Sir, - So, according to Harold Evans, "the American people have sustained Western civilisation by acts of courage, generosity, and vision unparalleled in world history."
The key words in Mr Evans's essay are "Western civilisation". The "other people" living outside this geographical state of mind - i.e., the people of, let's say, Hiroshima, South America, and Vietnam, who are not worthy of having their civilisation sustained, find themselves on the receiving end of atomic bombs, massive human rights abuses, and in the case of the Vietnamese an attempt to carpet-bomb an entire country back into the stone age.
I wonder what these people would have to say about American acts of "generosity" unparalleled in world history. - Yours, etc.,
Bernard O Neill, Dooradoyle, Limerick.