Letter: Victors in war pay a high price

BAILEY MORRIS is unfair to Norman Angell (whom she calls Wayne) over his prophetic book The Great Illusion ('War talk no one can afford', Business, 21 March). He did not claim that war had been made impossible by the growth of economic interdependence; rather that it was an 'economic impossibility' for 'one nation to seize the wealth of another, or for one nation to enrich itself by subjugating another'.

Sir Norman was, therefore, not 'proved wrong' by the First World War, as Morris claims, but absolutely right. The countries at war impoverished each other, and part of the taxes we still pay today are meeting interest on the national debt that our government, a victor in that war, incurred. Most governments now accept his analysis.

Michael Steed

Canterbury, Kent