Sir, - As an American living in Ireland for several years, I would like to congratulate Kevin Myers for his clear and concise analysis of the current crisis facing the world and the resulting media coverage in Ireland (An Irishman's Diary, September 20th).
Mr Myers has summed up the feelings of many Americans living here regarding the many years of "sanctimonious posturing of professional US-bashers in Irish life" which we have had to endure. However, we Americans are guests in Ireland and must keep our voices muted. Many of us simply bite our tongues.
Typical of this US-bashing is the assertion that all problems in the world lie with US foreign policy, yet if the US does not intervene nothing gets done at all. And if the US leaves problems to others, especially in areas such as Northern Ireland, Americans are accused of being isolationist.
This logic is the equivalent of a witch trial. If the person accused of witchcraft sinks in the vat of water, then she is not a witch (although she is dead from drowning). If she floats, then she is a witch and must be burned at the stake. Either way, the person accused is dead.
In the same edition of your paper, on the opposite page, Fintan O'Toole talks about the economics of outrage, asserting, with the usual witchcraft argument, that more people probably died in the Srebrenice massacre than in the World Trade Centre. That is probably true, but was Fintan O'Toole in the front line of sorting out the Balkans? No. Neither was I. But my country, America, was.
Was the rest of Europe capable of sorting out the horrible atrocities occurring in Bosnia? No. It required the US to take a lead role and insist that Europe commit troops. As I recall, Europe would not even consider committing troops unless the US did so. The economics of the outrage come from the fact that the US usually must take the lead in these problems because Europe (with the possible exception of France) does not. And the thanks that the US gets for taking the lead is a plane being flown into the WTC and the moralising of Mr O'Toole.
While we can tolerate Mr O'Toole (with an empty stomach), we cannot tolerate the kind of terrorism we saw last week. We Americans did not tolerate it in the Balkans, either.
What we want to know is whether Ireland will continue to sit on the fence and deliver the typical "platitudinous lectures" as in the past, or if Ireland will stand with us. Most Americans see no room for being on the fence. Ireland is either with America or it is not.
The old way of a "diseased and querulous neutralism" will indicate that Ireland is not. Mr Myers is one of the few Irish media commentators to see this simple truth. - Yours, etc.,
James Young, Chairman, Republicans Abroad - Ireland, Skerries, Co Dublin.