WITH my (t)rusty sword and shield I have to risk a brief engagement with the lance of the redoubtable BrianM Quail on what he calls the “Hiroshima Fallacy", meaning bombing Hiroshima was illogical and wrong. He says that under the rules of war you may not rape, torture, kill prisoners of war or deliberately target the civilian population, all of which are what the Japanese were infamous for doing throughout the war.

As they slowly fought the Japanese back towards their mainland, the US experienced large losses in overcoming fanatical resistance in taking, for example, Iwo Jima. Faced with the prospect of huge losses (on both sides ) in invading mainland Japan, the US called on the Japanese to accept the inevitability of their ultimate defeat and to surrender. When they did not, the US were faced with having to choose between invading or demonstrating their intention to force surrender by using the massive destructive effect of their atom bomb.

They chose the latter course but even then it took two such bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki before the Japanese capitulated, which shows the level of resistance any attempted invasion would have encountered. I believe the decision to use the atom bombs was both logical and correct.

Alan Fitzpatrick,

10 Solomon’s View, Dunlop.

IN his response (Letters, May 9) to Brian Quail's denunciation of nuclear weapons Keith Howell places himself firmly in the "multilateral disarmament camp". My long experience of discussing this issue with people suggests he is in the majority camp. However, being in the majority is not the same as being right.

The idea of multilateral disarmament sounds reasonable to most people, but they fail to analyse the concept. Retaining nuclear weapons is not retaining "an ability to stand up from what is right", because having them means one possesses and is promulgating one's willingness to commit indiscriminate mass murder. Indiscriminate mass murder is not "right".

Peter Martin,

Sruth Ruadh, Milton, Strathconon, Muir of Ord.