Lawrence Freedman @LawDavF · 3h At some point it is going to occur to Moldova and Georgia that if the Russian army continues on its current self- destructive path some currently frozen conflicts might get unfrozen.
Fast tracking Moldova into NATO seems to me to be an obvious move. Along with Sweden and Finland. Georgia is more problematic given their geographic location although they do share a border with a NATO country.
However that runs the risk of Putin invading Moldova too, maybe even Finland, if he gets wind of such a plan to fast track them into NATO
Putin's supply lines struggle to get to Kyiv. He won't be able to wage war against Moldova or Finland.
Moldova is less than 10% the size of Ukraine, even if he made the same progress there as he has so far in Ukraine, that would see pretty much all of Moldova fall to the Russians
Moldova would be a logistical nightmare for the Russians, and if Ukraine has shown anything, is that logistics are the weakest link in many, many Russian military weak links.
Russia seems to have an army fit only for fighting civilians who don't fight back.
Or playing defence where, historically, they have had their greatest triumphs.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
Someone upthread was literally in the FCO during the Falklands War.
I feel like I’m talking to those proverbial civil war widows who can remember playing a bit of how’s-your-father with Ulysses S Grant behind a haystack at Valley Forge.
That's me. I was 21 years old joining the FCO in 1980; 63 y.o. now. Strangely, my concept of old keeps receding.
Ah, apologies. I’d call you middle-aged rather than old. I think old starts at 75 these days.
It just boggles me that some folks were old enough to actually get a payslip in 1980. The timing of that is playing tricks with my mind, it suggests you must surely be in your 90s…
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
In the end @HYUFD is incapable of ever conceding he is wrong and here you are near 24 hours later calling him out and still he talks garbage
Indeed he has upset quite a few by his total lack of empathy and is in direct contrast to his claim he is a Christian
There is a distinction between empathy and allowing the Argentines to have taken the Falklands and British territory without fighting them at all costs.
I also suggest you read more of the Old Testament, God certainly did not act in a weak and mild manner when defending Israel and the Jews
Perhaps you should ask your wife to explain the concept of the New Covenant?
To be honest, if he existed and were able to have a wife, a more intelligent one as the hypothesis has it, that would be about number 900 on the list of things it would help having explained to him.
He has seen a grainy archival clip of noted activist Kenny Everett suggesting we nuke Russia and the standing ovation given by the Tory faithful — and drawn the wrong conclusion.
My comments would have been mild compared to those of most Tory delegates at Tory conferences, certainly in the 1980s
I went to the conferences at the time, did you
If HYUFD is representative of the current Tory party I'm glad I left it 10 years ago. It is a very strange perspective on what the party was, and how Margaret Thatcher and her cabinet prosecuted the Falklands war, but, I think, illuminating.
He is a unique advert for the permanent consignment of the conservative party to opposition, but fortunately he is quite unique and certainly has little knowledge of just how the Falklands campaign unfolded
He was interviewed by Farage on GB News recently. Very curious mixture of views but I wouldn't quite say he is a crank in the mould of Gisela Stuart or Kate Hoey. He also strongly supports HS2.
Root and Lawrence reached a 100 partnership Lawrence reached 50 Root reached 100
2 centuries at No.3 in a row, which apart from a very small number of matches at 6th (when the hell was that?) has been his lowest scoring position by average.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
He has seen a grainy archival clip of noted activist Kenny Everett suggesting we nuke Russia and the standing ovation given by the Tory faithful — and drawn the wrong conclusion.
My comments would have been mild compared to those of most Tory delegates at Tory conferences, certainly in the 1980s
I went to the conferences at the time, did you
If HYUFD is representative of the current Tory party I'm glad I left it 10 years ago. It is a very strange perspective on what the party was, and how Margaret Thatcher and her cabinet prosecuted the Falklands war, but, I think, illuminating.
He is a unique advert for the permanent consignment of the conservative party to opposition, but fortunately he is quite unique and certainly has little knowledge of just how the Falklands campaign unfolded
Yes. I should probably clarify: "illuminating HUYFD" not "illuminating the history of the Falklands conflict".
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
And it was the time of CND, and the government worrying about keeping public opinion on board with retaining our NW capability, let alone launching it.
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
So 50% were not and most were not sunk and our carriers survived.
Even if all 13 bombs had not gone off that did not mean we would have lost as we had nuclear weapons and Argentina did not.
As I said we could have parked subs armed with nuclear missiles off the Argentine Coast and refused to remove them until Argentine forces withdrew from the Falkland Islands
Again completely missed the point. All I objected to was you saying it was easy. Go on finally admit it wasn't easy. The US Navy thought it impossible. The head of the RAF thought that we would have lost if 6 of those ,13 bombs had exploded. If they had of exploded we would have lost over half our frigates and destroyers.
Under no circumstances can that be described as easy.
Go on admit it wasn't easy. That is all I am after. Be a man at admit you were wrong to say tha.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Bonkers. I never said we should concede defeat. Don't know where you got that from. Once we were committed, we were committed. And I was in favour of us doing so. You just make stuff up.
I have objected to one thing, you saying 3 times that the Falklands war was easy and you are so weak you can't admit that was a mistake. Pathetic.
You are so feeble and weak that you are happy to insult the memory of those that fought and the government of the day than admit you were wrong.
Shame on you.
Yes you did.
You were not prepared to use all methods at our disposal to free the Falklands. You effectively said if the war had started to go against our conventional forces we would automatically have lost.
You restarted this debate not me, so stop whinging if you can't take the heat
Go on stop keep avoiding the point. Admit you were wrong in saying the , Falklands war was easy.
Stop being a pathetic whimp and man up.
I am not ever going to concede to you so tough.
My original point stands absolutely we would in the end win the war with Argentina as we had a bigger and more effective military than them and nuclear weapons unlike them.
Intervening against a nuclear armed Russia over Ukraine however is a different matter
So you stick by your 3 statements that the Falklands War was easy.
You are an absolute disgrace. I can't imagine any Tory would support your view.
You are not even a Tory but a wet Liberal
So what and I'm certainly not wet, but my position is not relevant here.
For a Tory you have shown a complete lack of patriotism by throwing the servicemen and govt of the day under a bus. You have also shown a willingness to kill innocent civilians. You are unwilling to admit you said the war was easy let alone retract yet we can all see your posts so add lying to the list.
And you call yourself a Christian.
No I didn't. It is you who ruled out all defences to protect the Falklands making their sacrifices in vain, not me.
Did you say the Falklands War was easy or not? A yes or no will do. It is not like we can't all see what you said.
So are you going to lie or admit it?
There is nothing to admit.
My point that the war in Argentina was fought as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them in comparison to intervening against Russia in Ukraine stands absolutely.
I am not going to back down on it, even if you keep going on about it all night, all week, all month, all year and even until the day I die
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
So 50% were not and most were not sunk and our carriers survived.
Even if all 13 bombs had not gone off that did not mean we would have lost as we had nuclear weapons and Argentina did not.
As I said we could have parked subs armed with nuclear missiles off the Argentine Coast and refused to remove them until Argentine forces withdrew from the Falkland Islands
Again completely missed the point. All I objected to was you saying it was easy. Go on finally admit it wasn't easy. The US Navy thought it impossible. The head of the RAF thought that we would have lost if 6 of those ,13 bombs had exploded. If they had of exploded we would have lost over half our frigates and destroyers.
Under no circumstances can that be described as easy.
Go on admit it wasn't easy. That is all I am after. Be a man at admit you were wrong to say tha.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Bonkers. I never said we should concede defeat. Don't know where you got that from. Once we were committed, we were committed. And I was in favour of us doing so. You just make stuff up.
I have objected to one thing, you saying 3 times that the Falklands war was easy and you are so weak you can't admit that was a mistake. Pathetic.
You are so feeble and weak that you are happy to insult the memory of those that fought and the government of the day than admit you were wrong.
Shame on you.
Yes you did.
You were not prepared to use all methods at our disposal to free the Falklands. You effectively said if the war had started to go against our conventional forces we would automatically have lost.
You restarted this debate not me, so stop whinging if you can't take the heat
Go on stop keep avoiding the point. Admit you were wrong in saying the , Falklands war was easy.
Stop being a pathetic whimp and man up.
I am not ever going to concede to you so tough.
My original point stands absolutely we would in the end win the war with Argentina as we had a bigger and more effective military than them and nuclear weapons unlike them.
Intervening against a nuclear armed Russia over Ukraine however is a different matter
So you stick by your 3 statements that the Falklands War was easy.
You are an absolute disgrace. I can't imagine any Tory would support your view.
You are not even a Tory but a wet Liberal
So what and I'm certainly not wet, but my position is not relevant here.
For a Tory you have shown a complete lack of patriotism by throwing the servicemen and govt of the day under a bus. You have also shown a willingness to kill innocent civilians. You are unwilling to admit you said the war was easy let alone retract yet we can all see your posts so add lying to the list.
And you call yourself a Christian.
Through history, Christians have proved themselves perfectly adept at killing innocent civilians, in a variety of horrible ways.
He was interviewed by Farage on GB News recently. Very curious mixture of views but I wouldn't quite say he is a crank in the mould of Gisela Stuart or Kate Hoey. He also strongly supports HS2.
NO MORE FUCKING REFERENDUMS!!!
Perhaps we need a new party with no referendums as its one and only policy?
But seriously, it is ridiculous to have a referendum on net zero. There are parties standing e.g. Reform or whatever this week's name is, who are against it. So people can vote for that if they really care.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
You comment with no knowledge of the time, and quite frankly you do not have a clue of the actual circumstances and the nuances of the campaign, as if you had you would not speak such arrant nonsense
Forgive me if I haven't quite got this right, but are we at the stage of the argument where Maggie should be seen as a feeble pussy-footing Lib because she didn't nuke Buenos Aires?
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
And it was the time of CND, and the government worrying about keeping public opinion on board with retaining our NW capability, let alone launching it.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Do you think the Americans would have "allowed" us to strike a city like Cordoba with a nuclear weapon?
