Sir, - On the tired but important question, "Were the Blueshirts a fascist movement?", writing history should mean going to the sources. Anyone who takes the trouble to read the movement's paper The Blueshirt will be in no doubt about the deeply anti-democratic stance of its leadership. As for "an overriding adherence to democratic means" (Dr Mike Cronin, February 1st), the 1930s meant street (and field) politics, and the means could be rough, in Ireland as elsewhere.Comparing the Blueshirts to Hitler's Brownshirts, as some historians have done, is barking up the wrong tree. Dictators in strongly Catholic countries such as Italy and Spain were admired in Ireland then (and since) and provide a better idea of what might have transpired here given the extreme and often violent forms of some Catholic "action" in the early free State period.What stood between the Blueshirts and some form of power was firstly their inept leadership and lack of a Statewide populist organisation, such as Fianna Fail then had. Secondly, they could not tap into nationalism as easily as some European fascist movements, given the different versions of Free State and Fianna Fail/Republican nationalism. With the benefit of hindsight, we know the Blueshirts did not succeed; this does not necessarily mean that they were bound not to. - is mise,Eamon O Ciosain, Weston Park, Lucan, Co Dublin.