TERRORISM

ALTHOUGH the tactics used by terrorists are completely indefensible, they are sometimes responding, albeit disproportionately, to real injustice.

For every terrorist, there may be many thousands of ordinary, peaceful people who, while condemning the murderous methods of terrorism, nevertheless share the same grievances. It is not right to say to these people: "We will not listen to your demands, because there are wicked, violent people who make the same demands." To do so only increases frustration and drives more people to think that armed struggle is the only hope.

The unpalatable fact is that terrorism will never be defeated by military might. The "war on terrorism" proposed by George W Bush and Tony Blair will lead only to further loss of innocent lives and the intensification of hatred. They must surely know this, and presumably persist with their fantasy to satisfy the demand for vengeance.

In our determination not to be seen to give in to terrorism, we should not ignore the possibility that if we deal with the genuine injustices and inequalities upon which terrorism thrives, we can expose extremism for what it is and deprive terrorists of support, shelter and recruits. - P Winstanley, Chester-le-Street.

SO the West is to blame for all the wrongs of so-called poorer nations.

Iraq chemical bombs its own people, the Kurds in the north and Shi'ites in the south. Despite sanctions, it's sitting on billions of pounds of oil revenue and can't create an internal infrastructure to allow the country to thrive. The set-up allows the elite of the nation to cream off the money and the lower echelons to fight it out. They are fed the same argument from state-controlled TV that the US and Britain are to blame.

It's illegal in some of these countries to own a TV or radio and, outside of the urban areas, a postal service does not exist. Individual crackpot leaders, who are rich to the extreme, control them.

Muslims, Arabs and African nations have more classes, creeds, factions, tribes and sects than we can count and the lower down you are, the worse your individual treatment. Yet the West is the bad guy.

Go to these countries and see giant guarded palaces alongside shanty towns. The governments of these nations have squandered billions of pounds of Western aid over the years. Remember Ethiopia, the poor souls dying of starvation saw little of the money raised. Governments filtered it off for military hardware.

The finger of blame lies with their own rich "capitalist" leaders who show no regard for their own people. Our war is to win the hearts and minds of these oppressed people. - J Tague, Bishop Auckland.

AFGHANISTAN'S bold rhetoric does not come near matching the fire power of the US. Let's hope that President Bush acts with restraint and intelligence and does not blast away willy nilly at whoever.

This would give the extremists a proper excuse to shout "Jehad, holy war etc" and, of course, ordinary people would probably be killed. TV media is gorging itself on it, of course, and boring me.

There was a volcanic mud slide in Peru covering a town in 18 feet of mud and burying 10,000 people recently. That got two minutes of TV news on one day only. - FM Atkinson, Shincliffe, County Durham.

YOUR leader writer, "Striking the moral balance" (Echo, Sept 18), is not making much sense if he wishes to insult the Americans with such terms as "rhetoric on war".

The Americans may be guilty of being too complacent in the past, but whether the Taliban and other Islamic fundamentalists like it or not, the time of appeasement is over.

As for Tony Blair and his Government, it has failed us time after time with rhetoric and appeasement called a "peace process".

The Irish peace process is nothing more than appeasement and, time after time, the terrorist has been taking us for the mugs we are.

Obviously, it is a different war now, but it must be fought with the same determination and, if it means any state guilty of harbouring and financing this scum, then there cannot be any of the excuses and the moralising that The Northern Echo produces with such vigour.

The peacemakers have tried and failed miserably. It is now time to give the hawks their due - they are the real peacemakers.

Remember the 1930s and the appeasers who dragged the world into an horrific confrontation, that cost many millions of people, soldiers and civilians alike.

Let's not follow the road of appeasement, but freedom through strength and justice is the only way we can build a world free from the filth who commit such heinous acts. - John Young, Crook.

OLD SOLDIERS

DID you ever serve in the Royal Navy, Royal Marines, Royal Artillery or any other of HM Forces on board any of the light fleet carriers, HMS Bulwark, HMS Albion or HMS Centaur?

If so, you may be interested to know that there is an association, the Bulwark Albion Centaur Association, which you are eligible to join.

Associate membership is also available, a magazine, the RO8 (Bulwark's Fleet number) is published three times a year. The features include tracing lost pals, anecdotes and a letters page for members to regale their past glories etc.

Regular monthly meetings are held in Portsmouth and various functions are held through the year including an AGM/social. Membership costs £8 per annum, at around two pence per day, a veritable bargain.

Inquiries to the Membership Secretary, Leigh Easton at Glenmoray, Hayford Place, Cambusbarron, Stirling FK7 9JX or e-mail at bulwarkslineone.net. Further information is available on the website www.bulwarkassoc.plus.com. - Colin Taylor, pp Leigh Easton, Membership Secretary, e-mail: bulwardslineone.net.

MEMORIAL HOSPITAL

I WOULD like to say a big thanks to Dr Trewby and his team on Ward 43 at Darlington Memorial Hospital for all their care and help in looking after me when I was a patient for nine days.

I could not have been better cared for even if I had gone to a private hospital.

I would also like to thank all the people that visited and inquired about me while I was in hospital. Once again a big thanks to everybody. - Margaret Jenkinson, Darlington.

MARKET FORCES

CONGRATULATIONS to the excellent Hugh Pender for yet another dose of reality (HAS, Sept 9). His latest contribution is a welcome antidote to the usual contributions by the slowly diminishing band of bitter right-wing/anti-Europeans hang 'em & flog 'em/blood sport supporters/countryside destroyers. It is incredible that so many of your contributors still turn a blind eye to the excesses of the 1979 to 1997 era. Mass emigration from the North-East region; high unemployment; the poorest working conditions in western Europe; the run-down of public services and tax-cuts only for the wealthy etc.

The closure of the North-East's traditional industries was written off by the Tories as market forces. Yet the same people now blame the Labour Government for the inevitable outcome of creeping, right wing sponsored, globalisation within manufacturing.

Big business can now simply move factories without due regard for workers or, indeed, countries. We are seeing the powers of democratically-elected governments being eroded by faceless big business. No doubt some of your Tory contributors will be wringing their hands in glee at such a prospect.

The current Government still has a long way to go to resolve the inherited problems of modern day society. We must keep faith as a return to traditional conservative values is simply too awful to contemplate. - Mark Citrone, Hull.