Major mistake to expand NATO

To reply to David Spencer’s belief [Letters, March 7] that I have “misunderstood the logical reason for the UK’S nuclear deterrence in today’s world”, I would tell him that I have been a member of CND for several decades, was a national council member for several years, and am an active member of Kent Area CND. So I am well aware of the issues.

David Topple[letters, March 7] made the important point that Russia has been made to feel threatened by the preponderance of NATO bases in Europe.

In 1990 the U.S. Secretary of State (James Baker), the Soviet leader (Gorbachev), and the German chancellor (Helmut Kohl) agreed that “NATO should not expand its sphere of activity”, that there should be “not one inch” of expansion to the east.

If the West remembers how threatened America felt when in 1962 there was the Cuban Missile crisis, a near-miss of nuclear strikes, the West would understand how Russia must be feeling.

By now, there are US, UK, German, French, and Canadian troops in Romania, Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and Bulgaria.

It should have been foreseen that Russia would feel vulnerable. I am not an apologist for Russia, just trying to unravel the history of events.

We have got into this drastic situation now. We in CND at least hope that it will remind people that we should do all that we can to reduce nuclear weapons, and encourage other states (as well as our own!) to do so by signing the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

We all have to do what we feel is best for promoting world peace. Marilyn Sansom

Old Wives Lees

■ Three quick points in reply to Bob Britnell [Letters, March 31].

He says that he fears I am “one of those who support Russia” and implies that I would have been a supporter of the Soviet Union.

He has absolutely no grounds for saying this, nothing could be further from the truth, and I would appreciate it if he would withdraw the suggestion.

I realise the danger of appeasing a dictatorship. Ukraine had no choice but to resist the Russian invasion. We must hope that they succeed, and that they do so as soon as possible.

But all wars are terrible, this one is no exception, and we continue to live with the prospect that it might escalate to the use of nuclear weapons.

That risk will continue into the future for as long as there are unpredictable rulers who have the power to launch a nuclear attack and may be tempted to do so.

How do we get to a world where we no longer have to live with that risk? That was what my previous letter was about.

Mr Britnell says: “Going nuclear weapon free is only practical if everybody on the globe goes nuclear free.” Again, that was the point of my previous letter.

The UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is a treaty open to every country in the world to sign – a global treaty.

Getting the existing nuclear weapon states to sign up to it will be a long, slow and arduous process, but it is the only sane route to follow. If the UK were to switch to promoting it rather than denouncing it, that would be a start.

Richard Norman

St Michael’s Place, Canterbury