Consider boycotting Dutch consumer goods for the Dutch government's military support for the U. S. and British imperial occupation of Iraq.

To the Editor:

The Dutch government has joined the neo-colonial British and American governments in their suppression of the Iraqi people by their sending of one thousand "peacekeeping" troops to southern Iraq. (Story in San Francisco Chronicle, page A15, 2 August 2003). This action is in line with traditional Dutch imperialism: in the early 1920's the Dutch received a quarter of the Iraqi oil reserves after World War I. The British had invaded and conquered the Iraqi portion of the former Turkish Ottoman Empire, after the Empire's collapse at the end of World War I. The other colonial powers, the British, the French and the Americans also got a quarter share of Iraqi oil.

Perhaps Americans that oppose the continuing American military occupation of Iraq should express this attitude by boycotting consumer products from the Dutch Netherlands. The Dutch export tulips, other flowers, seeds, chocolate and other food products.

Yours truly,

James K. Sayre

2 August 2003