Alex Salmond gives welcome assurances that an independent Scotland in Nato wouldn't take military action without UN authorisation and a Scottish Parliament vote, mentioning Iraq (Why we can ban nuclear weapons and stay in Nato, Politics, October 14).
He doesn't mention Nato's UN-backed war in Afghanistan.
Continued Nato membership could draw us into similar unwinnable wars, fought for hidden motives like the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan oil and gas export pipeline route considered before the war and approved in 2002.
Would Scottish Parliament backbenchers have the power to initiate a vote on withdrawing troops from wars Parliament had previously approved by majority vote? Shouldn't a referendum also be required before going to war to give everyone a say in a matter of life or death for thousands?
Duncan McFarlane
Carluke
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