The Americans would have suffered an appalling political backlash throughout Latin America and I'm quite sure Reagan, for all his Anglophilia, would have been strongly advised by his administration the nuclear destruction of a Latin American city would be a catastrophe.
I suspect, had we got to that point, American political and economic pressure would have been applied to BOTH London and Buenos Aires to broker a diplomatic solution.
Who cares what the Americans did. We defend our territory at all costs, the Falklands was our territory.
If the Americans refused to respect that they were not true allies anyway.
Of course the UN did pressure both sides for a diplomatic solution and if the Argentines had withdrawn their forces from the Falklands one could have been found without further escalation
Just so I'm clear - if Washington had told us in the event of launching a nuclear attack on Argentina, they (Washington) would impose punitive economic sanctions on the UK, you would still have incinerated Cordoba.
The worldwide economic and diplomatic consequences of such a course of action would have been extreme - we might well have been thrown out of both NATO and the EEC. The pictures of the incinerated ruins of Cordoba would have been broadcast round the world and would have led to huge sympathy for the Argentines.
The economic impact would have been no less severe with a run on sterling and capital flight from the UK leaving us exposed to inflation and renewed unemployment.
Have you forgotten the extent to which American economic pressure forced both us and the French to stand down in Suez in 1956?
Thatcher's Britain would have been as much a pariah state as Putin's Russia is now.
As someone who was in the FCO at the time, I'd just like to say that even a UK threat of nuclear weapons use against a non-nuclear state, let alone their actual use, was unthinkable in 1982.
How do you know what Thatcher would have done had British conventional forces started to lose the War and her premiership then been at risk of ending in humiliation and British territory lost to invasion without using all means of defence at our disposal?
He was in the FCO for goodness sake and his statement is factual as you would understand had you been around at the time
He was not Thatcher was he and Thatcher would have decided not the FCO
I absolutely would have not had any input into that decision, but you seem oblivious of the fact that the US only just supported our effort to retake the Falklands - we persuaded them by the skin of our teeth. We would have lost all US support for the war had we even hinted at using NW. And without the US helicopter and logistics support, our troops would not even have made it to the Falklands.
So its time to put your ignorant arse on ignore.
We got to the Falklands with our aircraft carriers and cruise liners who transported our troops.
Not due to the US who were effectively little more than neutral in the campaign
Is Ukraine - and is the West - willing to let Russia normalise those grotesque annexations for the greater good?
Dead Putin is the key.
Sadly, not on the negotiating table.
Although there is something in the idea that we should push the Russians into agreeing the sort of humiliation that cannot go unanswered by malcontents in Moscow.
Both vindictive and ineffective. Muscovite malcontents lack the power to take out Putin either by ballot or bullet. And in 20s Germany the effect of humiliation was to make people get behind the leader. The danger is of reinforcing the belief in Putin that a majority of Russians currently have
Yes, we need to be serious. "Humiliating" Putin is stupid, as long as he remains in charge and as long as he has nukes.
Don't corner the rat. Give him an exit. It would be nice if we could eliminate him from global politics, at some point and in some way, but right now the world just needs to step back from the abyss, and end the war. Then we re-arm and wait, and hope that Russia mends itself
We don't need to punish Russia further, not right now. It is already quite humbled and the sanctions have already done serious longterm damage
I am afraid you are misreading the nature of the regime. We have been talking about off ramps for months now, and the reality is that the Kremlin does not want an off ramp. Indeed continuing to discuss even fig leaf concessions is counter productive. Literally the only thing that is understood in the mafia state is the naked use of power. In fact you should increase the pressure and upgrade the Ukrainian military capabilities to the point where they can successfully go on the offensive. This rat must be cornered before he recognises that he has no choice but to make whatever peace he can. To let him off the hook leaves him like Saddam Hussein after Desert Storm, when actually the defeat needs to be sufficiently comprehensive to ensure regime change.
Few governments make the kind of mistake that Putin has and survive. The West has been threatened with nuclear anhillation. If there is any way to ensure the removal of the tyrant as quickly as possible, then it should be taken now. Leaving him in place is simply too dangerous.
We established upthread that Charles xii of Sweden, Hitler, Napoleon and ancient Athens survived for years after equivalent mistakes. What are your counter examples?
Wars of aggression where the aggressor lost and there was a subsequent change or major modification of regime? Germany WWI, Germany WW2, Japan WW2, USSR Afghanistan 1979-89 , French occupation of the Ruhr 1923, Arab Israeli wars of 1948 and 1967, West Pakistan versus East Pakistan 1971. Falklands War 1982, there are others.
Given Karl XII was exiled for five years after his defeat at Poltava we should also note that Sweden abandoned absolutism and established Parliamentary rule in his absence, so I could claim him for the aggressors who failed list too.
In the long run, but then all regimes fail in the long run. The implication of your claim was that we can get Putin now while he is especially vulnerable. None of those examples supports that timescale.
Well History doesn´t repeat but it rhymes... I think the Russian army could mutiny and if it does, how long do you give Putin then?
If he is overthrown, it will be by a charismatic junior officer. Because the senior officers are too compromised and have benefited too much from Putin's reign.
That would be Decembrist style.
I think another danger may be that the different forces: Regular Army, armed FSB units, and Rozgvardia end up on different sides and it all gets Bucharest 1989 rather quickly.
Life comes at you pretty hard at times, I would have loved to have seen Steve Gibson's reaction to this news.
Chelsea are set to play any remaining home Champions League fixtures behind closed doors after owner Roman Abramovich was sanctioned by the EU, The Athletic understands.
It’s not funny at all. Chelsea and Chelsea fans are sanctioned, but not Roman Abramovich.
We have learned from previous times when governments have talked tough sanctions but the sanctions are pathetic because you have not sanctioned family or best friends. Romans fixer and best mate remains unsanctioned, so Chelsea fans and English football fans suffer in same way as All decoys to hide the truth suffer.
Anyway, I have ceded the TV and will watch the beloved’s beloved Arsenal. It only seems like yesterday they were last on live. 🥱
Though I had to tell her, I have analysed the fixtures, Arsenal finishes 5th and Another London side called Tottenham Hotspur will finish 4th this season. Tottenham favourites for their fixtures including arsenal home, arsenal will struggle in their fixtures with their weak bench. No top four for Arsenal this year I had to tell her.
But she shouldn’t shoot the messenger, should she, if I merely explain what the better bet for a serious sports bettor is 😆
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
In the end @HYUFD is incapable of ever conceding he is wrong and here you are near 24 hours later calling him out and still he talks garbage
Indeed he has upset quite a few by his total lack of empathy and is in direct contrast to his claim he is a Christian
I have decided to believe that HY doesn’t actually exist, in the real world. Since that is my strongly held faith, it is now a fact. HY is no more.
HY's just enjoying himself being PB's controversialist. It's just a bit of personal branding. He reminds me of British people who move to America and end up saying things like 'Gor Blimey Guvnah' or coming over like Princess Margaret because it seems to be expected of them. People shouldn't get so incensed by it. I'm always surprised when otherwise sensible posters let themselves get so frustrated by him.
Everyone has their own limit, even when they can see its deliberate frustration.
Well, when someone like so normally calm like Carynx loses it over a chauvanistic comment by HY, I always think he's scraping the barrel of things to try and inflame his nationalist passions.
I find this epistemologically fascinating, unless I mean historiographically. Many/most of us here were of the age to vote and get a mortgage in 1982. HYUFD was still, literally, in nappies. And he illustrates how extra spectacularly wrong you can be about stuff simply by not having been there or thereabouts when the stuff happened. I will always remember this in future when reading histories and biographies.
A classic HY post responds to a wide range of issues (all issues) through a lense of polling, party politics and electoral predictions. That's an unusual and amusing way to look at the world, and I think it offers real value because nobody else looks at the world like that. Some of his more recent posts are more just taking a controversial position and defending it against all comers, which is fine, doesn't bother me, but they are not classic HY.
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
So 50% were not and most were not sunk and our carriers survived.
Even if all 13 bombs had not gone off that did not mean we would have lost as we had nuclear weapons and Argentina did not.
As I said we could have parked subs armed with nuclear missiles off the Argentine Coast and refused to remove them until Argentine forces withdrew from the Falkland Islands
Again completely missed the point. All I objected to was you saying it was easy. Go on finally admit it wasn't easy. The US Navy thought it impossible. The head of the RAF thought that we would have lost if 6 of those ,13 bombs had exploded. If they had of exploded we would have lost over half our frigates and destroyers.
Under no circumstances can that be described as easy.
Go on admit it wasn't easy. That is all I am after. Be a man at admit you were wrong to say tha.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Bonkers. I never said we should concede defeat. Don't know where you got that from. Once we were committed, we were committed. And I was in favour of us doing so. You just make stuff up.
I have objected to one thing, you saying 3 times that the Falklands war was easy and you are so weak you can't admit that was a mistake. Pathetic.
You are so feeble and weak that you are happy to insult the memory of those that fought and the government of the day than admit you were wrong.
Shame on you.
Yes you did.
You were not prepared to use all methods at our disposal to free the Falklands. You effectively said if the war had started to go against our conventional forces we would automatically have lost.
You restarted this debate not me, so stop whinging if you can't take the heat
Go on stop keep avoiding the point. Admit you were wrong in saying the , Falklands war was easy.
Stop being a pathetic whimp and man up.
I am not ever going to concede to you so tough.
My original point stands absolutely we would in the end win the war with Argentina as we had a bigger and more effective military than them and nuclear weapons unlike them.
Intervening against a nuclear armed Russia over Ukraine however is a different matter
So you stick by your 3 statements that the Falklands War was easy.
You are an absolute disgrace. I can't imagine any Tory would support your view.
You are not even a Tory but a wet Liberal
So what and I'm certainly not wet, but my position is not relevant here.
For a Tory you have shown a complete lack of patriotism by throwing the servicemen and govt of the day under a bus. You have also shown a willingness to kill innocent civilians. You are unwilling to admit you said the war was easy let alone retract yet we can all see your posts so add lying to the list.
And you call yourself a Christian.
