The Falkland Islands, Las Malvinas in Spanish, lie off the coast of Argentina in the South Atlantic several thousand miles from the UK. The islands are a British Overseas Territory, which I think means Colony, but maybe not. (See Fuzzy Boundaries below, 1 August 2011.) In 1982, when the Argentinian army invaded the Islands, I was living in Venezuela and working for a Venezuelan company, but at the beginning of April that year I was in London on a business trip.
It was a convenient time for both the Argentinian and British governments to have a little war to distract attention for their low popularity figures. On top of that, then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s husband, Denis, was a major shareholder in the Falkland Islands Company. As soon as the news broke in London about the invasion, the whole country went a little crazy. In the railway stations there were blackboard signs announcing the immediate cancellation of all military leave. Mobilization for a counter-invasion force to depart was completed in just four days and the task force sailed for the South Atlantic.
I had flown back to Caracas on the day after the invasion, and was attending a cocktail party with work colleagues the next night. Naturally, the Argentinian action in Las Malvinas was just about the only topic of conversation that night. Venezuela and Venezuelans were very much on the side of their fellow South Americans and the invasion was seen by most people as anti-colonial in nature. The general feeling was that the British task force was a bluff and that the Brits wouldn’t really bother with fighting a war over these far-away islands.
At that party I was a lone voice arguing that most Brits really liked a good fight and a significant minority had to make due with Saturday night brawls in the clubs and pubs. Furthermore, I said, Thatcher wasn’t bluffing; this was her chance to prove she had bigger balls than President Galtieri in Buenos Aires. It worked. Thatcher had approval ratings in the low 30’s before the invasion and she won the next election with a comfortable majority. And, I don’t know for sure, but I guess Dennis’s share holdings probably turned out alright as well.
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