Abysmal ignorance

Like many of the anti-war protesters, I was alive during the Second World War and like them, I was opposed to the illegal attack on Iraq.

To make any comparison between Hitler and Saddam Hussein is to display an abysmal ignorance of two totally different situations.

Hitler was a serious menace with powerful and well-equipped armed forces.

He was already in the process of occupying the whole of Europe when the UK and France declared war.

It took five-and-a-half years to defeat him.

Saddam, on the other hand, was a menace only to his own people. He was defeated in two totally one-sided engagements.

If he had had weapons of mass destruction, it was because they were supplied by the US and UK in support of his war against Iran.

That is a fact that your warmongering correspondents tend to forget.

As for terrorism, it is time for a sense of proportion.

It is a futile gesture -- small groups of extremists killing small groups of civilians and leaving the rest of the country totally unaffected while the Government does their work for them by exaggerating the true level of the danger.

George Bush has exploited 9.11 to justify a massive and crippling expenditure on arms to protect the most invulnerable nation on earth.

GERALD SAMSON

Preston Road

Abingdon