WAR ON IRAQ: THE British Prime Minister's obsession with getting rid of Saddam Hussein, despite the British people (the people who elected him to office) saying no to war, makes a mockery of our democratic system.

Not only that, but we have here a man who, with the rest of the politicians who back him, never talks of war in human terms - ie the devastation and destruction which would be visited upon the innocent men, women, children and babies of Iraq.

If war does come about, with British and American troops off-loading their missiles on the people of Iraq (with the PM telling us that only military targets are being bombed), with George Bush and Tony Blair convinced that their evil methods are justified in getting rid of a military dictator who they say has weapons of mass destruction, what then?

Cheaper petrol (perhaps) and thousands of innocent Iraqis either dead or poisoned by uranium-coated, cancer-carrying weapons.

No doubt these two war leaders will declare, as Madeleine Albright, US Secretary of State, declared after the Gulf War in 1991 that it is a price worth paying.

Such is the sorry state of modern-day politics. - Rev John Stephenson, Sunderland.

AS we drift inexorably towards war with Iraq, I ask where are the rest of Europe's troops? They don't want to know.

I don't see why Britain should work to President Bush's election schedule and his desire to put a puppet government into Baghdad so he can control most of the world's oil.

That was the real reason for invading Afghanistan (rather than finding Osama). - F Atkinson, Shincliffe.

WE have good cause for knowing the kind of person we are dealing with in Saddam Hussein.

I cannot think that any amount of military hardware and personnel can be too much, or the attitude of the United Nations too bellicose.

Let Saddam Hussein, and he will know everything that's going on, detect the slightest weakness in our resolve and he will exploit it to the utmost. His spies and sympathisers in this country will be trying to sow seeds of doubt and dismay. Some may even be writing letters and articles to papers, not omitting The Northern Echo, as used to be tried by such as Lord Haw Haw in the Second World War.

As I see it, the more hardware and personnel we put into the field now, and the more determination we show, will be our surest hope of a peaceful end to this.

It is there to prevent a war not to start one. It'll cost an untenable amount of money and resources but it might, in the end, save lives.

It'll be all the better if we have to withdraw all of that without ever firing a shot and the effort will not have been wasted.

As the Prime Minister keeps repeating, the answer to war or peace is in one man and it is therefore all the more important to show what we can hit him with if he chooses the former. - R Lewis, Birtley.

PETE Winstanley (HAS Jan 11) suggests Saddam Hussein is secular and only a threat to his own people.

Saddam is a threat that must be addressed. Whether the Iraqi people wish to live under Saddam's oppression is one thing but when that oppression threatens others, then that oppression is our business.

If the Iraqi people wish to lift sanctions then they should behave in a responsible manner that proves they wish to live within a more civilised way of doing things. Their first priority is to rid themselves of Saddam and stop kidding us they mean us no harm.

To suggest that Islamic fundamentalists are the good gang in their condemnation of Saddam is rubbish. There is no proof at all that they are not being funded and more than likely are being provided with weapons of mass destruction by this despot.

Islamic fundamentalism is based on a hatred of the West and its ways and wish to take Islam back to its true form. - John Young, Crook.

TONY Blair persists in exaggerating the risk of Iraq supplying weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) to terrorists. Al Qaida defectors have confirmed Saudi intelligence reports that bin Laden considers Saddam unworthy to call himself a Muslim, and has condemned him for attacking Muslims and killing women and children.

A case of pot and kettle, but the antagonism is real. The Gilmore Commission, appointed by Bill Clinton, concluded that rogue states would hesitate to supply WMDs to a terrorist group because "the group's actions might be unpredictable even to the point of using the weapon against its sponsor".

The blame for the proliferation of WMDs rests mainly with the West, Russia and Israel. They have failed to honour their commitments under successive arms reduction, non-proliferation and test-ban treaties, and have continuously upgraded their own vast arsenals while self-righteously insisting that they alone are responsible enough to possess such weapons. - Pete Winstanley, Durham.

ASYLUM SEEKERS

BEFORE the 2001 General Election Ann Widdecombe, who was at the time Shadow Home Secretary, recommended that asylum seekers should be locked up until their identity had been proved.

Sixteen days after September 11 that same warning was given to this Government by senior civil servants. The Government, of course, refused.

Now we have a situation where at least two of the ricin suspects were asylum seekers living on benefits in a council flat in London.

Well done, Tony. Surely the most important task of any Prime Minister and his Government is to keep the country safe. You have failed. - Joan McTigue, Middlesbrough.