Through history, Christians have proved themselves perfectly adept at killing innocent civilians, in a variety of horrible ways.
Forgive me if I haven't quite got this right, but are we at the stage of the argument where Maggie should be seen as a feeble pussy-footing Lib because she didn't nuke Buenos Aires?
If only she’d been a proper Conservative?
I doubt real Thatcher lives up to the Thatcher that lives inside some peoples heads in darker corners of the internet and Conservative clubs.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Do you think the Americans would have "allowed" us to strike a city like Cordoba with a nuclear weapon?
The Americans would have suffered an appalling political backlash throughout Latin America and I'm quite sure Reagan, for all his Anglophilia, would have been strongly advised by his administration the nuclear destruction of a Latin American city would be a catastrophe.
I suspect, had we got to that point, American political and economic pressure would have been applied to BOTH London and Buenos Aires to broker a diplomatic solution.
Who cares what the Americans did. We defend our territory at all costs, the Falklands was our territory.
If the Americans refused to respect that they were not true allies anyway.
Of course the UN did pressure both sides for a diplomatic solution and if the Argentines had withdrawn their forces from the Falklands one could have been found without further escalation
Just so I'm clear - if Washington had told us in the event of launching a nuclear attack on Argentina, they (Washington) would impose punitive economic sanctions on the UK, you would still have incinerated Cordoba.
The worldwide economic and diplomatic consequences of such a course of action would have been extreme - we might well have been thrown out of both NATO and the EEC. The pictures of the incinerated ruins of Cordoba would have been broadcast round the world and would have led to huge sympathy for the Argentines.
The economic impact would have been no less severe with a run on sterling and capital flight from the UK leaving us exposed to inflation and renewed unemployment.
Have you forgotten the extent to which American economic pressure forced both us and the French to stand down in Suez in 1956?
Thatcher's Britain would have been as much a pariah state as Putin's Russia is now.
As someone who was in the FCO at the time, I'd just like to say that even a UK threat of nuclear weapons use against a non-nuclear state, let alone their actual use, was unthinkable in 1982.
How do you know what Thatcher would have done had British conventional forces started to lose the War and her premiership then been at risk of ending in humiliation and British territory lost to invasion without using all means of defence at our disposal?
He was in the FCO for goodness sake and his statement is factual as you would understand had you been around at the time
He was not Thatcher was he and Thatcher would have decided not the FCO
I absolutely would have not had any input into that decision, but you seem oblivious of the fact that the US only just supported our effort to retake the Falklands - we persuaded them by the skin of our teeth. We would have lost all US support for the war had we even hinted at using NW. And without the US helicopter and logistics support, our troops would not even have made it to the Falklands.
So its time to put your ignorant arse on ignore.
We got to the Falklands with our aircraft carriers and cruise liners who transported our troops.
Not due to the US who were effectively little more than neutral in the campaign
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Do you think the Americans would have "allowed" us to strike a city like Cordoba with a nuclear weapon?
The Americans would have suffered an appalling political backlash throughout Latin America and I'm quite sure Reagan, for all his Anglophilia, would have been strongly advised by his administration the nuclear destruction of a Latin American city would be a catastrophe.
I suspect, had we got to that point, American political and economic pressure would have been applied to BOTH London and Buenos Aires to broker a diplomatic solution.
Who cares what the Americans did. We defend our territory at all costs, the Falklands was our territory.
If the Americans refused to respect that they were not true allies anyway.
Of course the UN did pressure both sides for a diplomatic solution and if the Argentines had withdrawn their forces from the Falklands one could have been found without further escalation
Is Ukraine - and is the West - willing to let Russia normalise those grotesque annexations for the greater good?
Dead Putin is the key.
Sadly, not on the negotiating table.
Although there is something in the idea that we should push the Russians into agreeing the sort of humiliation that cannot go unanswered by malcontents in Moscow.
Both vindictive and ineffective. Muscovite malcontents lack the power to take out Putin either by ballot or bullet. And in 20s Germany the effect of humiliation was to make people get behind the leader. The danger is of reinforcing the belief in Putin that a majority of Russians currently have
Yes, we need to be serious. "Humiliating" Putin is stupid, as long as he remains in charge and as long as he has nukes.
Don't corner the rat. Give him an exit. It would be nice if we could eliminate him from global politics, at some point and in some way, but right now the world just needs to step back from the abyss, and end the war. Then we re-arm and wait, and hope that Russia mends itself
We don't need to punish Russia further, not right now. It is already quite humbled and the sanctions have already done serious longterm damage
I am afraid you are misreading the nature of the regime. We have been talking about off ramps for months now, and the reality is that the Kremlin does not want an off ramp. Indeed continuing to discuss even fig leaf concessions is counter productive. Literally the only thing that is understood in the mafia state is the naked use of power. In fact you should increase the pressure and upgrade the Ukrainian military capabilities to the point where they can successfully go on the offensive. This rat must be cornered before he recognises that he has no choice but to make whatever peace he can. To let him off the hook leaves him like Saddam Hussein after Desert Storm, when actually the defeat needs to be sufficiently comprehensive to ensure regime change.
Few governments make the kind of mistake that Putin has and survive. The West has been threatened with nuclear anhillation. If there is any way to ensure the removal of the tyrant as quickly as possible, then it should be taken now. Leaving him in place is simply too dangerous.
We established upthread that Charles xii of Sweden, Hitler, Napoleon and ancient Athens survived for years after equivalent mistakes. What are your counter examples?
Wars of aggression where the aggressor lost and there was a subsequent change or major modification of regime? Germany WWI, Germany WW2, Japan WW2, USSR Afghanistan 1979-89 , French occupation of the Ruhr 1923, Arab Israeli wars of 1948 and 1967, West Pakistan versus East Pakistan 1971. Falklands War 1982, there are others.
Given Karl XII was exiled for five years after his defeat at Poltava we should also note that Sweden abandoned absolutism and established Parliamentary rule in his absence, so I could claim him for the aggressors who failed list too.
In the long run, but then all regimes fail in the long run. The implication of your claim was that we can get Putin now while he is especially vulnerable. None of those examples supports that timescale.
Well History doesn´t repeat but it rhymes... I think the Russian army could mutiny and if it does, how long do you give Putin then?
15 years? 20?
Putin has a Praetorian guard, the FSO, not part of the army but geared up and equipped to fight an army. 20,000 strong and has its own tanks and artillery.
Hes 70 and not in the best of health so 15-20 years is unlikely. Certainly he has loyal units, but the $64,000 question is what happens if the mutiny agathers pace from here? 20,000 may be way too few.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Do you think the Americans would have "allowed" us to strike a city like Cordoba with a nuclear weapon?
The Americans would have suffered an appalling political backlash throughout Latin America and I'm quite sure Reagan, for all his Anglophilia, would have been strongly advised by his administration the nuclear destruction of a Latin American city would be a catastrophe.
I suspect, had we got to that point, American political and economic pressure would have been applied to BOTH London and Buenos Aires to broker a diplomatic solution.
Who cares what the Americans did. We defend our territory at all costs, the Falklands was our territory.
If the Americans refused to respect that they were not true allies anyway.
Of course the UN did pressure both sides for a diplomatic solution and if the Argentines had withdrawn their forces from the Falklands one could have been found without further escalation
Just so I'm clear - if Washington had told us in the event of launching a nuclear attack on Argentina, they (Washington) would impose punitive economic sanctions on the UK, you would still have incinerated Cordoba.
The worldwide economic and diplomatic consequences of such a course of action would have been extreme - we might well have been thrown out of both NATO and the EEC. The pictures of the incinerated ruins of Cordoba would have been broadcast round the world and would have led to huge sympathy for the Argentines.
The economic impact would have been no less severe with a run on sterling and capital flight from the UK leaving us exposed to inflation and renewed unemployment.
Have you forgotten the extent to which American economic pressure forced both us and the French to stand down in Suez in 1956?
Thatcher's Britain would have been as much a pariah state as Putin's Russia is now.
As someone who was in the FCO at the time, I'd just like to say that even a UK threat of nuclear weapons use against a non-nuclear state, let alone their actual use, was unthinkable in 1982.
How do you know what Thatcher would have done had British conventional forces started to lose the War and her premiership then been at risk of ending in humiliation and British territory lost to invasion without using all means if defence at our disposal?
I'm fairly sure that Thatcher was sane enough not to risk a nuclear war on the grounds that her premiership was at risk. You're supposed to be a fan of hers!
Argentina did not have nuclear weapons, there was no risk from a UK perspective.
Only from an Argentine perspective if the UK used its nuclear weapons.
The Argentines took that risk when they invaded the Falklands
I don't think even the hawkiest of hawks tend to think there is no risk of firing a nuclear weapon. And if you're viewing it solely through the lens of her electoral fortunes, well, starting nuclear wars isn't always viewed in an unambiguously positive light by electorates.
Nor is losing British territory.
It was Argentina who started it, they invaded the Falklands.
If you don't want a brutal response don't invade territory of other nations.
In any case Argentina had no nukes, it was them taking the risk, not us
I'm not trying to exonerate Argentina. Of course they started it. I'm just suggesting that a) Thatcher wouldn't have escalated it into nuclear war to save her premiership, and b) doing so probably wouldn't have been electorally positive. Killing enemy soldiers tends to be approved of by electorates. Killing millions and millions of civilians and rendering large chunks of their country uninhabitable is less popular.
Astonishing stat on Cricinfo. Since Jan 21 the next highest run scorer in test cricket is Pant with 1077 runs. At the time it was posted Root was on 2004, probably more now. He is honing on Twice as many as anyone else. Unbelievable.
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
Astonishing stat on Cricinfo. Since Jan 21 the next highest run scorer in test cricket is Pant with 1077 runs. At the time it was posted Root was on 2004, probably more now. He is honing on Twice as many as anyone else. Unbelievable.
I thought you meant Jan 21st, 2022 for a minute. That would de some scoring...
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
Russia still remains within the UN and Security Council and they attacked a neighbour rather than being attacked like us via the Falklands.
