Daily Mail – 25 August 2005

There is nothing new in Andrew Alexander's attempt (Mail, August 19) to blame the Americans for starting the Cold War by unnecessarily using the atomic bomb against Japan to frighten the Russians.

That thesis was put forward by a far-Left historian 40 years ago. It is false. The responsibility for starting the Cold War lay in Soviet flouting of the Declaration on Liberated Europe, well before the dropping of the bombs, by imposing communist control in Eastern Europe, most notably in Poland.

For all Mr Alexander's talk of Japanese 'peace feelers', the rejection by the Japanese of the 1945 Potsdam Ultimatum, which accurately warned them to expect 'prompt and utter destruction' unless they surrendered, made use of the atomic bomb inevitable.

Dr JULIAN LEWIS MP
House of Commons
London SW1A 0AA