"Be Bold, Bloody, Quick"

General Sir John Hackett, commander of NATO's Northern Army Group until his retirement in 1968, is perhaps better known as the man who started World War HI—and ended it, 360 pages later, in his chilling 1979 bestseller, The Third World War: August 1985. TIME asked Hackett for a general's assessment of the Falklands crisis. His analysis:

A growing and now great majority in Britain welcomed the dispatch of the Royal Navy task force to the South Atlantic. But some in the U.K. are beginning to express anxiety about its use. Sending the force was all right, the argument goes, but using it is quite another matter. Would that be wise, would it be right? The question can be simply and robustly settled. "Covenants without swords," wrote Thomas Hobbes in the 17th century, "are but words." There is no point in sending guns unless you are prepared to use them.

When I landed on a visit to North America on April 3, the day Parliament met on a Saturday for the first time since the Suez crisis in 1956, I was asked on all sides: What would happen next? I replied that the obvious first thing would be a blockade. What then? Repossession of South Georgia, I suggested, to give a land foothold and at the same time show that Britain meant business. And then? If the Argentine government could not see the possibility of a new entry into the negotiating field, there was likely to be a battle. The task force had been sent out to fight a battle, if it must, with forces formidably equipped, stoutly manned and resolutely commanded to do just that.

Among many problems facing the task force, two stood out. Winter was approaching. The increasing violence of some of the worst weather in the world made it imperative to act soon. Keeping a fleet of that size at sea about 8,000 miles from home would raise problems even in the conditions of a tropical paradise. In autumn in the Roaring Forties [the South Atlantic from 40° to 50° latitude, a region near the Falklands known for rough seas] what has to be done must be done quickly. Argentina's advantage lay in spinning the negotiations out, Britain's in speedy resolution. Be bold, be bloody, be resolute if you really must—but be quick.

The other difficulty that towered above the rest was provision of air cover for a seaborne assault. Excellent though Britain's Sea King helicopters and the Harriers might be, Argentina's Skyhawks, along with the Israeli Daggers and French-made Mirage fighters, would have the advantage. The runway at Port Stanley had been improved by the invaders but could hardly be considered fully operational, even for the Skyhawks carrying lightened loads. The airbase could, moreover, be readily neutralized from the sea. But Argentine planes could still operate from the continental mainland. The air force could not be completely contained and reduced by aerial combat, or even by surface-to-air missile attack, notwithstanding British electronic superiority. The air force would have to be taken out at base, and that would mean the bombing of targets on undisputed Argentine territory, on the mainland, almost certainly with civilian casualties.