SIR - As an unapologetic nationalist, I side fully with Paul Collins (T&A, January 16) and his more reasonable appraisal of imperialism, given in response to Eric Firth's scathing attack on Britain, the British Empire and nationalism (T&A, January 11).

Countries as far apart as Nigeria and New Zealand owe their existence to the British Empire. They were created by the British, and it is to a British-style educational, judicial, civil and parliamentary system these independent nations now cling.

The statesman Joseph Chamberlain said in 1895 that he believed the English to be: "The greatest governing race the world has ever seen." His words may sound empty and hollow to committed socialists like Eric Firth, living in our politically sanitised world, but Chamberlain's prediction that Britain would be the predominant force in the history of universal civilization has, for better or worse, turned out to be true.

Nationalism and the concept of the nation-state may, as demonstrated in modern Turkey, be the only answer to religious fundamentalism and extremism.

The anti-Western rhetoric and fanaticism, driven by religious hatred and intolerance, poses a far bigger threat to world stability than the British Empire ever did.

Andrew Clarke (The English Democrats candidate, Wibsey) Halifax Road, Bradford