On a gloomy day in 1946, over 160 people were told to leave their homes on an atoll little known to the world, and moved elsewhere. After the relocation, the sole purpose of which was to make way for U.S. nuclear experiments, they would never be able to safely repopulate their birthplace. That atoll, located in the Pacific and named Bikini, remains uninhabitable.

This was a result of just one of the dozens of nuclear tests the U.S. conducted in the Marshall Islands, of which Bikini Atoll is a part, as well as countless similar experiments done by the British and French governments around other Pacific islands. 

The forced removal of residents epitomizes the sense of helplessness felt by small Pacific states towards the nuclear-armed colonial powers. Fast forward to today, events reminiscent of history have resurfaced again, impacting the ecological systems of the islands as a whole and affecting their people's livelihood.

Japan, whose dozens of nuclear reactors are exposed to the dangers of earthquakes, put in motion its plan to discharge treated nuclear-contaminated water from the Fukushima plant, crippled in 2011 by a tsunami, into the ocean. Pacific island nations had repeatedly urged the Japanese government not to carry out the plan, but it had pressed ahead regardless.

"The ocean is our resource, a source of survival for our communities here in the Pacific, and we want to do everything possible to avoid that sort of initiative (Japan's discharge plan) going ahead," Tuvalu's Minister for Finance Seve Paeniu told reporters days before the release of the radioactive wastewater began.

Experts have said the economic impact will be non-negligible on Tuvalu and other countries belonging to the Pacific Island Forum, a regional bloc of 17 nations whose economies rely on fishing grounds and from where up to half the world's tuna is sourced.

Samu Maraiwai, president of the Suva Fish Market Association, contends that the 1.3 million tonnes of nuclear wastewater poses a risk of massive destruction to their source of livelihood and their marine ecosystem, on which both humans and animals heavily rely and to which rising sea levels and extreme weather caused by climate change have already posed severe threats.

Maraiwai's concerns echo those expressed by many other non-governmental organizations in the Pacific islands as well as in regions around Fukushima. But such concerns are not the start of the story.

Since the end of World War Two, these small Pacific island nations, due to their geological specificities, were a testing ground for Western countries' nuclear experiments, resulting in horrifying nuclear radiation contamination and ecological disasters. The islands' heightened sensitivity to nuclear pollution is largely rooted in the painful memories left by the extensive nuclear testing conducted by the nuclear powers.

From 1946 to 1958, the United States conducted 67 nuclear tests in the Marshall Islands, and to this day, the ecological environment and the health of residents in the nation continue to suffer the consequences. 

During one of those experiments, a miscalculation by the U.S. military regarding the explosive power of a hydrogen bomb led to nearby residents not being evacuated in time. Many people experienced acute radiation poisoning symptoms, and dozens of residents died soon after due to illnesses such as cancer and leukemia.

The UK also conducted nine nuclear tests in the former colony of Kiribati in the late 1950s. Research indicates that due to exposure to nuclear radiation, people on Kiribati at that time still face a higher cancer rate today. 

For nearly 40 years, countries including the UK and the U.S. dumped large amounts of nuclear waste into the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. The U.S. even transported 130 tonnes of nuclear-contaminated soil from Nevada to the Marshall Islands for disposal. And Australia, which sought to develop nuclear weapons, allowed the UK to conduct multiple nuclear tests on islands like Monte Bello off the west coast.

During these times, outcry and frustration from the Pacific islanders often fell on deaf ears, and repeated mistakes made by the Western governments dangerously impacted locals' health. In 1968, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson wrongfully declared Bikini Atoll fit for rehabitation. Residents moved back, only to find out 10 years later that their body burdens were drastically increased, and so they once again relocated. A class action suit filed by the Bikini islanders against the U.S. government was dismissed.

The effects of these abuses were so appalling to relive that the Pacific nations established a Pacific Nuclear Free Zone in 1985 under a treaty that prevents the dumping of radioactive materials.

But history has been repeated. 

The small countries located in the far-flung area of the Pacific have found their protests against Japan's release plan to be futile. While Tokyo insists it is safe to dump the nuclear-contaminated water into the sea, an assertion backed by the International Atomic Energy Agency, whether it is accurate and whether blunders will emerge during the 30-year release process are, as noted by scientists, unknown.