I AM quite convinced that the mistake that our post-war governments have made is their obsession with Britain's sovereignty, and this obsession is still with us today.

"For years the country has been bombarded with Tory propaganda about being a Great Power. The only Western European nation to have won the war, we were superior to the French, the Germans, the Italians, the Belgians and the Dutch. We had a special relationship with the Americans. We were the mother country of the Empire and, above all, we had the nuclear bomb -- the status symbol of the 20th century in Tory eyes.

"This disastrous attitude has completely misled the country, apart from its encouragement of nationalistic tendencies in other countries. Even now the Tories cling to the belief that we have and need an independent nuclear deterrent and, as a result, the French now have a bomb. If they go on preaching this doctrine, the Germans will get a bomb, then the Swedes, then the Israelis. The South American Republics will get one. Nasser will get one, and where on earth will we be then?"

I did not write the above paragraphs today. They formed part of a speech made by me on behalf of the Liberals at Bolton's Open Forum at Bank Street School in 1962. It has taken a little longer for the worst to happen -- if it has? Nasser did not get one. Eisenhower stopped our perfidious aggression to topple him at Suez. Now Bush thinks that Saddam has got one. Are we not entitled to oppose his Suez-like behaviour, until there is proof that his proposed aggression is not also just intended to cause a regime change? War against Nasser proved unnecessary. War against Saddam may also be. There is a danger of us being bulldozed into a war which is not of our choosing and not -- on the basis of the evidence so far -- vital to our national interests. Let us allow the inspectors to continue their work in the hope that they can ensure that Saddam has no weapons of mass destruction. It is quite possible that Bush may turn out to be a latter-day Anthony Eden.

BW Tyas Cooper

Breckland Drive

Heaton, Bolton