Letters To The Editor

AMERICANS GRAPLE WITH THE PROSPECT OF WAR

If the Mercury News had written an editorial similar to "Balance against
terror" after Pearl Harbor, the paper would properly have been accused of
treason. Your implication that our foreign policy and failure to understand
Arab resentments were responsible for the attack on Sept. 11 desecrates the
grief of the victims' families and the heroism and courage of many of our
people.

You insinuate that the disastrous results of the embargo against Iraq and
our failure to somehow "make nice" to Muslim nations that hate us is our
fault. In one way it is. Our failure to capture or kill the war criminal
Saddam Hussein has convinced terrorists that the United States lacked the
will to defeat them.

Furthermore, we do understand the reason many extremists in that region of
the world hate the United States. We are their mortal enemy because we have
steadfastly refused to stand by while they annihilate Israel and commit
genocide against the Jews who live there. We refuse to follow the fanatics'
religious dictates that would deny women any kind of normal life.

We earn the loathing of our foes because we cherish individual freedom in
lieu of religious tyranny. Are we to abandon our ideals in an attempt to
soothe religious fanatics who will still hate us?

Joseph D. McNamara
Research fellow, Hoover Institution

Stanford University