NOBODY can fail to have been deeply moved by the loss of the Russian submarine Kursk and the horrible deaths of all the men who sailed in her.

Yes, there was muddle and delay, and many in Russia, not least families of those lost, will be asking questions about how the news came out, and whether international help at an earlier stage could have saved any of the submariners.

But we should perhaps be asking a more fundamental question: What is the use and purpose of these vast, cumbersome, technologically-advanced and enormously expensive vessels? Have they any place in a world struggling to move away from war and confrontation into a new sort of globalism and co-operation?

In this International Year For Culture And Peace do we need submarines any more? Our own Trident subs exist only to carry the threat of nuclear retaliation to any part of the globe. No doubt they also carry out spying missions, as do the submarines of other states. Isn't it time to declare all such vessels outmoded, obsolete and a danger to peace?

This would be a big gesture of openness and trust and a declaration that we believe spying, war and vast expenditure on war preparations are out of place in this new century.

Joyce Pickard,

Saville Grove, York.