European Single Currency

Sir, - Your description (Editorial, May 4th) of the Euro as "an unprecedented experiment of supranational cooperation", lacks…

Sir, - Your description (Editorial, May 4th) of the Euro as "an unprecedented experiment of supranational cooperation", lacks clarity, conciseness and truth. The Euro will, like ERM and EMU and all other failed "European initiatives", prove an unmitigated disaster, economically, socially and politically.

Economically, it will lead to a weak currency, inflation and repeated devaluations until the currency will "stand face-to-face" not with the dollar, but with the bhat, the zloty and the ruble. Socially, it will cause greater and greater alienation as people will feel ever more remote from institutions they have no control over. Politically it will hasten the day when fascist dictatorship will appear to be the only "sensible" solution to rising unemployment, communal disintegration, racial and religious conflict. Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad. Every previous empire has founded a single currency only to see it fall to inflation and devaluation. Dura lex, sed lex.

The sooner Ireland opts out of the EU and joins NAFTA the better. - Yours, etc., Herb Meyer

Seacrest, Barna Road, Galway.