THE invasion of Ukraine by Russia has exposed the deeply-flawed nature of a number of myths whose chickens have clearly come home to roost. The first is the concept of nuclear deterrents. It is now abundantly clear that nuclear weapons are only a deterrent against nuclear warfare and are therefore a total waste of money.
The second is the assertion that Nato has played a significant role in maintaining peace and stability in post-war Europe. The main beneficiary of Nato has been the US military equipment industry, which requires an adversary to arm against somewhere far from its own shores, there being no threat from Canada or Mexico. The European Union, a peacetime market and trading alliance, contributed much more than Nato to peace and tranquility in post-war Europe.
Nato, which has been totally impotent in the face of Vladimir Putin's current campaign, was created to shield the US from the red menace after the Second World War and should have been wound down rather than expanded after the disintegration of the Soviet Union 30 years ago. If the citizens of the new democratic Russian Federation had been welcomed as friends into the European family instead of being treated as enemies by Nato, an imperialist ex-KGB officer like Putin would have been unlikely to emerge as a successor to Gorbachev and Yeltsin.
Our southern Eurosceptic neighbours who drove a wedge into the unity of the European Union should look in the mirror and ask themselves if their actions contributed to the situation which Putin is seeking to exploit today.
Willie Maclean, Milngavie.
NO SECURITY WITH NUCLEAR
NEIL Mackay has questioned whether Scotland should keep the 240 nuclear bombs which are based just a few miles from Glasgow ("Six tough questions Russian aggression poses for Scots", The Herald, March 3). Those bombs could destroy most of Europe within an hour. If a few dozen more states decided it would be in their interests to have nuclear weapons, do you think the world would be a safer place?
There are only two things within our control that can destroy human civilisations and our natural environment: climate change and nuclear weapons. Terrible conventional wars with great human suffering come and go but they don't fundamentally alter the nature of our planet perhaps to the point where resilience is no longer possible.
Yet in recent years none of the nine nuclear powers has shown the slightest interest in rolling back the nuclear threat. On the contrary they are all rushing to upgrade.
I was taken aback today when a respected public figure speaking about Ukraine said she had never seen anything like it in her lifetime. This is despite the years of invasions, civilian bombing and hundreds of thousand of casualties that we have seen in just two decades ... but when it is the UK and allies who are doing the invading and bombing, perhaps it looks different.
More than 20 years ago you published a letter I wrote condemning the brutal bombing that Vladimir Putin was inflicting on Chechnya, much worse than anything we have seen so far in Ukraine. No-one was interested. No gestures of solidarity. At the peak of that war Tony Blair paid a very friendly visit to Mr Putin with nice photo opportunities at the opera. Chechens were not, of course, white Europeans.
Nuclear weapons have provided all the security of living on top of a volcano. It might be fine for years but you never know when it might erupt.
Isobel Lindsay, Biggar.
* THE illegal war and destruction of Ukraine by Russia is continuing at pace, with pictures and reports from Ukraine truly distressing. Civilian, military and infrastructure targets are being bombed with equal ferocity. Meanwhile, the impotent West is congratulating itself on the unity of Nato. One is reminded of the well-known saying “Nero fiddled while Rome burned”.
Ian Forbes, Glasgow.
COMPARE UKRAINE WITH IRAQ
I READ, and entirely agreed with, the first paragraph of James Napier's letter (March 3): "Although it may take many months, or even years, Russia must be called to account for the misery and destruction of much of Ukraine's infrastructure and the senseless murder of so many of its citizens, which its unprovoked invasion has created". Then I read it again, and this time replaced "Russia" with "the UK" and "Ukraine's" with "Iraq's".
In a matter of days, it will be 19 years since British bombs rained down on Iraq, murdering innocent children; inexplicably, the multi-millionaire Tony Blair is not one inch closer to facing justice in a court of law for his illegal, bloody war.
Ruth Marr, Stirling.
PILE PRESSURE ON PATEL
IT is obvious that Russia’s brutal strategy of inflicting maximum suffering on the civilian population of Ukraine is intended to crush the people’s resistance, a strategy Vladimir Putin adopted in Syria. It has been a savage declaration of war on “ordinary” people. On children, on cancer sufferers running out of morphine – we’ve seen so many snapshots of the victims of Russian barbarity on our screens. Surely the scale of the suffering yet to come once Mr Putin’s troops surround and occupy yet more populated areas is beyond our humanity’s imagination.
How must we react to the Ukrainians’ current anguish and that yet to come? Those who can afford to do so must donate, to a sacrificial degree, to appropriate charities. I also suggest we welcome unreservedly, no matter our politics, the Scottish Government’s humanitarian aid to Ukraine worth £6.9 million ("Nicola Sturgeon unveils more help for Ukraine as Russia steps up attack", The Herald, March 2).
Secondly we must put pressure, by whatever means available to us, on the Home Secretary, who cannot overcome her Brexiteering shackles even in the face of such horrendous suffering, to go further and adopt a more humanitarian policy. She has already been forced by public opinion to extend her original limited definition of family members.
John Milne, Uddingston.
WOULD JOHNSON DO A PUTIN?
IF Wales were granted independence, disadvantaged its English residents and decided to instal a Russian military base, do you suppose Boris Johnson would stand passively by?
Eileen Stables, Paisley.
PLAY THE WORLD CUP TIE
NO disrespect to Patricia Bail (Letters, March 3), but the upcoming World Cup play-off tie with Ukraine should go ahead as planned. Ukraine is a proud nation which I’m sure would not wish to gain entry to the World Cup in this way.
However, should we be beaten I’m also sure that Ukraine will gain many new tartan supporters for its World Cup campaign.
Iain McDermid, Alexandria.
TIDAL POWER IS THE WAY FORWARD
CONGRATULATIONS on publishing the article on the astonishing potential of tidal power (“Does Scotland want to take tidal energy to its heart and make it ours?”, The Herald, March 3). As long as we have a moon, the tides will go in and out twice daily. It shows the paucity of intellect and scientific ignorance of successive governments (of all shades) that this obvious clean, reliable and available source of renewable energy has been starved of adequate resource development funds for so long.
Knee-jerk responses to the first suggestion (non-reliable wind power) that comes along has allowed our leaders to champion their populist green credentials, waste vast sums of money to the detriment of Scottish economy, and despoil our landscapes.
Let us hope that at least one person in Holyrood reads The Herald and brings this article to the attention of whoever is responsible for energy development. But I won’t hold my breath.
John NE Rankin, Bridge of Allan.
* I DECIDED to mount my hobby-horse to reply to your coverage today of renewable energy. You devote eight columns to wind ("Gone with the wind?", The Herald, March 3) and, almost as an afterthought, two columns to marine energy.
I have despaired at the extent to which wind turbines have become so dominant in our landscape and, increasingly, our seascape, as if wind were the only method by which we could obtain renewable power in future. Surely the current oil situation should encourage equal emphasis to be placed on marine solutions. We have heard of instances when there was little or no wind, often a feature of very cold weather when energy is needed most, yet, as Canute discovered, we can rely on the tide and currents to ebb and flow every day.
Of course, there are enormous costs involved, but that was also the case with wind turbines at the beginning.
Iain Maclean, Bearsden.
Read more: Like it or not, we all have to get behind Boris Johnson
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