18 MAY 1962, Page 14

Ste,—Nicolas Walter maintains that the pro- gramme Anti-American Attitudes, which

I edited, was 'misleading and irrelevant' because none of the speakers were anti-American. By this argument, any programme on anti-Semitism which did not present the views of an anti-Dreyfusard and an SS concen- tration camp guard would also be 'misleading and irrelevant.'

It is extremely difficult to find anyone in this country (who is not .crazy) who will come out and say, '1 am anti-American.' The usual, and tediously familiar, form is: 'Some of my best friends are Americans but. . . .' After which there comes the ill-informed and emotional malice which the con- tributors to the programme in question discussed in what were surely objective and dispassionate terms.

CONSTANTINE FITZGIBBON