Margaret Thatcher: The Autobiography (63 page)

A remark of mine was misinterpreted, sometimes wilfully. After John Nott had made his statement journalists tried to ask questions. ‘What happens next Mr Nott? Are we going to declare war on Argentina Mrs Thatcher?’ It seemed as if they preferred to press us on these issues rather than to report news that would raise the nation’s spirits and give the Falklanders new heart. I was irritated. ‘Just rejoice at that news and
congratulate our forces and the marines … Rejoice.’ I meant that they should rejoice in the bloodless recapture of South Georgia, not in the war itself. To me war is not a matter for rejoicing. But some pretended otherwise.

At home the apparent imminence of full-scale military conflict began to shake the determination of those whose commitment to retaking the Falklands had always been weaker than it appeared. Some MPs seemed to want negotiations to continue indefinitely.

Unfortunately, the cracks now appearing in the Labour Party were likely to be widened by what was happening at the United Nations. The Secretary-General of the UN started to become more involved. A low-key appeal from Sr Perez de Cuellar to both sides – which appeared to imply that we, like Argentina, had failed to comply with UNSCR 502 – was seized upon by Denis Healey and Michael Foot. I had a serious clash with Mr Foot during Prime Minister’s Questions on Tuesday 27 April on the question of our returning to the United Nations. In fact, the Secretary-General very quickly took the point, but the damage was done. We ourselves had been exploring whether an offer from President López-Portillo of Mexico to provide a venue for negotiations might be productive. But Al Haig did not wish us to pursue this.

Al Haig had had his own share of diplomatic problems. The Argentine Foreign minister, furious at the retaking of South Georgia, had publicly refused to see him, though they had been in contact privately.

Mr Haig had again modified the proposals discussed with Francis Pym in Washington and now transmitted these to the Argentine Government. He told the Junta that no amendments were permissible and imposed a strict time limit for their reply, though he was subsequently unwilling to stick to this.

At Cabinet on Thursday 29 April we discussed the continuing uncertainty. The deadline given to the Argentinians for their answer had passed, but now Mr Haig was talking of the possibility of the Argentinians amending his proposals. Where would all this end?

After Cabinet I sent a message to President Reagan saying that in our view the Argentinians must now be regarded as having rejected the American proposals. In fact, later that day the Argentinians did formally reject the American text. President Reagan now replied to my message in these terms:

Friday 30 April effectively marked the end of the beginning of our diplomatic and military campaign to regain the Falklands. The United States now came down clearly on our side. President Reagan told television correspondents that the Argentinians had resorted to armed aggression and that such aggression must not be allowed to succeed. Most important, the President also directed that the United States would respond positively to requests for military materiel. Unfortunately, they were not prepared to agree to place an embargo on imports from Argentina. However, the President’s announcement constituted a substantial moral boost to our position.

It was on this day the TEZ came into force. And it is fair to say that from now on it was the military rather than the diplomatic which increasingly commanded our attention. At that morning’s War Cabinet it was the Argentine aircraft carrier, the
25 de Mayo
, which concerned us. She could cover 500 miles a day and her aircraft a further 500. Her escorts carried Exocet missiles, supplied by France in the 1970s. The Exocet threat had to be taken seriously. It increased the danger which the Argentine carrier group posed to our ships and their supply lines. We therefore authorized an attack on the carrier, wherever she was, provided it was south of latitude 35 degrees and east of longitude 48, and outside the 12-mile limit of Argentine territorial waters. Such an attack would be based upon the right of self-defence and be within Article 51 of the UN Charter; in accordance with the notification which had been given on 23 April no further warning was required.

The battle for the Falklands in May and June 1982

F
ROM THE BEGINNING OF
M
AY
through to the recapture of the Falklands in mid-June military considerations loomed ever larger in my mind. But this did not mean that the pressure for negotiations eased – far from it. I was under an almost intolerable pressure to negotiate for the sake of negotiation and because so many politicians were desperately anxious to avoid the use of force – as if the Argentinians had not already used force by invading in the first place. And all this time there was constant, nagging fear of the unknown. Would we have sufficient air cover? Where were the Argentine submarines? Would we be able to reach the military and diplomatic position required for a successful landing within that narrow time-frame set by the onset of intolerable winter weather in the South Atlantic?

Over breakfast at Milton Hall in Stephen Hastings’s constituency I received a telephone call to say that our Vulcans had bombed the runway of Port Stanley airport. Our naval task force was also bombarding Argentine positions elsewhere on the Falklands. There had so far been no British casualties but it would still be many hours before the Vulcans – after their marathon flight involving five mid-air refuellings – would be back at Ascension Island. In fact they all returned safely.

That day the Argentine Air Force mounted a major attack on our ships. The Argentinians were in a position to send photographs to the outside world, which we were not. They claimed that many of our aeroplanes had been shot down but in that famous broadcast Brian Hanrahan, the excellent BBC correspondent, put the record straight when he reported: ‘I counted them all out and I counted them all back.’ It was a great relief.

The next day, Sunday, which I spent at Chequers, was one of great – though often misunderstood – significance for the outcome of the Falklands War. The members of the War Cabinet, Chiefs of Staff and officials came to Chequers for lunch and discussion. On this occasion there was a special matter on which I needed an urgent decision.

