Sir, - Lara Marlowe's piece "Only diplomacy can save NATO's tarnished honour" (The Irish Times, May 3rd) is perhaps the clearest piece of analysis of the Balkan crisis and NATO's cowardly policies to date.
NATO's bombardments have indeed been catastrophic for all concerned, all the more so when it is realised that the "cowards way out - bombing from high altitudes with minimal risk" was never going to defeat Milosevic. It seems that NATO has indeed been outmanoeuvred in this macabre chess game in which the pawns are innocent civilians.
When will NATO admit its tactical blunder in not sending in a ground force seven weeks ago? When will it pluck up the courage to admit that the real reason it won't send in ground forces is that it is terrified of NATO casualties?
It is one thing to drop bombs and rockets from the safety of a high-speed, high-spec aircraft and then scurry back to base in Italy. It is something else to march into the country and confront the Serbians eyeball to eyeball - which is what has to be done to protect ethnic Albanians from continuing genocide.
Perhaps modern-day armies are now kept just for show and not for the protection of innocent populations. Perhaps the sophisticated machinery of war is just one huge collection of toys for the big boys to play with. Now one of the smaller boys has called their bluff and they are afraid to play hard ball because it is far too dangerous. If we have any vestiges of decency or respect for human rights left in us we must demand that the ethnic Albanians are afforded the protection on the ground that they deserve.
NATO's cowardly approach has already wasted far too many lives. - Yours, etc.,
John O'Shea, Goal, Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.