Fast Buck$, Coorabell
I was in England in 1982 when Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands. It was announced in the press in a couple of paragraphs on page three, reflecting the fact that 99 per cent of Britons had never heard of the Falklands and didn’t give a stuff anyway.
Enter Margaret Thatcher, who was well down in the polls. Within a week, there was confected outrage all over and loud the rumblings of war were heard.
Soon the Brits were over there in force asserting their power and seeking to liberate the islands from a fourth tier power. The Split Enz song ‘six months in a leaky boat’ was banned from airplay. It goes without saying that there was no discussion of the historical right of the Argentinian claim to the islands.
One of the memorable events was the sinking of the Argentinian battleship Belgrano, which at that late stage was actually sailing away from the conflict; leading even British observers to question why it was necessary to sacrifice 300 sailors lives.
The likely answer emerged some 30 years later when the relevant documents were finally available: Britain had been humiliated by losing 26 sailors. But ocean-going boats and the Argentinian airforce knew all about the vulnerabilities of the British vessels and exploited them well. Belgrano was payback.
My point is that Thatcher was prepared to start a war for domestic political advance, even if thousands of lives were at risk.
Should we then be surprised at Trumps murder of that Iranian general (plus his bodyguard and driver)? Of course not; in one stroke, Trump was able to distract attention from his impeachment problems and to satisfy his Israeli controllers. And it’s a very old tradition to start a foreign war to boost your credentials anyway.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
