U.S. wasn't fully prepared for radiation risks following Japan
earthquake, top general says TOKYO — In the first few days of
Japan’s nuclear crisis this spring, the U.S. military wasn’t
fully prepared to deal with possible radiation exposure to its
troops and equipment, the top U.S. general in Japan said
Wednesday. U.S. Forces Japan commander Lt. Gen. Burton M. Field
talked about the radiation risk to U.S. troops during a briefing
on Operation Tomodachi for members of the American Chamber of
Commerce in Japan on Wednesday. The March 11 earthquake and
subsequent tsunami damaged the Fukushima Dai-Ichi Nuclear Power
Station, leading to the release of a radioactive plume that
contaminated air and water as far south as Tokyo. “As the
(Fukushima Dai-ichi) reactors exploded and they sent some of
that radiation out, we had the issue with it being detected off
shore by the Navy,” he said. “We had to start dealing with the
kind of environment that the U.S. military had not really worked
in, so we didn’t have the strict