FROM THE ARCHIVES:Britain responded to Argentina's invasion of the Falkland Islands in 1982 by dispatching a task force to re-seize the territory. Maeve Binchy described the mood in London just before the conflict turned into a shooting war.
– JOE JOYCE
THIS IS a bank holiday weekend for the British and there are more transistor radios packed to go on picnics and outings than usual. That’s about the only sign of war. People listen to the news every hour. In public houses where there is a television, silence falls on the drinkers as they listen to the sepulchral tone of a Mr Ian MacDonald announce the latest information.
Preparation for May Balls continue in the universities, the rose growers toil to have everything right for the Chelsea Flower Show and nobody on the three million dole queue seems to be at all apprehensive about being in uniform in a few weeks time.
“I think it’s all cheering people up, I do,” said a disco owner who says that his business has never been better. “They come in here laughing every night asking do we have corn beef sandwiches and wanting to put ‘Don’t Cry for Me Argentina’ on the turntable over and over again.”
There is a widespread belief that it can’t possibly be serious otherwise tacticians would hardly be explaining the whole strategy on television with pointer sticks jabbing at maps of the Falklands.
“They can’t mean all this business about setting up headquarters at Goose Green or Fox Bay or wherever” said one man in bewilderment. “If that’s what they’re going to do then surely they wouldn’t be talking about it so much. After all, anyone could just pick up the phone and tell them in Argentina.” Even the thought of troops so far away from home on what might well be a dangerous mission does not seem to inspire any general worry.
“They’ll be all right, America says it’s supporting us.”
“The Queen’s son wouldn’t be out there if there was any real danger.”
“No, it’s not a war . . . it’s just a matter of putting frightners on the Argies.”
“She’s really able to handle a war,” say people who despair of Mrs Thatcher’s ability to control an economy or employ the population. “She hasn’t put a foot wrong . . . she knows that she’s only got to keep pressure up. Their economy is so feeble out there it’ll soon collapse. I really can’t stand the woman but she does seem to have played it right. Even old Foot doesn’t know where to attack her about it.”
But perhaps the real sign that it hasn’t been taken seriously yet, is the fact that the major debate seems to be about not the war itself, but the language of war. While front pages of English newspapers have pictures of Harriers and Vulcans and maps of total exclusion zones, the letters columns range about whether to call the enemy Argentines or Argentinians. Whether the people who rule them are a junter or a hoonter. For most of the British, it’s still a war of words.
http://url.ie/asi0