Paul Ouimette's letter, 'US should review its policies?' (Oct 1) is a cynical one at best. If this is an example of what America thinks, I can only say that there has not been any improvement in its attitude, because that is what is wrong with the American policy today.

It is not how much aid you give but to whom and for what reason. America's aid to the third world is almost always with plenty of strings attached - mainly in terms of "America's economic and security interests".

Looking at Asia, with the exception of Japan, all of America's 'allies' - South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, Philippines, Indonesia (under Suharto) and Singapore - are dictatorships. America does not care what kind of government is in power; as long as it is pro-America it deserves America's support, and may I add, good media coverage as well.

If you are not pro-America, even a democratically elected government may become the target of adverse publicity, disinformation, etc. As the ex-PM of Singapore used to say many years ago, all you need to do is to wear a white hat and stand up proclaiming you are anti-communist and the American president will hug you!

In South Korea the military government slaughtered a few thousand students at Kwang-Jiu. But the matter has been allowed to die a quiet death.

In contrast, the Tiananmen Square massacre in China gets resurrected several times a year.

Americans killed millions in Vietnam and turned huge tracts of jungle into deserts with Agent Orange - what was left behind caused thousands of deformed infants.

Now the US government tells Vietnam that if it wants to trade with it, it must improve its civil rights record!

What civil rights are Americans talking about? Even in the US, the civil rights situation is in tatters. The sheer hypocrisy of it all is astounding.