Falklands War

Press, 13 May 1987, Page 20

Falklands War

Sir, —Despite a small net gain in British local government polls for the Conservatives, the 8.8. C. projection is that the continuing swing to the centrist Alliance would give Mrs Thatcher only a 30-seat parliamentary majority in the expected June General Election. This would be the equivalent of a New Zealand Government majority of only five seats. Hopefully, Mrs Thatcher will not “flog the Falklands factor” again as she did four years ago. The financial cost of that imperialist exercise was almost prohibitive, and still continues. Many Britons now realise the hollowness of power struggles (D. P. Rennick’s “one’s own sovereignty”) over barren, windswept South Atlantic rocks. What is never publicised is that Britain’s victory was secured by hardened, trained professional military personnel, over raw, conscripted youthful Argentinians. British voters should carefully weigh Mrs Thatcher’s contrived cordiality toward Mr Gorbachev with her subservience toward the Reagan Administration.—Yours, etc., M. T. MOORE. May 9, 1987.