The UN actually approved a UK based resolution that it was acting in self defence to defend Argentina and Argentine troops should withdraw. There are no limits on what can be done by a nation acting in self defence.
However regardless even all the above would have been better than losing the Falklands to Argentina which would have shown us to be so weak the USSR may even have tried an invasion of the UK
Is Ukraine - and is the West - willing to let Russia normalise those grotesque annexations for the greater good?
Dead Putin is the key.
Sadly, not on the negotiating table.
Although there is something in the idea that we should push the Russians into agreeing the sort of humiliation that cannot go unanswered by malcontents in Moscow.
Both vindictive and ineffective. Muscovite malcontents lack the power to take out Putin either by ballot or bullet. And in 20s Germany the effect of humiliation was to make people get behind the leader. The danger is of reinforcing the belief in Putin that a majority of Russians currently have
Yes, we need to be serious. "Humiliating" Putin is stupid, as long as he remains in charge and as long as he has nukes.
Don't corner the rat. Give him an exit. It would be nice if we could eliminate him from global politics, at some point and in some way, but right now the world just needs to step back from the abyss, and end the war. Then we re-arm and wait, and hope that Russia mends itself
We don't need to punish Russia further, not right now. It is already quite humbled and the sanctions have already done serious longterm damage
I am afraid you are misreading the nature of the regime. We have been talking about off ramps for months now, and the reality is that the Kremlin does not want an off ramp. Indeed continuing to discuss even fig leaf concessions is counter productive. Literally the only thing that is understood in the mafia state is the naked use of power. In fact you should increase the pressure and upgrade the Ukrainian military capabilities to the point where they can successfully go on the offensive. This rat must be cornered before he recognises that he has no choice but to make whatever peace he can. To let him off the hook leaves him like Saddam Hussein after Desert Storm, when actually the defeat needs to be sufficiently comprehensive to ensure regime change.
Few governments make the kind of mistake that Putin has and survive. The West has been threatened with nuclear anhillation. If there is any way to ensure the removal of the tyrant as quickly as possible, then it should be taken now. Leaving him in place is simply too dangerous.
We established upthread that Charles xii of Sweden, Hitler, Napoleon and ancient Athens survived for years after equivalent mistakes. What are your counter examples?
Wars of aggression where the aggressor lost and there was a subsequent change or major modification of regime? Germany WWI, Germany WW2, Japan WW2, USSR Afghanistan 1979-89 , French occupation of the Ruhr 1923, Arab Israeli wars of 1948 and 1967, West Pakistan versus East Pakistan 1971. Falklands War 1982, there are others.
Given Karl XII was exiled for five years after his defeat at Poltava we should also note that Sweden abandoned absolutism and established Parliamentary rule in his absence, so I could claim him for the aggressors who failed list too.
In the long run, but then all regimes fail in the long run. The implication of your claim was that we can get Putin now while he is especially vulnerable. None of those examples supports that timescale.
Well History doesn´t repeat but it rhymes... I think the Russian army could mutiny and if it does, how long do you give Putin then?
If he is overthrown, it will be by a charismatic junior officer. Because the senior officers are too compromised and have benefited too much from Putin's reign.
That would be Decembrist style.
I think another danger may be that the different forces: Regular Army, armed FSB units, and Rozgvardia end up on different sides and it all gets Bucharest 1989 rather quickly.
He might even nuke his own troops if they were on the way to depose him.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Do you think the Americans would have "allowed" us to strike a city like Cordoba with a nuclear weapon?
The Americans would have suffered an appalling political backlash throughout Latin America and I'm quite sure Reagan, for all his Anglophilia, would have been strongly advised by his administration the nuclear destruction of a Latin American city would be a catastrophe.
I suspect, had we got to that point, American political and economic pressure would have been applied to BOTH London and Buenos Aires to broker a diplomatic solution.
Who cares what the Americans did. We defend our territory at all costs, the Falklands was our territory.
If the Americans refused to respect that they were not true allies anyway.
Of course the UN did pressure both sides for a diplomatic solution and if the Argentines had withdrawn their forces from the Falklands one could have been found without further escalation
Just so I'm clear - if Washington had told us in the event of launching a nuclear attack on Argentina, they (Washington) would impose punitive economic sanctions on the UK, you would still have incinerated Cordoba.
The worldwide economic and diplomatic consequences of such a course of action would have been extreme - we might well have been thrown out of both NATO and the EEC. The pictures of the incinerated ruins of Cordoba would have been broadcast round the world and would have led to huge sympathy for the Argentines.
The economic impact would have been no less severe with a run on sterling and capital flight from the UK leaving us exposed to inflation and renewed unemployment.
Have you forgotten the extent to which American economic pressure forced both us and the French to stand down in Suez in 1956?
Thatcher's Britain would have been as much a pariah state as Putin's Russia is now.
As someone who was in the FCO at the time, I'd just like to say that even a UK threat of nuclear weapons use against a non-nuclear state, let alone their actual use, was unthinkable in 1982.
How do you know what Thatcher would have done had British conventional forces started to lose the War and her premiership then been at risk of ending in humiliation and British territory lost to invasion without using all means of defence at our disposal?
He was in the FCO for goodness sake and his statement is factual as you would understand had you been around at the time
He was not Thatcher was he and Thatcher would have decided not the FCO
I absolutely would have not had any input into that decision, but you seem oblivious of the fact that the US only just supported our effort to retake the Falklands - we persuaded them by the skin of our teeth. We would have lost all US support for the war had we even hinted at using NW. And without the US helicopter and logistics support, our troops would not even have made it to the Falklands.
So its time to put your ignorant arse on ignore.
We got to the Falklands with our aircraft carriers and cruise liners who transported our troops.
Not due to the US who were effectively little more than neutral in the campaign
Not at all true. America provided us with logistical support and hardware such as Sidewinder missiles, and perhaps most important intelligence from its spy satellites, as ours did not then cover the South Atlantic. One of the generals said that it is difficult to overestimate the difference America's support made to the outcome.
Caspar Weinberger was an enthusiastic Anglophile and well deserved the honorary knighthood he got.
Also the French helped us with information about their Exocets which in turn meant that Mrs Thatcher let them off far more lightly than they deserved over the Rainbow Warrior.
Another good header, @Cyclefree . I was struck by how little reaction the story about what was effectively sexual assault of a schoolgirl by Met police, with the reported acquiescence of her school, got here.
Though the fact that we’re teetering, and possibly edging away from the brink of armageddon does provide something of a distraction, it’s still distinctly uncomfortable.
The school's behaviour was a disgrace. The teachers involved seem to have had no understanding of what safeguarding actually means or involves.
I thought the whole story unbelievably disgusting. I know there's been an apology, but are the officers being proceduted, or even still employed?
Maybe the West can do better with a deep fake of Putin explaining it's all been a big mistake and is the fault of the aliens controlling him, or somesuch?
Life comes at you pretty hard at times, I would have loved to have seen Steve Gibson's reaction to this news.
Chelsea are set to play any remaining home Champions League fixtures behind closed doors after owner Roman Abramovich was sanctioned by the EU, The Athletic understands.
It’s not funny at all. Chelsea and Chelsea fans are sanctioned, but not Roman Abramovich.
We have learned from previous times when governments have talked tough sanctions but the sanctions are pathetic because you have not sanctioned family or best friends. Romans fixer and best mate remains unsanctioned, so Chelsea fans and English football fans suffer in same way as All decoys to hide the truth suffer.
Anyway, I have ceded the TV and will watch the beloved’s beloved Arsenal. It only seems like yesterday they were last on live. 🥱
Though I had to tell her, I have analysed the fixtures, Arsenal finishes 5th and Another London side called Tottenham Hotspur will finish 4th this season. Tottenham favourites for their fixtures including arsenal home, arsenal will struggle in their fixtures with their weak bench. No top four for Arsenal this year I had to tell her.
But she shouldn’t shoot the messenger, should she, if I merely explain what the better bet for a serious sports bettor is 😆
Arsenal v Everton in the final day could be highly significant for both. Although for us I fear it will be all over by then.
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an disproportionate use of nuclear weapons.
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
Yep. And part of his argument is that she'd have done it because to lose would have meant the end of her government...
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Do you think the Americans would have "allowed" us to strike a city like Cordoba with a nuclear weapon?
The Americans would have suffered an appalling political backlash throughout Latin America and I'm quite sure Reagan, for all his Anglophilia, would have been strongly advised by his administration the nuclear destruction of a Latin American city would be a catastrophe.
I suspect, had we got to that point, American political and economic pressure would have been applied to BOTH London and Buenos Aires to broker a diplomatic solution.
Who cares what the Americans did. We defend our territory at all costs, the Falklands was our territory.
If the Americans refused to respect that they were not true allies anyway.
Of course the UN did pressure both sides for a diplomatic solution and if the Argentines had withdrawn their forces from the Falklands one could have been found without further escalation
Just so I'm clear - if Washington had told us in the event of launching a nuclear attack on Argentina, they (Washington) would impose punitive economic sanctions on the UK, you would still have incinerated Cordoba.
The worldwide economic and diplomatic consequences of such a course of action would have been extreme - we might well have been thrown out of both NATO and the EEC. The pictures of the incinerated ruins of Cordoba would have been broadcast round the world and would have led to huge sympathy for the Argentines.
The economic impact would have been no less severe with a run on sterling and capital flight from the UK leaving us exposed to inflation and renewed unemployment.
Have you forgotten the extent to which American economic pressure forced both us and the French to stand down in Suez in 1956?
Thatcher's Britain would have been as much a pariah state as Putin's Russia is now.
As someone who was in the FCO at the time, I'd just like to say that even a UK threat of nuclear weapons use against a non-nuclear state, let alone their actual use, was unthinkable in 1982.
How do you know what Thatcher would have done had British conventional forces started to lose the War and her premiership then been at risk of ending in humiliation and British territory lost to invasion without using all means of defence at our disposal?
