Britain was not fighting for rights of independent democratic nations

Much has been written about the courage of deserters, by commentators who have not the moral courage to face unwelcome facts.

Dan Buckley (Irish Examiner, Jul 2) is apparently unaware that during the Second World War democrats such as Nehru and Gandhi were interned without trial in India, whose British rulers’ agenda did not include the Independence of their country, nor that the Battle of Kohima was fought to keep India British.

It might be added that De Gaulle’s Free French were no less intent on re-imposing French rule on their Asian and African colonies against the will of their inhabitants than Churchill was to see the British hold on to her own empire. The Belgians and the Dutch were not champions of human rights in their empires either.

So why should we kid ourselves that it’s a holy and a wholesome thing for an Irishman to desert the army of his own sovereign, independent and democratic State to join that of an empire intent on maintaining its ill-gotten gains?

Your Editorial (Jul 2) praises the forthright acceptance by David Cameron of the Savile Enquiry’s report.

But neither Cameron nor Savile could find it in their backbones to condemn the Widgery Enquiry, nor to recommend the planners and perpetrators of the Bloody Sunday massacres be brought to justice.

Nor could you summon up the natural curiosity of a journalist, to ask how Lt Col Widgery was appointed OBE, an Order of Chivalry, by Queen Elizabeth before the earth had settled on the graves of the innocents killed on Bloody Sunday, and retains his OBE to this day?

Donal Kennedy

Palmers Green

London