But not necessarily incorrect, and a whole lot more reputable than an anonymous poster on a message board.
On our local news last night they were talking about erecting a statue to Maggie in her home town of Grantham. “Roll up, roll up, get your rotten fruit here.”
There’s a link in that other wiki link that suggests Operation Journeyman should have been more forceful in ousting Argentinians from the island of Southern Thule, something which egged them onto invading years later.
Let me get this straight Quartz.
David Owen on national tv confirmed that three missions to deter Aregntine aggression took place prior to 1982.
You have links that confirm the presence of Operation Journeyman.
You then post a short passage from report that merely states that the modern administration of Argentina bears no responsibility for the past Argentine aggression, you have not put up anything from the Franks report that actually clears Thatcher.
You then go on to cite Thatchers autobiography, and yet somehow, I’m the one that’s being biased ?
I have provided you with cites, and also with the name of the person that sent me to the Falklands, and if you care to email David Owens office, you will certainly recieve a reply from there confirming his role.
Do you deny the 1982 Tory adminsitration was at 20% and less in the polls, because that is very easy to verify.
The Franks report came out when Thacther was at the height of her powers, there was no distance historically between the time of the inquiry and the war itself, and who made the apppointments to that board of inquiry ?
There are others who take a differant view to this report,
There was criticism levelled at James Callaghan’s government for sending out the wrong messages to the Argentine government, Falkland Islanders campaigned for years for HMS Endurance to be replaced before it was due forscrapping, but I still don’t see how our intelligence which had worked well previously would suddenly break down.
If you look at the Franks report, it apparently clears Thatcher in the last few paragraphs, and yet…and yet throughout the rest of the report it states that intelligence systems were working properly, and there are lots of other referances that are quite at odds with the conclusion.
http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0020-5850(198322)59%3A3<453%3AHFWF>2.0.CO%3B2-7&size=LARGE
Casdave, you have provided your experience. Multiple times. You persist in repeating it to obfuscate the issue. Your visit to the Falkands in the 70s is a completely seperate event. You have provided nothing which shows that Mrs Thatcher knew that the Argentines were going to invade and you have provided nothing which shows that she let them.
Provide evidence, not conspiracy. Let’s see a memo or something. Put up or shut up.
Nice try. I said that she was more reputable than an anonymous poster on a board.
Now provide us with evidence of her complicity.
You might note that Martin Middlebrook (The Falklands War), and Max Hastings and Simon Jenkins (The Battle for the Falklands) both disagree with you.
Max Hastings ???
Your evidence pretty much comes from Thatcherite apologists.
James Callaghan takes a differant view over the Franks report, there are others.
You really don’t expect a Thatcher b autobiography to report such do you ?
Please explain how our intelligence failed on a foruth occasion when on three previous occasions it had been successful, to the point that the ministers in position took action ?
Or put it another way, why didn’t Thatcher take action whenn informed by our intelligence services ?
If you say its because King cock-up rules, that in itself is a huge indictment, you have to remember that when these summary reports are delivered, they also inclue a briefing about past history and actions.
:dubious: Pot, meet kettle.
You have persisted in trying to link the Falklands conflict (regardless of any side discussion on the validity of it) with the fall of the Soviet Union with nothing more than a vague, completely noncausal appeal to the “psychological” boost of the victory in recapturing a collection of small South Atlantic islands, yet you fail to follow through on any logical chain that results in an impact upon the Politburo or any of the primary factors (internal economy, trade deficit, retirement/death of hardline ideologues, increased political agitation by client states for greater autonomy, reprecussions from the Afghanistan Conflict, et cetera.) You have persisted in obfuscating this issue. As far as I can tell (and in the predominiant view among historians and political theoriests) the Soviet Union was in economic freefall and was suffering erosion of central control long before Thatcher took office, and certainly before the Falklands ever became an issue. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn certainly had far more to do with turning public opinion in the West against the Soviet Union, and much earlier, than anything that came from the mouths of Reagan or Thatcher. Hell, John le Carre could probably be credited with having more influence than Thatcher in that regard. So put up a causitive link, or stop mumbling about “psychological impact”.
As for the domestic effect of the Falklands War, I’ll leave that to those posters who were there to expound, but the predominant, if anecdotal, opinion here seems to be that it was a needless cockup.
Stranger
[QUOTE=Stranger On A TrainYou have persisted in trying to link the Falklands conflict … with the fall of the Soviet Union with nothing more than a vague, completely noncausal appeal to the “psychological” boost of the victory in recapturing a collection of small South Atlantic islands[/QUOTE]
I suppose quoting Mrs Thatcher herself is not good enough?
You may disagree with my cite, but at least I have one. And, of course, I lived through the period. Unlike some here I am able to see both the good she did and the bad (poll tax, anyone?), and make a reasoned judgement. My admiration of her is not blind.
How about if I started quoting from the Communist Manifesto? Mein Kampf?
Taxi for Mr Godwin
I’m not going to bite. But if they were relevant, then why shouldn’t you cite them?
Because you’re using the quotation in a circuitious argument, using Maggie’s rose-tinted memoirs as evidence for the impact of her actions.
Well, I could also have pointed out that the British were so disheartened that we re-elected her with a thumping majority, that she forged a very close relationship with Ronald Reagan, that the Soviet Union called her the Iron Lady, etc.
And, of course, anyone who disagrees will have no trouble finding a contrary cite. But, of course, they can’t.
Or: it’s so easy to, we can’t be arsed.
There speaks someone who’s admitting defeat.