He was in the FCO for goodness sake and his statement is factual as you would understand had you been around at the time
He was not Thatcher was he and Thatcher would have decided not the FCO
I absolutely would have not had any input into that decision, but you seem oblivious of the fact that the US only just supported our effort to retake the Falklands - we persuaded them by the skin of our teeth. We would have lost all US support for the war had we even hinted at using NW. And without the US helicopter and logistics support, our troops would not even have made it to the Falklands.
So its time to put your ignorant arse on ignore.
We got to the Falklands with our aircraft carriers and cruise liners who transported our troops.
Not due to the US who were effectively little more than neutral in the campaign
(What are the odds The Only True Tory In History has no idea what I'm going on about?)
@HYUFD go on, do you know what he is referring to because it was the first thing I thought of when you made that post. You are supposed to have a degree in history but you appear to know F All.
Unlike the show 'As Time Goes By', which went by very slowly.
One of those successful “unfunny” comedies so popular in the 80s and 90s.
‘Last of the Summer Wine’ was the daddy, though.
Don’t Wait Up, George Layton’s Comedy was of that ilk and Allo Allo certainly outstayed its welcome.
I think Allo Allo is hilarious and holds up well. A lot of the comedy in the 80's and 90's was very well written. I also find it easier to laugh at things with a laughter track.
Another good header, @Cyclefree . I was struck by how little reaction the story about what was effectively sexual assault of a schoolgirl by Met police, with the reported acquiescence of her school, got here.
Though the fact that we’re teetering, and possibly edging away from the brink of armageddon does provide something of a distraction, it’s still distinctly uncomfortable.
The school's behaviour was a disgrace. The teachers involved seem to have had no understanding of what safeguarding actually means or involves.
It's that thing you say you have thought about so you can tick a box on a form, right?
That applies to pretty much all procedures these days.
I am Chair of Trustees at a primary school so safeguarding is something I've been taking a close interest in ever since taking on the role.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
There was absolutely no question of nuclear weapons. You might want to watch the Falklands Play which, although perhaps rather too pro-Thatcher, does give a flavour of what happened.
Another good header, @Cyclefree . I was struck by how little reaction the story about what was effectively sexual assault of a schoolgirl by Met police, with the reported acquiescence of her school, got here.
Though the fact that we’re teetering, and possibly edging away from the brink of armageddon does provide something of a distraction, it’s still distinctly uncomfortable.
The school's behaviour was a disgrace. The teachers involved seem to have had no understanding of what safeguarding actually means or involves.
I thought the whole story unbelievably disgusting. I know there's been an apology, but are the officers being proceduted, or even still employed?
This is the police. You cannot expect accountability. The "good cops" look the other way for the bad cops.
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
In the end @HYUFD is incapable of ever conceding he is wrong and here you are near 24 hours later calling him out and still he talks garbage
Indeed he has upset quite a few by his total lack of empathy and is in direct contrast to his claim he is a Christian
I have decided to believe that HY doesn’t actually exist, in the real world. Since that is my strongly held faith, it is now a fact. HY is no more.
HY's just enjoying himself being PB's controversialist. It's just a bit of personal branding. He reminds me of British people who move to America and end up saying things like 'Gor Blimey Guvnah' or coming over like Princess Margaret because it seems to be expected of them. People shouldn't get so incensed by it. I'm always surprised when otherwise sensible posters let themselves get so frustrated by him.
Everyone has their own limit, even when they can see its deliberate frustration.
Well, when someone like so normally calm like Carynx loses it over a chauvanistic comment by HY, I always think he's scraping the barrel of things to try and inflame his nationalist passions.
I find this epistemologically fascinating, unless I mean historiographically. Many/most of us here were of the age to vote and get a mortgage in 1982. HYUFD was still, literally, in nappies. And he illustrates how extra spectacularly wrong you can be about stuff simply by not having been there or thereabouts when the stuff happened. I will always remember this in future when reading histories and biographies.
A classic HY post responds to a wide range of issues (all issues) through a lense of polling, party politics and electoral predictions. That's an unusual and amusing way to look at the world, and I think it offers real value because nobody else looks at the world like that. Some of his more recent posts are more just taking a controversial position and defending it against all comers, which is fine, doesn't bother me, but they are not classic HY.
Classic HY for me will always remain the depiction of Hillary Clinton as "John Terry in a skirt".
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
Firstly the world would not know even if that happened.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
Yes he can. Only someone insane and evil would think otherwise.
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
In the end @HYUFD is incapable of ever conceding he is wrong and here you are near 24 hours later calling him out and still he talks garbage
Indeed he has upset quite a few by his total lack of empathy and is in direct contrast to his claim he is a Christian
I have decided to believe that HY doesn’t actually exist, in the real world. Since that is my strongly held faith, it is now a fact. HY is no more.
HY's just enjoying himself being PB's controversialist. It's just a bit of personal branding. He reminds me of British people who move to America and end up saying things like 'Gor Blimey Guvnah' or coming over like Princess Margaret because it seems to be expected of them. People shouldn't get so incensed by it. I'm always surprised when otherwise sensible posters let themselves get so frustrated by him.
Everyone has their own limit, even when they can see its deliberate frustration.
Well, when someone like so normally calm like Carynx loses it over a chauvanistic comment by HY, I always think he's scraping the barrel of things to try and inflame his nationalist passions.
I find this epistemologically fascinating, unless I mean historiographically. Many/most of us here were of the age to vote and get a mortgage in 1982. HYUFD was still, literally, in nappies. And he illustrates how extra spectacularly wrong you can be about stuff simply by not having been there or thereabouts when the stuff happened. I will always remember this in future when reading histories and biographies.
A classic HY post responds to a wide range of issues (all issues) through a lense of polling, party politics and electoral predictions. That's an unusual and amusing way to look at the world, and I think it offers real value because nobody else looks at the world like that. Some of his more recent posts are more just taking a controversial position and defending it against all comers, which is fine, doesn't bother me, but they are not classic HY.
Classic HY for me will always remain the depiction of Hillary Clinton as "John Terry in a skirt".
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
Yes he can. Only someone insane and evil would think otherwise.
There is nothing insane and evil about defending your nation's territory from invasion no matter what the cost.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I do wonder how Thatcher would have handled the Suez crisis. Probably a lot better than Eden.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
Life comes at you pretty hard at times, I would have loved to have seen Steve Gibson's reaction to this news.
Chelsea are set to play any remaining home Champions League fixtures behind closed doors after owner Roman Abramovich was sanctioned by the EU, The Athletic understands.
It’s not funny at all. Chelsea and Chelsea fans are sanctioned, but not Roman Abramovich.
We have learned from previous times when governments have talked tough sanctions but the sanctions are pathetic because you have not sanctioned family or best friends. Romans fixer and best mate remains unsanctioned, so Chelsea fans and English football fans suffer in same way as All decoys to hide the truth suffer.
Anyway, I have ceded the TV and will watch the beloved’s beloved Arsenal. It only seems like yesterday they were last on live. 🥱
Though I had to tell her, I have analysed the fixtures, Arsenal finishes 5th and Another London side called Tottenham Hotspur will finish 4th this season. Tottenham favourites for their fixtures including arsenal home, arsenal will struggle in their fixtures with their weak bench. No top four for Arsenal this year I had to tell her.
But she shouldn’t shoot the messenger, should she, if I merely explain what the better bet for a serious sports bettor is 😆
Arsenal v Everton in the final day could be highly significant for both. Although for us I fear it will be all over by then.
And for Arsenal 😆
I had to give her the honest sports betting analysis about 4th place and champions league football didn’t I, in case she wants to place a bet, just like we have to be honest about our political betting analysis on PB. 😄
Another good header, @Cyclefree . I was struck by how little reaction the story about what was effectively sexual assault of a schoolgirl by Met police, with the reported acquiescence of her school, got here.
Though the fact that we’re teetering, and possibly edging away from the brink of armageddon does provide something of a distraction, it’s still distinctly uncomfortable.
The school's behaviour was a disgrace. The teachers involved seem to have had no understanding of what safeguarding actually means or involves.
I thought the whole story unbelievably disgusting. I know there's been an apology, but are the officers being proceduted, or even still employed?
They're probably being promoted. That's what happened to the officers who fucked it up in the Stephen Port case.
The Associated Press @AP BREAKING: President Joe Biden calls Russian President Vladimir Putin a "war criminal" in the sharpest condemnation yet of Putin by a U.S. official since the invasion of Ukraine.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
Actually, you're the one asserting she'd have done something totally uncharacteristic, completely at odds with those who had better knowledge of her say she would do, and that those who were in the FCO or military are saying would happen.
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
So 50% were not and most were not sunk and our carriers survived.
Even if all 13 bombs had not gone off that did not mean we would have lost as we had nuclear weapons and Argentina did not.
As I said we could have parked subs armed with nuclear missiles off the Argentine Coast and refused to remove them until Argentine forces withdrew from the Falkland Islands
Again completely missed the point. All I objected to was you saying it was easy. Go on finally admit it wasn't easy. The US Navy thought it impossible. The head of the RAF thought that we would have lost if 6 of those ,13 bombs had exploded. If they had of exploded we would have lost over half our frigates and destroyers.
Under no circumstances can that be described as easy.
Go on admit it wasn't easy. That is all I am after. Be a man at admit you were wrong to say tha.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Bonkers. I never said we should concede defeat. Don't know where you got that from. Once we were committed, we were committed. And I was in favour of us doing so. You just make stuff up.
I have objected to one thing, you saying 3 times that the Falklands war was easy and you are so weak you can't admit that was a mistake. Pathetic.
You are so feeble and weak that you are happy to insult the memory of those that fought and the government of the day than admit you were wrong.
Shame on you.
Yes you did.
You were not prepared to use all methods at our disposal to free the Falklands. You effectively said if the war had started to go against our conventional forces we would automatically have lost.
You restarted this debate not me, so stop whinging if you can't take the heat
Go on stop keep avoiding the point. Admit you were wrong in saying the , Falklands war was easy.
Stop being a pathetic whimp and man up.
I am not ever going to concede to you so tough.
My original point stands absolutely we would in the end win the war with Argentina as we had a bigger and more effective military than them and nuclear weapons unlike them.
