Sir, - Daniel Keohane (World View, May 12th) seeks to present the Nice Treaty as an innocuous document without implications for Ireland's military neutrality beyond those already contained in the Maastricht and Amsterdam treaties: "The EU's new [military structures] were agreed at the Helsinki summit. . .but they are not in the Nice Treaty. . ." However, they are certainly enshrined in the seven annexes to the French Presidency Report at Nice, which are not easily accessible to the public - a dimension of secrecy that in itself should prompt rejection of the Nice Treaty as it stands. These annexes bear such headings as "The development of military capabilities", "Permanent arrangement for EU-NATO consultation and co-operation", and "Inclusion in the EU of the appropriate functions of the WEU" - the now defunct NATO-linked body that, significantly, published Mr Keohane's study "Realigning Neutrality?"
Mr Keohane suggests that the appointment of a neutral Finnish general as head of the EU's military committee proves its independence from NATO, without mentioning that the new EU foreign policy supremo is Javier Solana, former Secretary General of NATO. These elisions and half-truths are characteristic of the tactics employed by supporters of the project of European militarisation and privatisation.
At the heart of Mr Keohane's argument is the old truism that "traditional neutrality is a relic of the Cold War". However, the Cold War was a phony war waged in the interests of the military-industrial complex. Its purported ending has not led to the disbandment of NATO but to a whole new range of pretexts for militaristic expansion, depending on which of the US's former clients can at any given moment be re-designated as an enemy.
In the face of this cynical process, it is imperative that Ireland should retain an independent foreign policy. Regardless of whether or not the term "neutrality" is replaced by "non-alignment", it is clear that the real enemy of the new Eurocrats (who are simultaneously NATOcrats) is precisely such independence. - Yours, etc.,
Raymond Deane, Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.