. With only money in mind however, and little to no regulations, contractors started to cut corners and leave radioactive runoff from the mines open and exposed. Eventually 5000 Navajos would start to work in the mines, many of them dying from cancer as a result.In 2000 a study conducted by Health Physics found that Navajo men who worked in the mines were 29 times more likely to get lung-cancer then those who didn't. Yet it may be the miners children, and grandchildren who are most affected today. Many of the Navajo children grew up drinking from contaminated wells, and playing in pits contaminated with runoff from the mines. A dark time in our state's and government's history with the cost of many innocent live just to build weapons of mass destruction. And to the people of the Navajo, after over 60 years the E.P.A has finally given them only 1 billion dollars in reparations, however is that really enough for the hardships these great people had to endure? Below is a link to a video from azcentral interviewing Charley Colorado a uranium miner during 1957.
http://azc.cc/1omHgJs