"Yes, I am against war! I want my wife to be veiled and suppressed, fuck you America! Hail the tyrant! Where can I sent my donation for terror pilots?"

Is this, what you believe? Do you believe, the decision of anyone who is against war is taken lightly? Irony or no, I do see the point of your mail.

If anyone convinced me that a war on Iraq, which will, by the way, kill these "women in veil chains and their children in ignorant obedience", as well as those who keep the there, can achieve anything, I would agree that it might be necessary - although I still would consider it a great evil. But I don't think it will achieve anything. What will happen after you have won this war, I may kindly ask. Just ask. We see what happed in Afghanistan :One city which is relatively free, the rest of the country still totally out of control. And the war on Saddam will be much more difficult the situation being much more complex.

Your comparison to the liberation of Paris is utterly misleading: The people there wanted to be liberated. They could be trusted to install a democratic & fair Government after they had been liberated. They did not eventually hate their liberators.

And even on ironic terms: I don't see the joke in saying we should refrain from doing America "any great favor". Sending soldiers into death just because of a favor. What a ridiculous idea.

The lady in the harbor glistens alright. And yes, your country is more free than Saddam's. And so is mine. This is no big deal. And still the lady should be a reminder for both our countries that we could do a lot better in dealing with people criticizing our way of life; not by throwing bombs at us but by the using those peaceful means that the idea of liberty makes possible. (No, I have not forgotten the way the American Government treated socialist during the time of the first World war, virtually mocking every principle that America was claming to be fighting for. Has this attitude improved?).

I do not want to be generalizing here. This is not a matter of living in Europe or America. This is my personal Opinion versus Kate's. Being apposed to war or being in favor of it is a personal decision based on moral values or convictions. There is no other way.

In the 70th , Paul Fussel stated that "Every war constitutes an irony of situation because its means are so melodramatically disproportionate to its resumed ends." As long as you cant convince me otherwise, stop talking of "lack of oil reserves" or "lack of character reserves."

As I said before, maye I am simply missing the irony or the point of Kate's mail. If this is so, just for me, being the stupid European that I am (soory to all my intelligent fellow Europeans ;-) ), could it be made more clear?