Those who want us to be dragged into the US crusade against Iraq are a vital part of a crucial debate.

They should be encouraged to air their views. What they are not entitled to do is rewrite history.

The US entered the Second World War in December 1941 but it had nothing to do with the battle against Nazism that was taking place in Europe.

The US and Japan had been economic rivals and on December 7 the Empire of Japan made its pre-emptive strike at Pearl Harbour. But this was a Pacific war.

Such was the distrust of Europe and the power of isolationism in the US that it couldn't get into the battle against Nazism.

Hitler solved the problem for the US. He was part of the axis of evil of the time - Germany, Italy and Japan. To show solidarity with Japan, he then declared war on the US. Until D-Day in 1944, the bulk of the US war effort was directed towards the Pacific.

In the battle against the Nazis, the British bore the brunt on the western front and the Soviet Union on the eastern front.

The role of the Soviet Union has been largely forgotten these days, yet it was on the eastern front that the bulk of the German army was tied down and where the most savage battles were fought. There were 20 million Russians dead and its land scorched. Yet it was, to use Winston Churchill's words: "The Red Army who tore the guts out of the German war machine."

At the moment, the Americans are unhappy with the Russians because they are trying to build a consensus to find a peaceful solution to the Iraqi crisis.

To state these facts is not to be anti-American or to hate the American people. On the contrary, we have the true interests of that country at heart.

Its real enemies are the pro-war chauvinists on both sides of the Atlantic.

-John Hodgson, Capel Avenue, Peacehaven