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4 hours ago
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In our crazy, unregulated world, we watch the unedifying spectacle of two rogue nations, each awash with nuclear weapons, going to war to stop a third rogue nation from acquiring similar weaponry (Editorial, 30 March). The resulting conflict is bringing chaos, death and destruction to the Middle East, and instability and unknowable consequences to the rest of us.
If this is the new “world order”, where rogue nations are free to pick and choose their next acquisitions, it surely gives the green light to those with more legitimate claims – China with Taiwan, Spain with Gibraltar, Argentina with the Falklands. So, what can be done to halt this descent into madness?
The UK has waning influence on the world stage and our political classes are dangerously intertwined with both aggressors, leaving them with very little room for manoeuvre at a national level.
It is left to us as individuals to do what we can, and I suggest we learn from the successful campaign against apartheid in South Africa. There, a boycott of products from that country and a cricket embargo was instrumental in changing minds. A healthy swerving of US and Israeli products and services, combined with a disengagement from this summer’s Fifa World Cup, might begin to persuade both nations to rethink their antagonism to those of us beyond their shores.
David Tayler
Bristol
Your editorial lays out the difficult issues currently facing the US and Iran succinctly and clearly, which is why, in my opinion, it fails to encapsulate the spirit of this rampage in the Middle East. Succinct and clear are not the hallmarks of Donald Trump’s campaign of vengeance and retribution. The name of this campaign, Epic Fury, says it all. This name represents the hyperbolic truth. Ideas of achieving nuclear compliance and regime change were just grist to throw into the media mill. The only purpose of this destabilising, chaotic war is to vent ire and demonstrate God’s wrath. It’s Trump’s way of booking a gold-tap suite in Hotel Heaven.
You may laugh, but there is some serious craziness in Trump’s methods. He didn’t spend all that time and effort building an obedient rightwing regime to spread democracy and fairness for all. He’s on a crusade. Earning atonement for all his multifarious transgressions. This murderous malarkey is earning him divine credits. He’ll stop when he’s bored with kicking the heathens around. Then he’ll get on with making America and crypto great again.
Peter Gregory
Marsham, Norfolk
Your editorial observes that the Iran war “should never have been started. The threat was not imminent, the objectives unclear and the justification fell apart under scrutiny.” This begs the question of why Keir Starmer does not now stand with Spain and deny the US military use of UK airspace. Despite an initial withholding of our bases from the US, we have, as in Gaza, quietly caved in to Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu’s perception that war and the threat of war is a replacement for diplomacy.
The disaster for our economy and that of Europe could last for years. What we are being drawn into is profoundly immoral and profoundly illegal. It is not too late to U-turn and enforce our dissent.
Rev Graham Murphy
Liverpool
China, as you say in your editorial (26 March), “shows no interest in stepping up” to mediate in the Iran war. The question is why. Beijing repeatedly claims to practise “major country diplomacy” and yet fails to do so constructively. It’s similar to the Ukraine war, where China seems constrained by the Xi-Putin relationship to do nothing more than issue vague statements.
The immediate advantages to China of letting two wars continue should be outweighed by the global benefits of peace. Friends of China (there are still quite a few) and governments with a voice there should be pressing Beijing to play the role it claims in both crises.
John Gittings
Former East Asia editor, the Guardian
