The British Miners’ Strike of 1984–1985 represents one of the most central periods in British industrial relations. This paper, drawing on Cognitive Linguistic Critical Discourse Studies (CL-CDS), displays how one particular metaphorical framing of the strike, which construed the strike as a war between the State and the National Union of Miners, persisted through the year-long period and considers the potential ideological functions of this framing in media strategies of (de)legitimation. It is displayed how this metaphor featured in linguistic, visual and multimodal forms of media representation.