Letters: We cannot contemplate indyref2 while a madman threatens atomic war

First, they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out because I was not a socialist,

Then they came for the trade unions and I did not speak out because I was not a trade unionist,

Then they came for the Jews and I did not speak out, because I was not a Jew,

Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.

Mr Mackay is right to agree with Ian Blackford, "that we have got to be respectful of the situation we are in". We are faced with the threat of a possible atomic war because a madman who apparently thinks he is God is armed to the teeth with weapons of mass destruction and is taunting the world with the fact.

Ruth Marr, Stirling.

WE ARE NOT PUTIN APOLOGISTS

I WAS disappointed in the simplistic and close-to-warmongering article by the usually thoughtful Neil Macky, a columnist I always read with interest and a good deal of agreement.

First, he argues the equivalence of the "comfy left and right" as being "useful idiot" stooges for Vladimir Putin. I find it quite offensive and lazy when journalists argue like this. I am of the left and have attended three public "left" events recently. At all of them, there was strong condemnation of Putin and the Russian invasion, a demand for troops out of Ukraine now, full support for the Ukranian resistance and the anti-war protests in Russia and a call for Britain to do its bit for refugees. There were differences of opinion on whether sanctions did any good in this case or made it harder for ordinary Russians to combat Putin’s regime – a legitimate argument and hardly support for Putin. There were also calls to try to understand the whole issue as wider than just an irrational and unstable man and his supporters organising an invasion.

This is where Mr Mackay is a bit simplistic. Putin’s war and Nato expansion have to be seen as two sides of the same coin. Mr Mackay, who knows a lot about history, would scoff at the idea, put about at the time, that the First World War was about a shot in Sarajevo or about plucky little Belgium. Everyone now agrees it was about imperial antagonisms. People who argued it then were called "useful idiots" and stooges for Germany. Likewise this. I expect better from Mr Mackay than the first shot theory of history.

Finally, I applaud and agree with his instincts of wanting to do something to help the Ukrainians, but he comes dangerously close to calling for a Nato intervention which, we might assume, threatens World War Three. For him, this is a gamble worth taking – as he puts it "stand up to…and hope he (Putin) backs down". I’m less of a gambler I think than he and I hope most people are. It doesn’t make us apologists for Putin.

Emeritus Professor Henry Maitles, Glasgow.

IRELAND PUTS US TO SHAME

THIS morning (March 8) the Irish Government confirmed that more than 2,300 Ukrainian citizens had arrived in in Ireland and been welcomed into Irish households and hotels across the country under the EU’s Temporary Humanitarian Directive – which grants them freedom to live and work in Ireland. Many more are on their way to Ireland today and will be warmly welcomed, despite the mean-spirited UK Government grumblings about the "security threat" posed to the UK from war refugees living in the common UK-IRL travel area.

This in stark contrast to the 300 or so refugees (Priti Patel and Boris Johnson don’t seem to know exactly) permitted entry into the UK to date. And also to the Westminster Government’s pretence at setting up a "pop-up" UK entry point in Calais – which in reality was just a desk and sign directing Ukrainians (mainly women and children fleeing a war zone) to UK embassies more than 100 miles away in Brussels and Paris to process their applications.

As a Scot I feel a deep sense of outrage at this state of affairs and shame at being British and our inability to match the hospitality of our Irish neighbours. Once again it is clear to all that the post-Brexit GB is a selfish, isolated pariah state, with no close friends or partners here in Europe.

Despite his Churchillian fantasies, Mr Johnson is irrelevant in the developing geopolitical situation at our continent’s eastern end. Within western leaders, only Emmanuel Macron is keeping the hotline open to Vladimir Putin with regular direct telephone calls between them continuing through the crisis to listen to what Mr Putin has to say and assess his state of mind and liaise closely with Anthony Blinken and Joe Biden in the US.

Even the UK’s attempts to impose economic sanctions are currently being watered down by Mr Johnson for British self-interest. The so-called Economic Crime Bill being introduced this week in Westminster, designed to strip wealth from the London proceeds of international criminal money laundering of property and assets, deliberately leaves an "oligarch loophole" – an exemption where "to do so would support the economic wellbeing of the UK". Unsurprisingly the British Government cannot be relied on to do even this.

It is to be hoped that the Scottish Government will do everything in its (UK-limited) power to ensure that as many Ukrainian war refugees are welcomed into Scotland over the coming days/weeks. However the stark contrast with Ireland’s ability to quickly mobilise its resources, is a reminder of how the UK renders Scotland impotent and marginalised within the UK.

Diarmid Jamieson, Dunbar.

SAVE CHILDREN, THEN THE PLANET

A YEAR ago when our spaniel broke a bone in her foot our lead walks led us to Cathcart Cemetery, where there are many headstones of those lost in the first and second world wars.

It is extremely sad to see the young age at which these service men and women died, particularly in the First World War where, tragically, there are some headstones with more than one son “lost but not forgotten”.

It seems, however, there continues a trait of bombing civilians with women and children taking the brunt of the indiscriminate action. Systematic bombing of cities during the Second World War seems to have galvanised nations into following suit with North Korea and Vietnam and later, by the West in Iraq and the Saudis in Yemen. Now the Russians in Ukraine.

Your pages recently have been full of climate change articles but, in my view, the whole concept of climate change is a busted flush; a complete waste of time.

There is no point in looking at saving the planet when we cannot take care of our greatest natural resource – our children.

Ken Mackay, Glasgow.

DISARMAMENT IN CONTEXT

THE current war in Ukraine has quite rightly prompted much debate about nuclear weapons and their effect as deterrents.

As a much younger man, I set out full of moral purpose to convince people to vote Labour in the 1983 General Election and thereby to achieve unilateral nuclear disarmament. To my disappointment, a grateful electorate did not respond kindly on the doorstep; of their arguments, two remain with me particularly strongly. First, I met an elderly gentleman who had been a prisoner of war in the Far East: he was grateful for the bombs dropped on Japanese cities because he knew that he would have been murdered by his captors had a conventional invasion of their country taken place.

Second, and probably more relevantly for today, the question asked by many voters was "why should we get rid of our weapons while our enemies keep theirs?" I still often wonder why opinion polling on disarmament is not always phrased in those terms. I cannot think that anyone actually wants nuclear weapons, but at the same time I am pretty confident that they would not like to be left defenceless either.

For the record, my own position is that I would support UK nuclear disarmament as long as it was executed under a legitimate parliamentary mandate, that is, either having been the subject of a manifesto commitment by the party of government, or being voted through on a bi-partisan or free vote of MPs. Such a big step needs the support of the people to justify taking risks on their behalf. I am afraid that Vladimir Putin has made that consent much less likely.

Peter A Russell, Glasgow.

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