NFLAs endorse international appeal for justice over French nuclear tests

NFLA 13th Feb 2025

Sixty-five years ago (13 February 1960), the first French nuclear test was conducted in its colony of Algeria, exposing French soldiers and Indigenous Tuareg civilians to radiation.

The NFLAs have been campaigning for justice for veterans and local communities impacted by British atomic and nuclear bomb tests in Australia and the Pacific Islands, so in the spirit of solidarity we have joined UK and international partners in endorsing a similar appeal to the French and Algerian Governments over the impact of the ‘Gerboise Bleue’ (‘Blue Jerboa’) test and those which followed.

President Charles de Gaulle ordered a nuclear test in the first quarter of 1960. After a plan to explode a device in Corsica was prevented by public protests, the Nuclear Experiments Operational Group relocated to the Saharan Military Experiments Centre near Reggane in (then) French Algeria.

‘Gerboise Bleue’ (or ‘Blue Jerboa’) was the operational name for the first test of a series. The name combined a reference to one of the colours of the French flag with a rodent that resided in the Sahara Desert. On 13 February 1960, the plutonium bomb was detonated atop a 100-metre steel tower. No journalists were allowed on site, but an eyewitness account given to the French press stated that “the desert was lit up by a vast flash, followed 45 seconds later by an appreciable shock-wave” with “enormous ball of bluish fire with an orange-red centre” followed by a mushroom cloud.

Following the test, France followed the United States, the USSR and the United Kingdom as the world’s fourth nuclear armed power.

With a yield of 70 kilotons, ‘Gerboise Bleue’ was over three times more powerful than the Fat Boy plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki and the largest by far of the first test bombs used by any of the previous nuclear powers.

Following this test until 1966, France carried out a further three atmospheric nuclear tests and another thirteen underground tests as the ‘Gerboise’ series at this location.

The French treatment of test veterans and Indigenous communities mirrored that of the UK.

The French Ministry of the Armed Forces maintained that the radioactive effects on humans present at the site would be “weak”, and “well below annual doses.” However, test veterans said that protection gear was lacking and charged the military authorities with using them to study the effects of nuclear radiation on humans. After the later ‘Gerboise Verte’ test, soldiers were sent within 1 km of the hypocentre to practice combat exercises and to drive tanks, being subjected to high levels of radiation for three hours before being offered only a shower as a method to decontaminate.

After the tests, nuclear fallout was detected as far away as Senegal, Ivory Coast, Burkina Faso and Sudan. According to the French NGO, ACRO, Saharan dust blown northwards by strong seasonal winds to France in early 2021 carried measurable levels of radioactive caesium-137 attributable to the ‘Gerboise’ tests……………………………………………………………….. https://www.nuclearpolicy.info/news/nflas-endorse-international-appeal-for-justice-over-french-nuclear-tests/