ABSTRACT
Appearances, however, can be deceptive. Thatcher was a more cautious, and certainly more temporising, world leader than the strident image implies. She also developed a perceptive understanding of what was achievable. When she came to power, she wanted a resolution of the long-running dispute over the independence of Southern Rhodesia, which, since 1965, had been governed by white colonials led by Ian Smith in what the Foreign Office prissily told the BBC to refer to as ʻthe illegal Smith regimeʼ. Among the nationalist leaders queuing to take over when negotiations brought ʻmajority ruleʼ, Thatcher much favoured Abel Muzorewa, a moderate black bishop she trusted, over Robert Mugabe, a black Marxist she did not. Additionally, Muzorewa had been the only senior black politician to stand in an election arranged by the Smith government in April 1979. Mugabe, who had been leading a civil war against Smith, had boycotted the elections.
