Tuesday, April 03, 2007

The Falklands War Remembered

A couple of links:

  • From the SPGB blog, Socialism Or Your Money Back: The Falklands War Remembered
  • From the archives of the Socialist Standard: 'Doing the Bulldog Thing'
  • Yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the beginning of the Falklands/Malvinas conflict, when Argentina invaded those islands that Adrian Mole's dad thought were off the coast of Scotland.

    Perhaps in light of more recent - and more bloody conflicts - it is a minor footnote in a world always seemingly at war, but for those of us of a certain generation (and nationality) it remains seared in the memory for the Sun's 'Gotcha' headline, the return of respectable jingoism to mainstream British politics and for supplying one of the major reasons that Margaret Thatcher and the Conservatives secured a landslide majority at the 1983 General Election despite the fact that Britain was in the midst of its severest depression since the 1930s.

    1 comment:

    Edward the Bonobo said...

    My memories:

    1) A friend and I hearing the news of the invasion, turning to one another and saying:
    "Well I'm not fucking going."

    2) University. Being physically threatened for having an EP Thompson article on my wall titled 'Why Neither Side Is Worth Backing'.

    The anniversary haa triggered a (fairly obvious) musing of my own.