Falklands

peterstorey said:
Well you're either backtracking or made a meaningless statement in the first place. It was quite clear to me (and Mike) that you were saying war=anything goes and using that as a justification for sinking the Belgrano.
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Mike knew exactly what I was saying in his first post, that there isn't small, large, big or total war, there is just war.
 
Team Brian GB said:
Britain was restrained during the war given the circumstances, it did the least necessary to regain the islands - and yes, sinking the Belgrano was part of that.

We were well within our rights to attack the Argentine mainland yet we only fought against Argentines on the seas, in the air or on the Falklands themselves, despite the fact that most of their navy remained ready to sail and their fighter aircraft were coming from there yet we didn't.

Of the other great powers of the day or today, would you trust them not to carpet bomb Buenos Aires in such a circumstance - if you attacked and occupied an American territory don't be surprised if shock and awe were to find its way to your cities.
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Basically the war was logistically fought and won by the Yanks so the Brits did what they were told (and didn't nuke BA as some nutters have advocated).
 
Team Brian GB said:
Mike knew exactly what I was saying in his first post, that there isn't small, large, big or total war, there is just war.
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While I understood what you were trying to say, I'm not sure I entirely agree with it.

There does certainly seem to be practical situations where wars are fought within restrained boundaries. For example, despite North and South Korea being at war, any aggressive military act by either country would be condemned as unjustified and illegitimate, even if it was intended to bring the war to a conclusion.
 
MikeUpNorth said:
While I understood what you were trying to say, I'm not sure I entirely agree with it.

There does certainly seem to be practical situations where wars are fought within restrained boundaries. For example, despite North and South Korea being at war, any aggressive military act by either country would be condemned as unjustified and illegitimate, even if it was intended to bring the war to a conclusion.
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An unconditional ceasefire which is pretty much what the two Koreas have is a provisional peace treaty essentially, though yes you have found an exception to the rule.
 
peterstorey said:
Basically the war was logistically fought and won by the Yanks so the Brits did what they were told (and didn't nuke BA as some nutters have advocated).
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What absolute and utter rubbish, I wasn't aware that the US Navy was manning the sealanes, the US Marine Corp was storming beaches or that the USNAF were fighting for control of the skies.
 
mjs020294 said:
Mrs T. She was low in the polls but the war carried her to a general election victory. She would have probably won anyway because the Labour party were a diabolical mess back then.
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the Argentinians played into her hands. I was sickened by that 'Gotcha' headline Pete mentioned. But what the junta did was unify this country.

Remember walking up to the lady selling poppies and asking for one so I could donate without being asked.

I think the long term solution, if Argentina's claim is economical is give 'some concession' as the islands are so close to Argentina.
 
“Without American logistic support, most of which was channeled through Ascension Island, the operation would have taken much longer, and would undoubtedly have been compromised by the onset of the southern winter.”

As Lord Lewin said 'it was a damn close-run thing'. If winter had come in the south Atlantic it was over for Britain and it wouldn't have been wrapped up before then without the Yanks.
 
And how does that translate to the Americans logistically fought and won the war? You do not win wars through logistical support - somebody at some point has to do some shooting.
 
peterstorey said:
“Without American logistic support, most of which was channeled through Ascension Island, the operation would have taken much longer, and would undoubtedly have been compromised by the onset of the southern winter.”

As Lord Lewin said 'it was a damn close-run thing'. If winter had come in the south Atlantic it was over for Britain and it wouldn't have been wrapped up before then without the Yanks.
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What a load of absolute bollox. Sure the onset of winter would have been very significant to any conflict but the US didn't provide significant help that would have made much difference to the outcome and its timing. The main thing they helped with was submarine detection equipment, which was moot because the Argentinian navy stayed in port after the Belgrano. And they also supplied sidwinder missles,
 
A few things, first off Maggie didn't want the war nor was it done to help boost her polls, Maggie and the cabinet were going to enter negotiations as they were originally trying to hand over the islands to Argentina anyway. The only group guilty of going to war to help boost their popularity was the military junta. It was an admiral that reminded the cabinet of the duty of the crown to protect its people wether anyone likes it or not. The Falklanders don't see themselves as British, but as Falklanders who have descended from British Heritage who are part of the British tradition, there are many countries like this all over the world. So lets stop looking at this it's British, it's their own country and they were resigned in the 70's to eventually being handed over to a country the had no interest in being ruled by. We don't rule them, they govern themselves and we protect them from foreign invaders.

As for all this imperial land grabbing bollocks, Argentina is itself an imperial landgrab, as is the rest of South America. If it wasn't for the Junta invasion they probably would be owned by Argentina by now. The Falkland islanders don't want to be ruled by the Argentinean and in all this noise, it's their wishes that are always ignored. We ignored them in 70's, we no longer are.

As for the logistics bit, yes we purchased some supplies from the USA as it was the quickest and easiest option we had other avenues available to us and would have used them if needs be. This wasn't World War 2 where the campaign relied upon supplies from the States. There was no logistics problem, we just used our usual source.

I wish all parties would negotiate and just put aside this whole sovereignty bollocks and let the islands be what they are, a independent country open to trade from all sides.
 
peterstorey said:
A simple enough concept I'd have thought even for you, without winning the the logistic war you would have lost the shooting bit.
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And without the shooting bit there would have been no war at all, you cannot essentially assign credit for the win of the whole conflict to the Americans when they didn't fire a single bullet or even have any personnel within thousands of miles, people like to though around the words respect and disrespect - that is disrespectful to those who did fight that war.
 
