20 x 20 hindsight Richard.

The contention that Margaret Thatcher deliberately started a war in April 1982 to win an election in June 1983 is downright lunacy.

On the June 1983 Election:

"The campaign displayed the huge divisions between the two major parties. Thatcher had been extremely unpopular during her first two years in office until the swift and decisive victory in the Falklands War, coupled with an improving economy, considerably raised her standings in the polls.

The Conservatives' key issues included employment, economic growth, and defence.

Labour's campaign manifesto involved leaving the European Economic Community, abolishing the House of Lords, abandoning the United Kingdom's nuclear deterrent by cancelling Trident and removing cruise missiles — a policy programme dubbed by Labour MP Gerald Kaufman as "the longest suicide note in history". "Although, at barely 37 pages, it only seemed interminable", noted Roy Hattersley."