SO President Bush has warned the Iraqis not to resort to 'criminal acts' by retaliating with chemical or biological weapons when he launches his promised attack on their country.

Is it not a 'criminal act' to deliberately obstruct the UN weapons inspectors by imposing impossible demands and conditions, and then to start a war with Iraq in defiance of the UN and international law, killing thousands of innocent men, women and children?

Bush himself has abandoned the principle of no first use of nuclear weapons, and is threatening Iraq with so-called 'low yield' nuclear bunker-busters. The fallout, both radioactive and political, could provoke a global catastrophe.

Cluff's recent cartoon (Echo, Sept 16) said it all. It showed one American soldier explaining to another: "But we're entitled to have weapons of mass destruction because we're civilised." - Pete Winstanley, Durham.

AFTER reading the many letters to HAS on the Bush/Blair attitude to the forthcoming conflict with Iraq, one can conclude they follow two lines of thought.

They are either pacifists, whose main theme dwells on the large number of innocent women and children who will suffer, or those who are anti-American and see the main issue centre on oil.

They insist it is a battle of personalities and power rather than a clash of cultures, which are total opposites. One is formed through democracy, the other is shaped by the harsh environment of the wilderness and desert where the stark choice is survival or death.

Prior to his dethronement, the Shah of Persia (Iran) attempted to modernise his country where 90 per cent of his subjects were illiterate. The opposition saw the modernisation as an introduction of Western decadence, which led to an Islamic revolution. The simple message was that if you stand firm, Western governments would agree to a compromise rather than a fight.

Saddam Hussein will make every effort to survive because he will see himself as not being alone in resisting the advance of Western liberalism.

The US/UK coalition, which places great emphasis on freedom and choice, has no other option but to resort to an armed conflict because the present situation requires a winner. - Thomas Conlon, Spennymoor.

YOUR readers should not be surprised to note the similarity of opinion expressed by President Bush in a recent speech in Nashville, Tennessee and that expressed by Peter Mullen (Echo, Oct 1).

President Bush proclaimed that: "It's time for them (the United Nations) to determine whether they'll be the United Nations or the League of Nations". He seems to be unaware that the "them" he refers to includes his own country.

Now we have Peter Mullen beating the US war drum in his column, starting out with: "It's time we scrapped the United Nations".

One might be forgiven for thinking that Peter Mullen is taking instructions from President Bush. The United Nations may not be perfect but at least it acts as a restraint on the United States which, by the way, is the only country that has used weapons of mass destruction and, since the Second World War, has bombed 21 countries.

I believe The Northern Echo is at least partially owned by American interests. I believe also that Peter Mullen has connections with the American right wing. Would I be wrong in assuming a connection? - W Collinson, Belmont.

WHEN the Western allies evicted the Iraqi military from Kuwait, and rightly so, little did we know the terrible revenge we would exact on Iraq.

Sanctions have killed hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children and today, one-in-five children never reach their fifth birthday. The US has been guilty of one of the most barbaric acts in history and we are their co-conspirators.

Even if we do destroy Iraq, murdering countless innocent people and even if we do topple the Iraqi leader, we must surely incur the wrath and hatred of many Arab countries.

How many more people must die to satisfy the misguided ambitions of George Bush and Tony Blair?

Their bellicose rhetoric, if it becomes reality, will ensure that we too will suffer at the hands of enraged people from the Middle East.

I thought the idea was to stop terrorism, not to encourage it, and surely not to become terrorists ourselves. - Hugh Pender, Darlington.

CAPITALISM

HARRY Mead's denunciation of capitalism (Echo, Oct 9) squares with my own views about it: it stinks.

"Capitalism was doomed ethically before it was doomed economically," said Alexander Solzhenitsyn. - Alfred H Lister, Guisborough.

NEW LABOUR

I FORECAST three years ago that Tony Blair and New Labour would be remembered as the party who took the 'Great' out of Britain.

At last week's Labour Conference he dangled the carrot on how good getting into Europe would be for our people. What he did not mention is that in Germany there are four million unemployed and they are having serious problems with immigrants. The same is happening in France and Italy.

He also forgot to say that, eventually, all passports will be scrapped and all borders in Europe will be open, which will allow thousands to just walk into our country.

You have all seen what is happening at Black & Decker. If Tony Blair believes that subsidising the plant with taxpayers' money is the answer, he is going to have a lot of other firms doing the same.

Tony Blair has made a rod for his own back, with his obsession with Europe and wanting to ditch the pound.

Just do us all a big favour, get us out of Europe and just realise now what damage your New Labour has done to our own people. - F Wealands, Darlington.