Why did Britain limit herself to war in the Falklands and exclusion zone?

Monroe only prevents aggression against New World states, it says nothing about defending yourself from them.

They hate the West more than they love Gommunism.

Margaret Thatcher's morals prevented her from doing so.

Fun fact: Argentina sent commandos to attack Gibraltar but spanish police discovered the whole thing

Attacking cities is pretty high up on the escalation ladder. And mass civilian casualties don't mesh well with war goals of retaking the islands.

>Britain did actually send covert SAS troops onto the continent IIRC.

There was a planned mission to attack a airbase, but it was scrubbed after the reconnaissance mission failed.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mikado

"anti-imperialists" love sucking fascist cock if the cock is making the right noises about how terrible the west is.

For example, US green party presidential candidate Jill Stein recently apologized to ISIS for "US bombs terrorizing civilians" after the Kurds liberated Manbij.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Algeciras
>The police were ordered to take the arrested men to Málaga. Nicoletti said that once the policemen realized they were not common criminals, their attitude changed and became more favourable. The police let Nicoletti handle the explosives, as he had training the police did not. Then Nicoletti invited them to lunch, so the police convoy, still carrying the explosives, stopped at a roadside restaurant. Then they went to pick up some clothes at a dry cleaners and finally headed for the Málaga police headquarters.

>At the airport, the police charged with taking the photos thought it would look awkward to take mugshots in public and so a friendly, group photo of the commandos with the police guarding them was taken. This photo has not been found.

holy lol.

still more wierd: one of the guys was actually a leftist terrorist who had previously blown up an argie navy cruiser inside the dry dock

Because:
Liberating occupied territory from a hostile force=justified
Invading and bombing a weaker nation=tyrannical

If there was anything that the Falklands demonstrated it was that the SAS consistently jumped the gun, irritated other elements of the task force by engaging in wild heroics and ultimately caused more trouble than they were worth.

>Why did Britain limit herself to war in the Falklands and exclusion zone?

>Why not air and ballistic missile strikes on Argentina proper? Surely a night of attacks on Buenos Aires would have ended the war instantly?

Because the casus belli was the Argentine invasion of the Falklands, and it was agreed that that should be the main focus. Anything else would have undermined the justification for British military action.

Intense diplomatic shuttles and negotiations were ongoing as the initial stages of the conflict developed, and it was crucial to undermine support for Argentina within the wider international community, specifically via the UN. If the UK had started to attack the mainland, and indiscriminately targeted urban areas, not only would this have marshaled Argentine determination to retain the Falklands, it would have convinced certain nations globally that the UK was a imperial pariah acting in its own parochial interests.

The other point is that there simply wasn't enough resources to enact such an operation on the sort of scale you're thinking of. Julian Thompson's account of the initial preparation in 'No Picnic' is arguably the most illustrative of this, especially in the post-War context he paints for the UK; the UK was an ailing imperial power, operating as a peripheral element on the edge of NATO's considerations, and had a dilapidated if not outright poor range of hardware and equipment demonstrating this. The Task Force being mobilised was an ad hoc scraping together of whatever military resources the UK had on hand at the time. British forces could barely operate this structure successfully 8000 miles from home, let alone a full-scale scorched earth policy on the Argentine mainland.

>(remember they were being secretly armed by the French!),

telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1387576/How-France-helped-us-win-Falklands-war-by-John-Nott.html

bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17256975