Intervening against a nuclear armed Russia over Ukraine however is a different matter
So you stick by your 3 statements that the Falklands War was easy.
You are an absolute disgrace. I can't imagine any Tory would support your view.
You are not even a Tory but a wet Liberal
So what and I'm certainly not wet, but my position is not relevant here.
For a Tory you have shown a complete lack of patriotism by throwing the servicemen and govt of the day under a bus. You have also shown a willingness to kill innocent civilians. You are unwilling to admit you said the war was easy let alone retract yet we can all see your posts so add lying to the list.
And you call yourself a Christian.
No I didn't. It is you who ruled out all defences to protect the Falklands making their sacrifices in vain, not me.
Did you say the Falklands War was easy or not? A yes or no will do. It is not like we can't all see what you said.
So are you going to lie or admit it?
There is nothing to admit.
My point that the war in Argentina was fought as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them in comparison to intervening against Russia in Ukraine stands absolutely.
I am not going to back down on it, even if you keep going on about it all night, all week, all month, all year and even until the day I die
Did you say it or didn't you? We can all see you did. This is hilarious that you can't say it even though we can all see it. Do you not see how idiotic you look.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
And not yours.
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an disproportionate use of nuclear weapons.
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
The loss of the Falklands to Argentine invasion would have left us so weak we would have been ripe for invasion and may well have faced a Soviet invasion within a few years.
On a forced choice any nation's leader should prefer being feared and reviled as a last resort than being weak and incapable of defending the nation and its territory
Forgive me if I haven't quite got this right, but are we at the stage of the argument where Maggie should be seen as a feeble pussy-footing Lib because she didn't nuke Buenos Aires?
If only she’d been a proper Conservative?
I doubt real Thatcher lives up to the Thatcher that lives inside some peoples heads in darker corners of the internet and Conservative clubs.
There is the real Margaret Thatcher, who many of us lived through and either loathed or loved, and the inflatable Margaret Thatcher so beloved for the fantasies of Tory boys of a certain age.
When the Channel Islands were invaded during WW2 if you were in Churchill’s cabinet would you have advised him to
1. Fight them on the plages and end up with lots of dead people for something that wasn’t actually that important in the big picture however sad it would be that Britain lost their oldest “possessions”.
2. Do what Churchill did.
I’m just curious as to whether you side with people like Churchill that sometimes you have to take the odd loss for the greater good or that you are absolutely intransigent that British possessions must be defended at all costs.
Losing the Falklands would have been grim but let’s face it, before the Argentines invaded 99.999999% of people in the UK had never heard of them and would not have really perhaps been a popular decision to Nuke hundreds of thousands of people and become a global pariah for the sake of these forgotten islands.
Without wanting to go over the last thread all over again I looked up some stuff on the Falklands War regarding @HYUFD comment on it being easy.
The US Navy assessed that a successful counter invasion was impossible
Lord Craig stated that if just 6 of the 13 bomb fuses that failed because the Argentine Hawks were flying too low had detonated we would have lost
And that is ignoring the threat of the exocets getting past the destroyers and frigates which suffered badly protecting the carriers.
But hey ho just a cake walk.
Right you want to restart this I can go on all evening and all night now if needed.
None of that changes whatsoever my point that Thatcher was prepared to fight to retake the Falklands as Argentina did not have nuclear weapons unlike us and had a far weaker military like us. Hence we won the war and she would have continued to fight the war no matter what the cost.
Sending a no fly zone into Ukraine against a Russia armed with nuclear weapons is however a totally different ball game
Even had all our carriers been sunk and most of our destroyers and frigates been sunk (which they weren't and was highly unlikely) we could still have placed submarines armed with nuclear weapons off the coast off Argentina and refused to remove them until the Argentines withdrew
Again showing your ignorance. Re our frigates and destroyers over 50% were hit. As per my previous reference frome some who actually knew what he was talking about if just 6 of the 13 bombs that failed to explode had done so we would have lost. So not highly unlikely at all, but nearly happened. Bizarrely we were lucky that the very brave Argentine Hawk pilots got too low. As it was 4 did sink.
So 50% were not and most were not sunk and our carriers survived.
Even if all 13 bombs had not gone off that did not mean we would have lost as we had nuclear weapons and Argentina did not.
As I said we could have parked subs armed with nuclear missiles off the Argentine Coast and refused to remove them until Argentine forces withdrew from the Falkland Islands
Again completely missed the point. All I objected to was you saying it was easy. Go on finally admit it wasn't easy. The US Navy thought it impossible. The head of the RAF thought that we would have lost if 6 of those ,13 bombs had exploded. If they had of exploded we would have lost over half our frigates and destroyers.
Under no circumstances can that be described as easy.
Go on admit it wasn't easy. That is all I am after. Be a man at admit you were wrong to say tha.
Nope. That was absolutely the point. You were willing to concede defeat.
Defeat never needed to be conceded as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them. Thatcher knew that hence she went to war.
You could have gone through every war in history as to hypotheticals which might have given it a different course, so what.
Bonkers. I never said we should concede defeat. Don't know where you got that from. Once we were committed, we were committed. And I was in favour of us doing so. You just make stuff up.
I have objected to one thing, you saying 3 times that the Falklands war was easy and you are so weak you can't admit that was a mistake. Pathetic.
You are so feeble and weak that you are happy to insult the memory of those that fought and the government of the day than admit you were wrong.
Shame on you.
Yes you did.
You were not prepared to use all methods at our disposal to free the Falklands. You effectively said if the war had started to go against our conventional forces we would automatically have lost.
You restarted this debate not me, so stop whinging if you can't take the heat
Go on stop keep avoiding the point. Admit you were wrong in saying the , Falklands war was easy.
Stop being a pathetic whimp and man up.
I am not ever going to concede to you so tough.
My original point stands absolutely we would in the end win the war with Argentina as we had a bigger and more effective military than them and nuclear weapons unlike them.
Intervening against a nuclear armed Russia over Ukraine however is a different matter
So you stick by your 3 statements that the Falklands War was easy.
You are an absolute disgrace. I can't imagine any Tory would support your view.
You are not even a Tory but a wet Liberal
So what and I'm certainly not wet, but my position is not relevant here.
For a Tory you have shown a complete lack of patriotism by throwing the servicemen and govt of the day under a bus. You have also shown a willingness to kill innocent civilians. You are unwilling to admit you said the war was easy let alone retract yet we can all see your posts so add lying to the list.
And you call yourself a Christian.
No I didn't. It is you who ruled out all defences to protect the Falklands making their sacrifices in vain, not me.
Did you say the Falklands War was easy or not? A yes or no will do. It is not like we can't all see what you said.
So are you going to lie or admit it?
There is nothing to admit.
My point that the war in Argentina was fought as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them in comparison to intervening against Russia in Ukraine stands absolutely.
I am not going to back down on it, even if you keep going on about it all night, all week, all month, all year and even until the day I die
Did you say it or didn't you? We can all see you did. This is hilarious that you can't say it even though we can all see it. Do you not see how idiotic you look.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
And not yours.
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
She did not scrap our nuclear deterrent did she, so she always kept it as a last resort of defence
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
Firstly the world would not know even if that happened.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
Oh, that sort of thing would have got out. If for no other reason than it would be very difficult to conceal a raving Prime Minister.
Second - why do you think I said it would be a massive constitutional crisis ensuing? The Queen isn't supposed to get involved.
Third - have you noticed that the Officers of the Armed Forces do not swear an oath to the Prime Minister? We swear an oath to the Monarch. Some Constitutional scholars regard this as the ultimate check/balance. Just in case the PM does go all Putin.
Forgive me if I haven't quite got this right, but are we at the stage of the argument where Maggie should be seen as a feeble pussy-footing Lib because she didn't nuke Buenos Aires?
If only she’d been a proper Conservative?
I doubt real Thatcher lives up to the Thatcher that lives inside some peoples heads in darker corners of the internet and Conservative clubs.
There is the real Margaret Thatcher, who many of us lived through and either loathed or loved, and the inflatable Margaret Thatcher so beloved for the fantasies of Tory boys of a certain age.
Loving and loathing her were not the only options. That in itself is historical fantasy.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
And not yours.
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
She did not scrap our nuclear deterrent did she, so she always kept it as a last resort of defence
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an disproportionate use of nuclear weapons.
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
The loss of the Falklands to Argentine invasion would have left us so weak we would have been ripe for invasion and may well have faced a Soviet invasion within a few years.
On a forced choice any nation's leader should prefer being feared and reviled as a last resort than being weak and incapable of defending the nation and its territory
I think NATO would have had something to say about a Soviet invasion of the UK
Unlike the show 'As Time Goes By', which went by very slowly.
One of those successful “unfunny” comedies so popular in the 80s and 90s.
‘Last of the Summer Wine’ was the daddy, though.
Don’t Wait Up, George Layton’s Comedy was of that ilk and Allo Allo certainly outstayed its welcome.
I think Allo Allo is hilarious and holds up well. A lot of the comedy in the 80's and 90's was very well written. I also find it easier to laugh at things with a laughter track.
I really liked Allo Allo but, like with Are you Being Served, it probably ran for two too many seasons. They just run out of ideas and repeat gags and catchphrases.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
And not yours.
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
She did not scrap our nuclear deterrent did she, so she always kept it as a last resort of defence
Yes, last resort.
The Falklands War was not the last resort.
It was British territory as much as Surrey, if there was no other means of defending it that would have been the last resort
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
Firstly the world would not know even if that happened.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
Oh, that sort of thing would have got out. If for no other reason than it would be very difficult to conceal a raving Prime Minister.
Second - why do you think I said it would be a massive constitutional crisis ensuing? The Queen isn't supposed to get involved.
Third - have you noticed that the Officers of the Armed Forces do not swear an oath to the Prime Minister? We swear an oath to the Monarch. Some Constitutional scholars regard this as the ultimate check/balance. Just in case the PM does go all Putin.
As I said the Monarch also swears an oath to defend her territory
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
And not yours.
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
She did not scrap our nuclear deterrent did she, so she always kept it as a last resort of defence
Yes, last resort.
The Falklands War was not the last resort.
