Re: ACTION TO AID EAST TIMOR

In "Manipulators of Mayhem" (Sept. 12), Donald K. Emmerson writes, "Anarchy reigns in East Timor." The same characterization has previously been made of such countries as Lebanon, Yugoslavia, Northern Ireland and Somalia, among others. "Anarchy" has been defined as "the absence of government," and yet it seems clear that in each of these instances--including East Timor--it has been an abundance of government, not its absence, that is responsible for the violence and butchery. Different political factions--many of them supported by arms and money from other nation-states--vie for the control of the political machinery that will impose coercive rule over millions of men and women. The explanation for such deadly disorder is to be found not in anarchy but in the nature of politics itself.

BUTLER SHAFFER
Los Angeles