Heard the phrase, ‘the British disease’ recently? No - Mrs Thatcher’s doing.
Heard the phrase, ‘the sick man of Europe’ recently? No - Mrs Thatcher’s doing.
Do remind me about how Dennis Healey (the Labour Chancellor in the prior government) so mismanaged the economy that he had to go to the IMF.
American checking in with a trivia tidbit:
I was a friend of (the late) Alan Roberts, Labour MP from Bootle back in those days, and went with him to a session of Parliament. We ran into Margaret in a hallway and despite being from the other party, she was quite gracious to him, as he was to her, and he introduced me. The woman had charisma that was almost visible. That’s all I got.
But it was a fun day to watch the session and then sit outside, overlooking the Thames and have a beer in the afternoon while the rest of England couldn’t (back when the pubs had to close in the afternoons, but not in the Parliament building!)
Far too easy, I would have expected you would have done a little research on that topic, and it also shows just how unaware you are of world events.
During the '70’s in that decade the oil price rose by almost a factor of 10. Oil prices quadrupled in one year alone.
There were something like 4 serious price hikes in oil, the last was early 1980’s, which turned out not a be a huge problem, as the oil price rise meant our own North Sea produced oil went up in value too and this insulated us from the last shock to a large degree.
It’s extremely easy to blame the administration, but I notice that the Thatcher apologists never ever remark on this phenomenon.
I am sure I know why, because it would mean acknowledging that far from being some economic genius, Thatcher was extremely lucky, and any real economist could tell you that.
The UK at the time was particularly badly placed to deal with oil price hikes, and it does get us back to the North Sea oil revenue that Thatcher had the immense benefit to support her during the 1980’s, and it also goes back to Jim Callaghan predicting that those oil revenues would ensure a boom time in the UK economy for whoever was the Prime Minister on the day.
Thacther used that oil money to make large tax cuts, this windfall option was one that had never been previously available and most certainly not to Dennis Healey.
Oh how we conveniently forget.
But that was the early 1970s - 1974 - not the late 1970s. Labour weren’t even in power then; Mrs Thatcher came into power a whole 5 years later.
Mind you, it’s funny how the recent vast increases in the price of oil haven’t caused a recession. So to simply blame it on the oil price rise is simply wrong and irrelevant to our discussion.
Sending warnings to the Argentines doesn’t necessarily translate to the fact we think they’d invade the Falklands, which is the possession of a developed country with a highly trained military forces, so that ‘theory’ is out of the window. Argentinas economy was suffering badly, and Leopoldo Galtieris government was facing economic disaster, so chose to invade the Falklands as a convienient distraction from these woes.
The Tories were 20% in the polls, but did you even read the dreadful manifesto that Labour came up with? Which is why it’s called the ‘Longest Suicide note in history?’ Come on Michael Foot for PM? Are you joking?
Intelligence can be sketchy and not always 100% accurate, besides, invasion strength can be variable according to conditions or willingness to risk action. So I doubt from what I hear from you the Galiteri Administration was going to attack, more likely testing our responses, which again doesn’t always translate back to Westminister.
Yes, because it was improvised quickly and then poorly implemented.
In January 1982, these diplomatic talks over sovereignty ceased. It is not known when serious plans to invade the Falklands were first considered, but following this breakdown, the plans were updated. Although it is often thought that the Falklands invasion was a long-planned action, it became clear after the war that it had been largely improvised. The isles were not fortified, sea mines were not deployed at strategic landing spots, and a large part of the infantry forces sent to the Falklands consisted of young recruits. Arguments that the War was a last minute decision are bolstered by the fact that the Argentine Navy would have received, at the end of the year, additional Exocet anti-ship missiles, Super Étendards and new ships being built in West Germany.
Ok, let’s look at the list of important military situations within that era of her Government
Those are
IRA Terrorism
Soviet Threat
Middle East
And right at the bottom is the far off threat of an invasion of the Falklands by the Argentinian Government, which still in negotiation with the British over sovereignty, and only cut off diplomatic relations with the UK a few weeks before invading the islands.
And from what I hear about the Royal Navy, ships were being decommissioned and mothballed, whilst the ability of the Royal Navy to be in certain areas of the World was restricted to areas the Soviets were operating in acting as a counter. Don’t you remember the certain cruiseliners being transformed into troop carriers?
Thatcher didn’t do ‘nothing’ she was hoping before the invasion that diplomacy was the way to go forward, you sound like you’re implying she wanted the whole conflict in the first place.
Absolute rubbish, considering the economy had been picking up after her monetarist polices had come into effect, not to mention a neutered opposition, she was well on her way to winning a second victory. Falklands had around 10% to do with the whole election. Not to mention the Labour split.
Yet in the midst of the Cold war, most of the RN was needed near the Home Islands incase of a Soviet attack, since Chernenko was alarmed at increased NATO military exercises around Western Europe.
With the Labour left still strong – in 1981 Benn decided to challenge Healey for the deputy leadership of the party, a contest Healey won by the narrowest of margins – Foot struggled to make an impact and was widely criticised for it, though his performances in the Commons, most notably on the Falklands crisis of 1982, won him widespread respect from other parliamentarians.** (He was however criticised by some on the left who felt that he should not have supported the Thatcher government’s immediate resort to military action in defence of 2,000 Falkland islanders’ wish to remain British subjects.) **
However, if you take into the situation the fact that the Argentine military needed an excuse to distract the population from the economic woes it was facing, the invasion of the Falklands was it, showing that the main perpetrator was in fact the dictatorship (which btw fell after the Falklands) who wanted to maintain its’ grip on power.