It was British territory as much as Surrey, if there was no other means of defending it that would have been the last resort
Does the Falkland Islands send MPs to Westminster like Surrey does?
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
Have you read Margaret Thatcher´s memoires? I can assure you that you are completely wrong.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an unproportional use of nuclear weapons.
You cannot prove that and it was more than an election it would have been loss of British territory to foreign invasion
I'll get Sir Max Hastings to give you a call, he wrote the definitive book on the war.
I have met him before but again it was Thatcher's decision, not his
And not yours.
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
She did not scrap our nuclear deterrent did she, so she always kept it as a last resort of defence
Yes, last resort.
The Falklands War was not the last resort.
It was British territory as much as Surrey, if there was no other means of defending it that would have been the last resort
Oh really? Please name the MPs for Surrey in 1983 and the MPs for the Falkland Islands if it were just as much.
It was an overseas territory, it was not integral British territory. Losing it in a war would have been bad, but it would not have been the last resort.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an disproportionate use of nuclear weapons.
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
The loss of the Falklands to Argentine invasion would have left us so weak we would have been ripe for invasion and may well have faced a Soviet invasion within a few years.
I shouldn't have read this whilst taking a drink. Nearly choked to death.
And I thought I was going off on one with the alternate history ideas. Apparently, Andropov , Chernenko, or Gorbachev would have seen this and somehow either decided to go charging across the German plains, France, and Belgium just to get his teeth into us, or somehow bypassed all of them just to attack the UK alone. I don't know - send hordes of landing craft all the way from Archangelsk?
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
Firstly the world would not know even if that happened.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
Oh, that sort of thing would have got out. If for no other reason than it would be very difficult to conceal a raving Prime Minister.
Second - why do you think I said it would be a massive constitutional crisis ensuing? The Queen isn't supposed to get involved.
Third - have you noticed that the Officers of the Armed Forces do not swear an oath to the Prime Minister? We swear an oath to the Monarch. Some Constitutional scholars regard this as the ultimate check/balance. Just in case the PM does go all Putin.
As I said the Monarch also swears an oath to defend her territory
Given that Queen Elizabeth II has given up quite a bit of territory during her reign, do you think regicide would be appropiate?
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an disproportionate use of nuclear weapons.
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
The loss of the Falklands to Argentine invasion would have left us so weak we would have been ripe for invasion and may well have faced a Soviet invasion within a few years.
On a forced choice any nation's leader should prefer being feared and reviled as a last resort than being weak and incapable of defending the nation and its territory
Have you noticed how all of us, irrespective of politics, agree it would be utterly wrong to use nuclear weapons first against a non-nuclear state in any circumstances? Does that not tell you anything? Thatcher wouldn’t have done it. No PM would do it, and if they tried the Cabinet, MOD, or the military would stop them.
There's absolutely no way that Willie Whitelaw would have been ok with using nukes on Argentina and he would have told Thatcher that and she trusted his advice implicitly.
There was no way Thatcher would have been OK with losing the Falklands to Argentine invasion.
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
I'll let you into a little secret, Thatcher would have rather have lost an election than order an disproportionate use of nuclear weapons.
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
The loss of the Falklands to Argentine invasion would have left us so weak we would have been ripe for invasion and may well have faced a Soviet invasion within a few years.
On a forced choice any nation's leader should prefer being feared and reviled as a last resort than being weak and incapable of defending the nation and its territory
When the Channel Islands were invaded during WW2 if you were in Churchill’s cabinet would you have advised him to
1. Fight them on the plages and end up with lots of dead people for something that wasn’t actually that important in the big picture however sad it would be that Britain lost their oldest “possessions”.
2. Do what Churchill did.
I’m just curious as to whether you side with people like Churchill that sometimes you have to take the odd loss for the greater good or that you are absolutely intransigent that British possessions must be defended at all costs.
Losing the Falklands would have been grim but let’s face it, before the Argentines invaded 99.999999% of people in the UK had never heard of them and would not have really perhaps been a popular decision to Nuke hundreds of thousands of people and become a global pariah for the sake of these forgotten islands.
We could not beat the Nazis on our own, as we proved we could beat Argentina on our own.
Churchill also did not have nuclear weapons, had he had them and the Nazis did not then he could well have threatened Hitler with a nuclear bomb if he attacked the Channel Islands
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
Firstly the world would not know even if that happened.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
Oh, that sort of thing would have got out. If for no other reason than it would be very difficult to conceal a raving Prime Minister.
Second - why do you think I said it would be a massive constitutional crisis ensuing? The Queen isn't supposed to get involved.
Third - have you noticed that the Officers of the Armed Forces do not swear an oath to the Prime Minister? We swear an oath to the Monarch. Some Constitutional scholars regard this as the ultimate check/balance. Just in case the PM does go all Putin.
As I said the Monarch also swears an oath to defend her territory
In which case comparing the territory that the Monarch had when she swore her oath, and the territory she has now, then this must be the worst Monarch in the history of the United Kingdom.
Or alternatively, the Monarch has other priorities than your mad ramblings.
Unlike the show 'As Time Goes By', which went by very slowly.
One of those successful “unfunny” comedies so popular in the 80s and 90s.
‘Last of the Summer Wine’ was the daddy, though.
Don’t Wait Up, George Layton’s Comedy was of that ilk and Allo Allo certainly outstayed its welcome.
I think Allo Allo is hilarious and holds up well. A lot of the comedy in the 80's and 90's was very well written. I also find it easier to laugh at things with a laughter track.
I really liked Allo Allo but, like with Are you Being Served, it probably ran for two too many seasons. They just run out of ideas and repeat gags and catchphrases.
That's all comedy! I admire how prolific they were. Find a winning formula and grind it out - if you get a shit series, sort it out in the next one. Look at how long Friends went on - in the US they don't kill a cash cow.
Is Ukraine - and is the West - willing to let Russia normalise those grotesque annexations for the greater good?
Dead Putin is the key.
Sadly, not on the negotiating table.
Although there is something in the idea that we should push the Russians into agreeing the sort of humiliation that cannot go unanswered by malcontents in Moscow.
Both vindictive and ineffective. Muscovite malcontents lack the power to take out Putin either by ballot or bullet. And in 20s Germany the effect of humiliation was to make people get behind the leader. The danger is of reinforcing the belief in Putin that a majority of Russians currently have
Yes, we need to be serious. "Humiliating" Putin is stupid, as long as he remains in charge and as long as he has nukes.
Don't corner the rat. Give him an exit. It would be nice if we could eliminate him from global politics, at some point and in some way, but right now the world just needs to step back from the abyss, and end the war. Then we re-arm and wait, and hope that Russia mends itself
We don't need to punish Russia further, not right now. It is already quite humbled and the sanctions have already done serious longterm damage
I am afraid you are misreading the nature of the regime. We have been talking about off ramps for months now, and the reality is that the Kremlin does not want an off ramp. Indeed continuing to discuss even fig leaf concessions is counter productive. Literally the only thing that is understood in the mafia state is the naked use of power. In fact you should increase the pressure and upgrade the Ukrainian military capabilities to the point where they can successfully go on the offensive. This rat must be cornered before he recognises that he has no choice but to make whatever peace he can. To let him off the hook leaves him like Saddam Hussein after Desert Storm, when actually the defeat needs to be sufficiently comprehensive to ensure regime change.
Few governments make the kind of mistake that Putin has and survive. The West has been threatened with nuclear anhillation. If there is any way to ensure the removal of the tyrant as quickly as possible, then it should be taken now. Leaving him in place is simply too dangerous.
We established upthread that Charles xii of Sweden, Hitler, Napoleon and ancient Athens survived for years after equivalent mistakes. What are your counter examples?
Wars of aggression where the aggressor lost and there was a subsequent change or major modification of regime? Germany WWI, Germany WW2, Japan WW2, USSR Afghanistan 1979-89 , French occupation of the Ruhr 1923, Arab Israeli wars of 1948 and 1967, West Pakistan versus East Pakistan 1971. Falklands War 1982, there are others.
Given Karl XII was exiled for five years after his defeat at Poltava we should also note that Sweden abandoned absolutism and established Parliamentary rule in his absence, so I could claim him for the aggressors who failed list too.
In the long run, but then all regimes fail in the long run. The implication of your claim was that we can get Putin now while he is especially vulnerable. None of those examples supports that timescale.
Well History doesn´t repeat but it rhymes... I think the Russian army could mutiny and if it does, how long do you give Putin then?
If he is overthrown, it will be by a charismatic junior officer. Because the senior officers are too compromised and have benefited too much from Putin's reign.
That would be Decembrist style.
I think another danger may be that the different forces: Regular Army, armed FSB units, and Rozgvardia end up on different sides and it all gets Bucharest 1989 rather quickly.
He might even nuke his own troops if they were on the way to depose him.
Unfortunately I fear that this can not be ruled out.
He was interviewed by Farage on GB News recently. Very curious mixture of views but I wouldn't quite say he is a crank in the mould of Gisela Stuart or Kate Hoey. He also strongly supports HS2.
NO MORE FUCKING REFERENDUMS!!!
Perhaps we need a new party with no referendums as its one and only policy?
But seriously, it is ridiculous to have a referendum on net zero. There are parties standing e.g. Reform or whatever this week's name is, who are against it. So people can vote for that if they really care.
I'm going to disagree on this. There are sometimes big picture issues which need to be resolved, where the entire political class is united on a view, and the public aren't behind them.
The EU was a case in point. Net Zero looks likely to be another area where the politicans decide on a policy that's pretty unpopular with a good chunk of the electorate, and just impose it on them anyway, by cosy consensus.
We should really have a lot more referendums, and thus firmly keep clipping the wings of governments who don't to what the electorate want- the problem with the EU one wasn't that it was held, but that it was held 20 years too late. If it had been impossible for the UK to have become integrated into the EU because the voters had the opportunity to reject Maastricht/Nice/Lisbon/EU Constitution etc, then firstly we probably wouldn't have left, and secondly leaving would have been nearly as big a shock anyway as we wouldn't have ever become so deeply embedded.
