Omega Sources Re-examined

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31981, 7 May 1969, Page 12

Omega Sources Re-examined

Throughout the Omega controversy, two important factors have strengthened the anti-Omega viewpoint, and have led' to doubts among many thoughtful New Zealanders about the Government’s attitude. These are, first, that the anti-Omega movement has been led by a number of scientists who were able to speak with apparent authority about technical details of the Omega-system; and second, that the protesters have documented their statements heavily with references to scientific, technical and official publications.

Even the layman who has understood little of what the scientists were talking about has felt there were questions which needed answering. And the Government, for its part, has found considerable difficultyin answering these questions to the satisfaction of a large part of the public. This report is not intended to answer the substantive questions raised in the current controversy, such as whether Omega is part of the United States Navy's Polaris programme and whether New Zealand should have an Omega station. The aim is much narrower—to analyse the use of source material. It

will no doubt be found that some questions raised in the controversy are scarcely touched upon here, because they have not involved the use of documentation. The ' issue that has concerned the author is: have the parties to the debate made correct and valid use of the source material on which they have based their statements? The author examined some of the available source ma-1 terial and heard a number < of the principal protagonists I on each side present their 1 cases. As a result, he became i confirmed in his disquietude i about the use of documenta- i tion, and convinced that the I

matter was of sufficient importance to merit a much more detailed study. For the purposes of. this inquiry, attention has been concentrated on five or six fairly typical statements of the antiOmega case, and on the various statements of the Government viewpoint by the Prime Minister. Since this study is confined to an examination of the use of source material cited in the controversy, no attempt has been made to introduce new sources except where it can be reasonably assumed they were viewed by the protagonists but ignored.