11 SEPTEMBER 2004, Page 30

Desperately seeking war

From Ian Taylor

Sir: You write (Leading article, 28 August) that in the run-up to the war Chirac and SchrOcler were looking for 'excuses to do nothing' (as though this was somehow perverse in spite of your admission that Iraq 'posed no serious threat' to us). This is simply untrue. Pre-invasion, the French and German alternative was for Unmovic to continue their work with treble the number of inspectors and to extend the no-fly zone across the whole of Iraq. A peculiar way of doing nothing.

Meanwhile Britain and America were determined to do all they could to scupper any hope of peace, including it seems, lie to their own people, as they desperately looked for excuses to go to war.

Ian Taylor

Farnham Common, Buckinghamshire