The arms race

Press, 16 December 1985, Page 12

The arms race

Sir,—The world is spending JUSIOOM an hour on munitions, and a visiting American professor stated that 50 per cent of all qualified scientists and engineers in his country are employed in the

military industrial industry. Yet anyone who speaks out against this waste of material and human resources is treated as suspect or some sort of a wet. Sir Leonard Thornton and his 17 cohorts who have all contributed in even a small measure to this present state of madness should get behind the present Government in its bid to bring sanity back into world relationship instead of creating more pessimism by parroting Pentagon propaganda. Why do they not tell us who is going to attack us, and how such an attack would be mounted and sustained over thousands of miles of supply lines, and what the objective of such an attack would be? We could then judge their credibility for ourselves, or see if they are just promoting their stock in trade. — Yours, etc., E. L. BARCLAY. December 12, 1985.