Monarchy and the End of Empire

In an imaginary conversation in Private Eye in 1986, Mrs. Thatcher says of her relationship with the Queen: ‘There’s no disagreement between us’. To which the Queen responds, ‘We just hate each other’s guts’. The mock exchange probably came close to the mark. Three years previously, the Queen had commanded the Prime Minister to come immediately to the palace to explain the American occupation of Grenada. The far-fetched military purpose was to prevent a Marxist regime from launching rockets at the United States, but the invasion violated the sovereignty of a member of the Commonwealth. Denis Healey (then Labour Shadow Foreign Secretary) compared the American assault to the Soviet occupation of Czechoslovakia in 1968. The Queen’s anger focused on the Prime Minister, who was conducting a Cabinet meeting at the time of the summons. The Queen had to repeat her command. According to the Daily Express , ‘Her Majesty wished to see her prime minister now and so Maggie had to get up, leave the meeting, go straight to Buckingham Palace because the Queen was extremely put out that her realm had been invaded by our ally’

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