Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Thatcher
Margaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, LG, OM, PC, FRS, FRICwas a British stateswoman and politician who was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and the Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. She was the longest-serving British prime minister of the 20th century and the first woman to have held the office. A Soviet journalist dubbed her the "Iron Lady", a nickname that became associated with her uncompromising politics and leadership style. As...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionWorld Leader
Date of Birth13 October 1925
CityGrantham, England
home trying prejudice
Whether at home or abroad, the task of statesman is to work with human nature warts and all, and to draw on instincts and even prejudices that can be turned to good purpose. It is never to try to recreate Mankind in a new image.
children school home
People from my sort of background needed grammar schools to compete with children from privileged homes like Shirley Williams and Anthony Wedgwood Benn.
home where-you-come
Home is where you come to when you've got nothing better to do.
fighting dark land
And what a prize we have to fight for: no less than the chance to banish from our land the dark divisive clouds of Marxist socialism.
war important alliances
It is important not to allow ever wider coalition-building to become an end in itself. As we saw in the Gulf War of 1990, international pressures, particularly those exerted from within an alliance, can result in the failure to follow actions through and so leave future problems unresolved.
country real russia
When we hear (as we sometimes do) that (Russia's) economic output is about half the level of a decade ago or that real incomes have fallen sharply, it is worth recalling that economic statistics under the Soviet Union were hardly more reliable than any other official statements. Moreover, a country that produces what no one wants to buy, and whose workers receive wages that they cannot use to buy goods they want, is hardly in the best of economic health.
running guilt generations
The application of collective guilt, running from one generation to another, is a dangerous doctrine which would leave few modern nations unscathed.
war order numbers
Major international interventions are doomed unless the US is directly or indirectly involved. But if American politicians, officials and servicemen are to be put at risk of arrest and prosecution, the United States will be most reluctant to act in order to curb aggression or prevent genocide. So the effect of the court may well be to diminish, not increase, the numbers of (in the words of the UN Secretary General) 'innocents of distant wars and conflicts'.
justice trials victors
The Nuremburg trials were attacked at the time as 'victor's justice'. And this is precisely what they were - and were intended to be.
war kuwait devastation
The Iraqis had paid a terrible price for Saddam's folly (in the Gulf War). But looking at the devastation they left behind (in Kuwait), my sympathy was limited.
taken expression law
It is recorded how towards the end of the eighteenth century a Muslim visitor to England was taken to see the House of Commons at work. He later wrote of his astonishment at finding the that the British Parliament actually made laws and fixed punishments for their infraction - because unlike Muslims the English had not accepted a divine law revealed from heaven and therefore had to resort to such unsatisfactory expedients. Muslims still understand the expression 'the rule of law' very differently than do most Westerners.
motive terror deals
As a motive for terror, religion has more often than not required a good deal of lubrication by lucre.
issues chinese democracy
It can be argued - and rightly - that Taiwan is not just another regional issue: after all, the Chinese regard it as part of China. But Taiwan is also a regional issue for three reasons. First, the overthrow or even the neutering of democracy in Taiwan, which is what Beijing effectively demands, would be a major setback for democracy in the region as a whole. Second, if the Chinese were able to get their way by force in Taiwan, they would undoubtedly be tempted to do the same in other disputes. And third, there is no lack of such disputes to provoke a quarrel.
august chinese world
When in August 1793 a British delegation showed their hosts a terrestrial globe, it turned into a diplomatic incident, for the Chinese were furious to see that their empire covered so little of it. For centuries the Chinese had thought of themselves as 'The Middle Kingdom', that is the centre of the civilized world. To see otherwise was a shock.