I called together Willie Whitelaw, John Nott, Cecil Parkinson, Michael Havers, Terry Lewin, Admiral Fieldhouse and Sir Antony Acland. (Francis Pym was in America.) Admiral Fieldhouse told us that one of our submarines, HMS
Conqueror
, had been shadowing the Argentine cruiser,
General Belgrano.
The
Belgrano
was escorted by two destroyers. The cruiser itself had substantial firepower provided by 6 guns with a range of 13 miles and anti-aircraft missiles. We were advised that she might have been fitted with Exocet anti-ship missiles, and her two destroyer escorts were known to be carrying them. The whole group was sailing on the edge of the Exclusion Zone. There had been extensive air attacks on our ships the previous day and Admiral Woodward had every reason to believe that a full-scale attack was developing. The Argentine aircraft carrier, the
25 de Mayo
, had been sighted some time earlier and we had agreed to change the rules of engagement to deal with the threat she posed. However, our submarine had lost contact with the carrier and there was a strong possibility that
Conqueror
might also lose contact with the
Belgrano
group. From all the information available, Admiral Woodward concluded that the carrier and the
Belgrano
group were engaged in a classic pincer movement against the task force. It was clear to me what must be done to protect our forces. We therefore decided that British forces should be able to attack any Argentine naval vessel on the same basis as agreed previously for the carrier.

The necessary order conveying the change of rules of engagement was sent from Northwood to HMS
Conqueror
at 1.30 p.m but it was not until after 5 p.m. that
Conqueror
reported that she had received the order. The
Belgrano
was torpedoed and sunk just before 8 o’clock that evening. Our submarine headed away as quickly as possible. Wrongly believing that they would be the next targets, the
Belgrano
’s escorts seem to have engaged in anti-submarine activities rather than rescuing its crew, some 321 of whom were lost. The ship’s poor state of battle readiness greatly increased the casualties. Back in London we knew that the
Belgrano
had been hit, but it was some hours before we knew that she had sunk.

A large amount of malicious and misleading nonsense was circulated about the reasons why we sank the
Belgrano.
These allegations have been
demonstrated to be without foundation. The decision to sink the
Belgrano
was taken for strictly military not political reasons: the claim that we were trying to undermine a promising peace initiative from Peru will not bear scrutiny. Those of us who took the decision at Chequers did not at that time know anything about the Peruvian proposals, which in any case closely resembled the Haig plan rejected by the Argentinians only days before. There was a clear military threat which we could not responsibly ignore. Moreover, subsequent events more than justified what was done. As a result of the devastating loss of the
Belgrano
, the Argentine Navy – above all the carrier – went back to port and stayed there. The sinking of the
Belgrano
turned out to be one of the most decisive military actions of the war.

Both military and diplomatic pressure now mounted. On Tuesday 4 May the destroyer HMS
Sheffield
was hit by an Argentine Exocet missile with devastating effects. It was a terrible demonstration of the risks our forces faced. The
Sheffield
was a relatively old ship, with outdated radar: it was transmitting via satellite to London moments before the missile struck, interfering with its capacity to detect the attack sufficiently in advance to throw up chaff as a decoy. Also the fire doors were open and, as we learnt from the raging fire that followed the missile impact, there was too much aluminium in the structure. At first I was told that there were 20 casualties: then 40.

It was very difficult to know how to announce this sort of news. We would have liked to inform all next of kin first, and indeed sought to do so. But meanwhile the Argentinians would be putting out statements – some true, some false but all with a deliberate purpose – before we knew the real facts. As a result, wives and families spent some agonizing days and nights. That day we also lost one of our Harriers.

By this stage Francis Pym had returned from the United States. We did not like the US/Peruvian proposals he brought with him, but Al Haig would not accept our changes or pass them to the Peruvians because he believed that the Argentinians would reject them out of hand. I received a message from President Reagan urging us to make further compromise.

On the morning of Wednesday 5 May I called first the War Cabinet and then the full Cabinet to consider the US/Peruvian proposals. I was deeply unhappy about them and Cabinet did not like them much either. But we had to make some response. I wanted to ensure that any interim administration would consult the islanders and that their wishes should be
respected in the long-term settlement. I also wanted South Georgia and the other Falklands dependencies to be outside the scope of the proposals. Cabinet was firm about these objectives. We agreed to seek changes to meet them and in this we were successful.

Tony Parsons defended Britain’s position at the UN with great force and brilliance. The Argentinians were clearly determined to get the maximum propaganda advantage in the discussions sponsored by the UN Secretary-General, but I was not prepared to hold up military progress for negotiations. We were coming to a critical period. If we were to land and repossess the islands it would have to be done between 16 and 30 May. We could not leave it later because of the weather. That meant that negotiations at the UN must be completed within ten days or so. If they were successful and our principles and minimum requirements were met, well and good. If not, or they were still dragging on, then – if the Chiefs of Staff so advised – we would have to go ahead.

As the negotiations with the Argentinians in Washington continued it became ever more evident that they were not prepared to make the concessions we required. An ultimatum was obviously necessary.

We now had to stand firm against the pressure for making unacceptable compromises while avoiding the appearance of intransigence. Specific instructions went to Tony Parsons about our position on withdrawal distances, interim administration, the issue of immigration and the acquisition of property during the interim period and to ensure that the Argentinians did not get away with prejudging the issue on sovereignty. There were detailed discussions on the constitutional position of a United Nations administration of the islands. Our view was that the UN representative could only administer the law, not change it. We also continued to press for a United States military guarantee of the security of the islands – but with very limited success. The UN Secretary-General was somewhat taken aback by the firmness of our stance. But Tony Parsons impressed on him the basic facts of the dispute. It was not we who had committed the aggression; any arrangement which appeared to reward Argentine aggression would simply not be accepted in Britain.