Salient: Victoria University Students' Paper. Vol. 27, No. 4. 1964.
Ban the Bombers Where To ?
Ban the Bombers Where To ?
( Continued from page three.)
For a start, members themselves are lacking in many cases fundamental knowledge of what they are protesting about.
The discussions held during the course of the march reveal this only too well. Members of a group such as this must be acquainted with answers to such questions as whether in fact is is possible to ban nuclear weapons and how possible nuclear free zones for Europe and the south are. There is the second possibility of direct action against the French such as severing economic links. However the C.N.D. were strangely silent when proposals along these lines were made by the Federation of Labour.
The Direct Action group that was formed during the last year's march has so far done nothing apart from the reprinting of the "Spies for Peace" pamphlet. It remains to see whether with the French tests becoming more imminent its activities will not increase. Meanwhile, a rather slovenly attitude on the part of the N.Z.C.N.D. has prevented it so far from not becoming the focal point to opposition to French testing. There can be little hope for the protest movement to gain more support, let alone slop losing its support unless CND becomes more active and imaginative in the schemes it uses or adopts for protest. The N.Z.C.N.D. has long since ceased to be a dynamic movement, if it ever was one.
I do not agree with Anthony Howard who in an article alongside that of Marlin's argues that this unilateralist or trend to concentrate on opposition to nuclear arms was a side track which the Labour Parly stumbled upon, and has distorted and clouded many issues. Wilson has promised this group nothing and yet has their support, undoubtedly one of the main reasons for the waning interest in C.N.D. in Britain. If Labour again fails at the elections the C.N.D. movement will still voice a slightly less shrill voice of protest. The French tests have produced a strong note of nihilism in New Zealand which induced people to scoff, though, in most cases sign, the demand for a nuclear free Southern Hemisphere. Positive and real action is needed to combat this attitude. The lead is not being given by the N.Z.C.N.D.