Labour was unelectable in 1983, and the excitement of the SDP launch quickly subsided when the public realised it was Woy, Shirl, the boy David and Bill Rogers.
Thatch would probably have been returned to power even without the Falklands factor, but with a much-reduced majority---something that might have encouraged Tarzan to try his luck in ousting her a year or so later.
80,s
Re: 80,s
Giles wrote:
>>>
So are you trying to claim that the Soviet Union was just a benevolent, peace-loving, isolationist "Great Socialist Utopia" that just wanted to be left alone?
All ballerinas, combine harvesters and workers' collectives?
It was the Soviets (not NATO) that started the medium range nuclear arms race of the '80s when they put SS-20s into Eastern Europe.
This led to the deployment of cruise & Pershing by the Americans IN RESPONSE, though of course CND, the Labour Party and other left-wing organisations were at the time very successful in propagating the myth that the opposite was true - a myth that still prevails today.
- Eric
>>>
So are you trying to claim that the Soviet Union was just a benevolent, peace-loving, isolationist "Great Socialist Utopia" that just wanted to be left alone?
All ballerinas, combine harvesters and workers' collectives?
It was the Soviets (not NATO) that started the medium range nuclear arms race of the '80s when they put SS-20s into Eastern Europe.
This led to the deployment of cruise & Pershing by the Americans IN RESPONSE, though of course CND, the Labour Party and other left-wing organisations were at the time very successful in propagating the myth that the opposite was true - a myth that still prevails today.
- Eric
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andy at handiwork
- Posts: 4113
- Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 2:40 am
Re: 80,s
warren zevon rip wrote:
This coincides exactly with the collapse of
> Poland, East Germany and so on. Mrs T and Mr Reagan won the
> Cold War. This was A Good Thing. Unless of course you prefer no
> free speech and the gulag.
If Sellars and Yateman were ever to update their wonderful book I'm sure they would use exactly the same phrase to describe the 'winning' of the Cold War. Of course it might have been cold for us in the West, but not so for those who suffered the proxy wars both sides fought throughout the period.
As for Thatcher and her ilk calling for the defeat of communism and the consequent dismantling of the Iron Curtain, when that did happen, the downside of a unified and possibly resurgent Germany, raised its ugly (for her) head. A very poor part of the country having to be baled out by the western part, and the possibility of all those economic refugees from the rest of Eastern Europe of course.
This coincides exactly with the collapse of
> Poland, East Germany and so on. Mrs T and Mr Reagan won the
> Cold War. This was A Good Thing. Unless of course you prefer no
> free speech and the gulag.
If Sellars and Yateman were ever to update their wonderful book I'm sure they would use exactly the same phrase to describe the 'winning' of the Cold War. Of course it might have been cold for us in the West, but not so for those who suffered the proxy wars both sides fought throughout the period.
As for Thatcher and her ilk calling for the defeat of communism and the consequent dismantling of the Iron Curtain, when that did happen, the downside of a unified and possibly resurgent Germany, raised its ugly (for her) head. A very poor part of the country having to be baled out by the western part, and the possibility of all those economic refugees from the rest of Eastern Europe of course.
-
Sam Slater
- Posts: 11624
- Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2017 2:40 am
Re: 80,s
[quote]Nobody WON the cold war,[/quote]
No, because there was no actual war. Maybe it was a staring competition, where the USSR blinked first?
No, because there was no actual war. Maybe it was a staring competition, where the USSR blinked first?
[i]I used to spend a lot of time criticizing Islam on here in the noughties - but things are much better now.[/i]