Page 226 - An Introduction to Political Communication Third Edition

INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL COMMUNICATION

complete. The belief of some, essentially pro-war, journalists that
they had the right and indeed the duty to report the conflict in its
totality, and the reluctance of the government to censor on anything
but security criteria, did generate disturbing images, which cannot
fail to have influenced many of those who became active opponents
of the war.

The Falklands
Whether the Vietnam War was lost on television or not (and a
scientifically conclusive answer to that question may never be forth-
coming), the perception that it had been remained strong in the
1970s. When a new generation of political leaders came to power
in Britain and the US in the 1980s they allowed that perception to
govern their approach to information management in the conflicts
of that decade.
When Argentinian forces invaded the Falkland Islands in April
1982 they triggered a conflict which, if relatively small-scale in
military terms, was of immense symbolic importance to the British
government. At that time the government of Margaret Thatcher
was suffering the lowest popularity ratings ever recorded. Britain
was deep in economic recession, and unemployment was over three
million. ‘Thatcherism’ had not yet established pre-eminence in the
British political landscape. The Argentine aggression against a piece
of British territory overseas, however, permitted the Thatcher
government to undertake a late post-colonialist military expedition,
and to demonstrate its patriotism and resolve in the face of the
upstart dictator Leopoldo Galtieri. In this sense, the conflict became
in itself an act of political communication, loaded with symbolic
resonance and echoes of Britain’s imperial past. It was also a limited
war, as defined above, in which no less important than military
success was the battle for public opinion at home and abroad.
The military option was not the only one available for dealing
with the Argentinians. Economic and diplomatic sanctions could
have been used more aggressively by the British government, as they
have been used against many other countries in recent history. Once
the military option had been decided upon, however, the Falklands
conflict became a war of news and opinion management, as much
as one of armed force. Throughout, the British government, like the
Americans in Vietnam, had to counter domestic and international
opposition to its preferred means of resolving the conflict. That
Margaret Thatcher and her ministers succeeded where the

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