Letter: We could stand alone on defence

JOHN Kelly (Letters 7th August) was surely being ironic when he made demeaning comments about a defence force for an independent Scotland. Has he recently looked at the continuing and continuous contraction of the British armed forces?

Scotland, as admitted by none other than Secretary of State for Defence, Liam Fox, has contributed disproportionately to Britain's defence budget in terms of deployment of assets sited in Scotland. An independent Scotland could afford defence forces within the amount we currently send to the Ministry of Defence - the figures are in the public domain.

These forces would be used for defence and participate in peacekeeping operations as part of the United Nations, and hopefully young people in our military will be contributing to a better world rather than being exploited in a vain attempt to achieve Britain's post-empire ambitions.

Mr Kelly can be further assured that Scotland will not be invading Iraq or Afghanistan, conducting futile bombing operations over Libya, nor will it need nuclear armed submarines in the Clyde to protect some of the poorest people in Europe.

While it is estimated that Scotland could afford such defence forces, we will, unfortunately, be unable to afford aircraft carriers - with or without aircraft.

Bill McLean, Dunfermline