Madam, - Laurence Power (October 3rd) is wrong when he claims there is no comparison between George Bush and Harry Truman. There is one important area of office where both men can be compared — that of weapons of mass destruction.
Bush ordered an invasion of Iraq to seek weapons of mass destruction, but found none. Truman, who had weapons of mass destruction, used them on an already defeated foe - Japan. This was probably the worst single act of mass murder in history.
The old argument that the dropping of "Little Boy" on Hiroshima and "Fat Man" on Nagasaki was to designed to bring Japan to its knees and save 500,000 US lives has been long discredited. The real reason, it appears, was to demonstrate to Stalin and his generals that America had such weapons and was willing to use them.
As for Mr Power's claim that Truman was the best 20th-century US president, tell that to the families of the US, the British, the Australian and Dutch soldiers, who, being used as slave labour at the Mitsubishi heavy-industry plant in Nagasaki, died in the atomic bombing of that city. - Yours, etc,
A.F. MacGABHANN,
Herbert Road,
Bray, Co Wicklow.