Lessons of the Falklands Crisis?
| Author | Peter Nailor |
| Date | 01 October 1982 |
| DOI | 10.1177/004711788200700402 |
| Published date | 01 October 1982 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
2158
LESSONS
OF
THE
FALKLANDS
CRISIS?
PETER
NAILOR
1982
has
been
an
eventful
year
in
many
ways,
and
one
of
the
first
conclusions
one
can
make
about
the
Falklands
crisis
is
that
it
is
too
early
yet
to
be
able
to
say
how
intrinsically
important
it
has
been.
Joseph
Frankel
has
emphasised
that
we
must
distinguish
between
what
is
salient
and
what
is
important
in
politics,
and
although
it
seems
to
me
that
this
is
a
very
useful
distinction
to
make,
it
is
also
true
that
the
distinction
depends
in
part
upon
the
.
timescale
that
we
use
to
codify
what
conclusions
or
deductions
we
draw
out
of
the
set
of
events.
There
is
too
the
consideration
that
events
on
the
international
plane
seldom
occur
without
having
effects
upon
the
domestic
political
environments
of the
participants,
and
there
may
be
a
quite
separate
set
of
factors
(including
time)
to
be
taken
into
account
there.
Even
having
made
the
point
that
we
are
still
in
the
immediate
aftermath
of
the
conflict
may
not
be
sufficiently
cautious.
There
is
an
inference
to
be
taken
into
account
that,
the
fighting
having
stopped,
the
peak
of the
crisis
having
passed,
the
way
is
open
to
the
resolution
of
the
issue
in
question:
or,
at
the
very
least,
that
we
no
longer
have
to
give
it
so
much
of
our
attention.
But
the
general
relief
that
the
fighting
has
stopped
is
paralleled
by
a
range
of
cautious
statements
and
actions
which
indicate
that
neither
the
British
nor
the
Argentinian
governments
think that the
question
of
the
future
of
the
Falklands
has
been
settled.
The
basic
issue
has
been
sidestepped:
it
may
even
have
fundamentally
changed;
but
it
has
not
been
resolved,
and
the
very
fact
that
a
war
has
taken
place
creates
a
new
prism
through
which
that
future
now
has
to
be
viewed.
On
the
British
side,
the
steps
that
are
being
proposed
both
to
ensure
that
another
unexpected
invasion
could
not
succeed
and
that
the
Falkland
Islanders
are
provided
with
a
wider
range
of
economic
and
social
opportunities
are
of
a
size
and
cost
that
emphasises
how
much
things
have
changed.
A
relatively
minor
point
in
this
regard
is
that
no
common
descriptive
usage
has
yet
emerged
to
describe
the
events
of April,
May
and
June
1982
and
this
may
be
indicative
of
the
difficulties
that
still
exist
about
putting
the
affair
into
perspective.
A
war:
a
campaign:
a
crisis,
an
expedition,
or
simply
nothing
beyond
&dquo;The
Falklands&dquo;
are
all
terms
that
have
been
used
in
the
United
Kingdom;
and
although
there
are
perfectly
good
scholarly
doubts
about
which
might
be
the
most
accurate
description,
one
tentative
conclusion
might
be
offered.
If
eventually
the
events
became
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