HAVING seen the article on the anti-nuclear protesters in the Citizen (August 12), I would like to highlight the other side of this argument.

It's all very well for these people to go around waving banners about all things nuclear, but have people of this persuasion ever considered the fact that if their grandfathers had been required to invade mainland Japan, the projected casualties would have gone into the millions as opposed to the approximate 500,000 killed by both (small) atomic blasts.

Also, they fail to realise that Preston had at least three thermonuclear warheads aimed at sites in and around the town which would, if given the opportunity, have been levelled by the Soviet Union without a moment's hesitation.

This is not Cold War propaganda, or an opinion that war is anything but horrific; it is common sense combined with the facts and a secure knowledge that an effective nuclear deterrent has ensured that we still have a Preston to protest in!

Paul Cushion

Address supplied

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.