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Salient: Victoria University Students' Paper. Vol. 29, No. 7. 1966.

Apathy to bomb threat

Apathy to bomb threat

Any Day Now, a mushroom cloud will sprout over a once-peaceful South Pacific atoll. France will have commenced its atom bomb tests.

It seems probable that a New Zealand public lulled by the soothing words of Mr. Holyoake will scarcely notice this real threat to New Zealand, will scarcely murmur in protest.

And thus the indictment of the National Government will be complete.

The National Government has gone right down the line in support of this country's dubious commitment in Vietnam. It has published books and booklets, sent MPs and others on trips, joined in debates and helped make the war a topic of current discussion.

But it has deliberately and callously underplayed the French bomb test. It had three pragmatic reasons:

• An informed, frightened populace might have demanded action.

• France buys too much of our exports for us to threaten any significant action.

• We might ourselves use nuclear weapons in the future.

We would have thought that, in face of a threat to the people of New Zealand rather more real than the Communists we are fighting in Vietnam, the New Zealand Government might have been consistent and sent troops to fight in Tahiti, too.

But we learned long ago that consistency cannot be expected in the foreign policy of this country.

H.B.R.