Unlike the show 'As Time Goes By', which went by very slowly.
One of those successful “unfunny” comedies so popular in the 80s and 90s.
‘Last of the Summer Wine’ was the daddy, though.
Don’t Wait Up, George Layton’s Comedy was of that ilk and Allo Allo certainly outstayed its welcome.
I think Allo Allo is hilarious and holds up well. A lot of the comedy in the 80's and 90's was very well written. I also find it easier to laugh at things with a laughter track.
I really liked Allo Allo but, like with Are you Being Served, it probably ran for two too many seasons. They just run out of ideas and repeat gags and catchphrases.
Always leave them wanting more. Blackadder, Fawlty Towers, arguably the Office etc. Perfect comedy, undiluted.
There is an alternate history where, had the retaking of the Falklands stalled, the military leaders had allowed Thatcher's command to nuke Rosario, was it not.
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
There's an alternate history where she Thatcher goes completely Bursar and orders a nuke strike, and the monarch gets involved.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad. Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover" And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario. All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
Firstly the world would not know even if that happened.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
Oh, that sort of thing would have got out. If for no other reason than it would be very difficult to conceal a raving Prime Minister.
Second - why do you think I said it would be a massive constitutional crisis ensuing? The Queen isn't supposed to get involved.
Third - have you noticed that the Officers of the Armed Forces do not swear an oath to the Prime Minister? We swear an oath to the Monarch. Some Constitutional scholars regard this as the ultimate check/balance. Just in case the PM does go all Putin.
As I said the Monarch also swears an oath to defend her territory
Yeah, if you think HMQ would ever act like you fantasise, you've got zero idea about what she's like.
Comments
I’d call you middle-aged rather than old.
I think old starts at 75 these days.
It just boggles me that some folks were old enough to actually get a payslip in 1980.
The timing of that is playing tricks with my mind, it suggests you must surely be in your 90s…
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/live/cricket/56549517
https://www.espncricinfo.com/player/joe-root-303669/bowling-batting-stats
Had she lost the war her premiership would have been over anyway so Whitelaw's advice would not have been much use as her period in No 10 would have been over and ended in humiliation for her and for the UK
Putin's version of NK is on the way.
My point that the war in Argentina was fought as we had a bigger military than Argentina and nuclear weapons unlike them in comparison to intervening against Russia in Ukraine stands absolutely.
I am not going to back down on it, even if you keep going on about it all night, all week, all month, all year and even until the day I die
‘Last of the Summer Wine’ was the daddy, though.
Perhaps we need a new party with no referendums as its one and only policy?
But seriously, it is ridiculous to have a referendum on net zero. There are parties standing e.g. Reform or whatever this week's name is, who are against it. So people can vote for that if they really care.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenham_Common_Women's_Peace_Camp
Not due to the US who were effectively little more than neutral in the campaign
I think another danger may be that the different forces: Regular Army, armed FSB units, and Rozgvardia end up on different sides and it all gets Bucharest 1989 rather quickly.
We have learned from previous times when governments have talked tough sanctions but the sanctions are pathetic because you have not sanctioned family or best friends. Romans fixer and best mate remains unsanctioned, so Chelsea fans and English football fans suffer in same way as All decoys to hide the truth suffer.
Anyway, I have ceded the TV and will watch the beloved’s beloved Arsenal. It only seems like yesterday they were last on live. 🥱
Though I had to tell her, I have analysed the fixtures, Arsenal finishes 5th and Another London side called Tottenham Hotspur will finish 4th this season. Tottenham favourites for their fixtures including arsenal home, arsenal will struggle in their fixtures with their weak bench. No top four for Arsenal this year I had to tell her.
But she shouldn’t shoot the messenger, should she, if I merely explain what the better bet for a serious sports bettor is 😆
I mean, just:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mgiCechWNCo
... made a huge difference.
(What are the odds The Only True Tory In History has no idea what I'm going on about?)
I'll try. Latin America, including Chile, break relations with us, as does any state hostile to us for any other reasons. The USA and France step back and distance themselves. Most of the Commonwealth drop out. Australia, New Zealand and Canada go very silent. The EU move towards expulsion. Our presence within the United Nations is actively opposed. There is no explicit support anywhere, and there is almost nowhere where we can visit. As the effects of radiation sickness in Argentina become evident, our unpopularity grows. We are isolated. Even possible friends accept that we should be isolated in every way. We try to survive on own. We fail. Nobody cares.
Alternate history, for which we may be grateful; but we should perhaps remember that it is one view of the implication of the hope of a Tory voice on this site.
The UN actually approved a UK based resolution that it was acting in self defence to defend Argentina and Argentine troops should withdraw. There are no limits on what can be done by a nation acting in self defence.
However regardless even all the above would have been better than losing the Falklands to Argentina which would have shown us to be so weak the USSR may even have tried an invasion of the UK
Caspar Weinberger was an enthusiastic Anglophile and well deserved the honorary knighthood he got.
Also the French helped us with information about their Exocets which in turn meant that Mrs Thatcher let them off far more lightly than they deserved over the Rainbow Warrior.
Maybe the West can do better with a deep fake of Putin explaining it's all been a big mistake and is the fault of the aliens controlling him, or somesuch?
Although for us I fear it will be all over by then.
Willie Whitelaw phones the Palace after Maggie starts gibbering and chewing the table legs screaming "BURN THEM IN NUCLEAR FIRE!"
The Queen sends a message to the sub commanders telling them they are NOT, under any circumstances, to launch missiles against Argentine sites.
Massive constitutional crisis ensues. The fate of the monarchy itself is now in jeopardy (the Queen would have known this was coming, but her duty would compel her). Maggie leaves Downing Street in a straightjacket. International repercussions and huge recriminations over the fact that the British PM even tried to order such a thing. Huge loss of standing of the UK on the world stage.
And for all of this, it's probably considerably more likely than everyone standing by and letting the nukes fly.
(First and hugely the most likely: Maggie doesn't go mega-evil and mad.
Second, and the most likely by far of all the possibilities where she gets possessed by the ghost of Joe Stalin, those around her just say, "No, Prime Minister, I think you need a rest cure, Mr Whitelaw can take the helm while you recover"
And then we can go with the Queen Intervention scenario.
All more likely than HYUFD's fantasy)
She would have realised it would have made the UK a pariah nation of decades, if not centuries.
And part of his argument is that she'd have done it because to lose would have meant the end of her government...
This is what war means.
Putin is evil. I hope he dies an extremely painful death and rots in hell. That applies to pretty much all procedures these days.
I am Chair of Trustees at a primary school so safeguarding is something I've been taking a close interest in ever since taking on the role.
Second it is constitutionally the PM who in reality sends our forces to war and the Monarch who takes an oath to defend her territory at all costs.
The Queen would know her coronation oath also required her to support her PM defend the Falklands at all costs
In fact it is weak to do anything but that
I had to give her the honest sports betting analysis about 4th place and champions league football didn’t I, in case she wants to place a bet, just like we have to be honest about our political betting analysis on PB. 😄
@AP
BREAKING: President Joe Biden calls Russian President Vladimir Putin a "war criminal" in the sharpest condemnation yet of Putin by a U.S. official since the invasion of Ukraine.
https://twitter.com/AP/status/1504176384159145984
===
How did you go to war, Mr President?
Slowly at first, and then very quickly.
Accordingly, the burden of proof is on you.
Go on - prove she'd have nuked Argentina.
[Fetches popcorn and waits]
She never once expressed an interest in using non-convention unproportional nuclear force. This is a bizarre and twisted fantasy you've invented.
On a forced choice any nation's leader should prefer being feared and reviled as a last resort than being weak and incapable of defending the nation and its territory
When the Channel Islands were invaded during WW2 if you were in Churchill’s cabinet would you have advised him to
1. Fight them on the plages and end up with lots of dead people for something that wasn’t actually that important in the big picture however sad it would be that Britain lost their oldest “possessions”.
2. Do what Churchill did.
I’m just curious as to whether you side with people like Churchill that sometimes you have to take the odd loss for the greater good or that you are absolutely intransigent that British possessions must be defended at all costs.
Losing the Falklands would have been grim but let’s face it, before the Argentines invaded 99.999999% of people in the UK had never heard of them and would not have really perhaps been a popular decision to Nuke hundreds of thousands of people and become a global pariah for the sake of these forgotten islands.
Second - why do you think I said it would be a massive constitutional crisis ensuing? The Queen isn't supposed to get involved.
Third - have you noticed that the Officers of the Armed Forces do not swear an oath to the Prime Minister? We swear an oath to the Monarch. Some Constitutional scholars regard this as the ultimate check/balance. Just in case the PM does go all Putin.
The Falklands War was not the last resort.
It was an overseas territory, it was not integral British territory. Losing it in a war would have been bad, but it would not have been the last resort.
If so, it seems to be the only part of the Russian strategy that's working.
And I thought I was going off on one with the alternate history ideas. Apparently, Andropov , Chernenko, or Gorbachev would have seen this and somehow either decided to go charging across the German plains, France, and Belgium just to get his teeth into us, or somehow bypassed all of them just to attack the UK alone. I don't know - send hordes of landing craft all the way from Archangelsk?
Churchill also did not have nuclear weapons, had he had them and the Nazis did not then he could well have threatened Hitler with a nuclear bomb if he attacked the Channel Islands
We had conducted nuclear tests by then?
Or alternatively, the Monarch has other priorities than your mad ramblings.
The EU was a case in point. Net Zero looks likely to be another area where the politicans decide on a policy that's pretty unpopular with a good chunk of the electorate, and just impose it on them anyway, by cosy consensus.
We should really have a lot more referendums, and thus firmly keep clipping the wings of governments who don't to what the electorate want- the problem with the EU one wasn't that it was held, but that it was held 20 years too late. If it had been impossible for the UK to have become integrated into the EU because the voters had the opportunity to reject Maastricht/Nice/Lisbon/EU Constitution etc, then firstly we probably wouldn't have left, and secondly leaving would have been nearly as big a shock anyway as we wouldn't have ever become so deeply embedded.