US Declinesto Give Details on Japan's Radiation

US government officials, in private sessions on Capitol Hill Friday, repeatedly declined to give details of radiation measurements at the stricken Japanese nuclear complex, saying the situation is shrouded in a "fog of war." Separately, the Obama administration said Friday "miniscule quantities" of radiation from the Japanese nuclear accident were detected Friday at a monitoring station in Sacramento, Calif., a day after similar traces of radiation were detected in Washington state. The administration said the levels of the radioactive isotope xenon 133 were approximately equivalent to one-millionth the dose received from the sun, rocks or other natural sources. The Obama administration's reluctance to detail in public what it is learning from radiation-detection operations around the damaged Fukushima Daiichi complex in Japan highlights a broader sensitivity in the US's posture toward a stricken ally. The shift comes after statements Wednesday by the head of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission that painted a grimmer picture of the nuclear crisis than Japanese had offered, and suggested that the US didn't trust the information coming from the Japanese government.