Team Brian GB said:
And without the shooting bit there would have been no war at all, you cannot essentially assign credit for the win of the whole conflict to the Americans when they didn't fire a single bullet or even have any personnel within thousands of miles, people like to though around the words respect and disrespect - that is disrespectful to those who did fight that war.
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Not necessarily true. Nixon essentially fought and ended the 1973 Arab-Israeli war by supplying the Israelis and then threatening the Israelis that he would withhold supplies unless they negotiated a truce.

Obviously there wasn't that level of involvement in the Falklands but the point stands. Logistics win wars.
 
peterstorey said:
It's not disrepectful to point out truths like the contribution of Weinberger and the US, nor truths like Thatcher and Carrington's feck-up leading them to have to fight a war that could easily have been avoided.
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Jesus you sound like Tam Dalyell. :lol:
 
gambit28 said:
I wish all parties would negotiate and just put aside this whole sovereignty bollocks and let the islands be what they are, a independent country open to trade from all sides.
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They are! It's a British dependency, that's all. Doesn't quite have the status of a Crown dependency, but there you go.
 
WeasteDevil said:
They are! It's a British dependency, that's all. Doesn't quite have the status of a Crown dependency, but there you go.
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I know but the whole world doesn't look upon them as that, the whole Argeninea claim is invalid. The people of the island want to stay independent and govern themselves as they do now, for some reason this is ignored by the world and treated as some sort of land grab. The only time the argentineans had any supposed settlers they were removed by the USA due to their pirating of the area, the Argentinean government are the only ones acting like a imperialist now. Anyway article in the Telegraph today with regards the Belgrano

Belgrano was heading to the Falklands, secret papers reveal
Top secret papers are set to prove that the warship Belgrano was heading into the Falkland's exclusion zone when it was sunk, and not heading back to port as the Argentinians claimed.

For decades debate and recrimination has raged over where the ship was heading when it was torpedoed by a Royal Navy submarine.

Britain received international criticism after the sinking after the Argentine Junta announced that the warship had been returning to its home port and was outside the 200 mile exclusion zone imposed by Whitehall.

But Major David Thorp, who spent 34 years working as a signals expert in military intelligence, has disclosed for the first time that he was asked to carry out a trawl of all the intelligence on the sinking at the direct request of Margaret Thatcher a few months after the end of the war.

He was ordered to compile a report for the Prime Minister called “The Sinking of the Belgrano” that has never been published.

From his own signals intercepts and those from other Government agencies, he proved that the Argentine cruiser was heading into the exclusion zone.

Major Thorp was in charge of a top secret signals interception section hidden on the amphibious warship Intrepid as it steamed with the Task Force.

Around Ascension Island, 4,000 miles from the Falklands, his team began picking up naval communications sent to the Argentine fleet which they were easily able to decipher.

The report states that in late April 1982, they intercepted a message sent from naval headquarters ordering the Belgrano and its escorts to a grid reference within the exclusion zone and not back to base as the Argentines later claimed.

The Belgrano was sunk by two torpedoes fired by the hunter-killer submarine Conqueror on May 2 with the loss of 323 lives a number of miles outside the exclusion zone.

“For some reason they decided on a rendezvous point still within the exclusion zone,” Major Thorp said. “Whether they were trying to raise a thumb at us I don’t know. At the time I thought it was strange thinking why didn’t they go straight into port?”

In his new book, The Silent Listener, Major Thorp wrote: “The findings of my final report stated the destination of the vessel was not to her home port as the Argentine Junta stated but the objective of the ship was to relocate to a prearranged RV within the exclusion zone.”

Despite the report being read by Mrs Thatcher she never disclosed the information either in Parliament or elsewhere possibly because she did not want to reveal Britain’s eavesdropping capabilities.

But during her infamous BBC exchange with the schoolteacher Diana Gould who confronted her on the sinking Mrs Thatcher made an intriguing reference to the report saying: "One day, all of the facts, in about 30 years time, will be published." Mrs Gould died earlier this month.

In recent years the Argentine navy has accepted that the sinking of the Belgrano was a legitimate act of war.

In his book, that was cleared by the security services, Major Thorp also discloses for the first time how the British code-cracking operation gave the force a significant advantage.

Shortly before the Battle of Goose Green, Lt Col “H” Jones, the commander of 2nd Bn The Parachute Regiment, boarded Intrepid after hearing about the eavesdroppers through SAS colleagues.

“That morning we had picked up 10 grid references on intercepts and H looked at the map and realised that they were his own troops’ locations. He said “bloody hell we are sharing the same hill as the enemy.’”

“He wanted to know the strengths and weaknesses of the Argentines, then we looked at calibre of people on ground and he came to the conclusion that perhaps 600 Paras were worth 1,500 Argentines.”

The intelligence gave the commanding officer the “peace of mind” to start the battle that would lead in his own death, a posthumous Victoria Cross award and ultimately victory in the campaign.
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It really doesn't matter where the Belgrano was or its heading. The exclusion zone is only for neutral vessels. Even the captain of the Belgrano and the Argentinian government confirmed the sinking was justifiable.
 
I don't know about that, as war was never declared, thus there was never an attack against mainland Argentina, which would have happened under a declaration of war to take out air bases etc. They shit themselves when the Vulcan appeared as they had no clue as to what it was carrying.
 
WeasteDevil said:
I don't know about that, as war was never declared, thus there was never an attack against mainland Argentina, which would have happened under a declaration of war to take out air bases etc. They shit themselves when the Vulcan appeared as they had no clue as to what it was carrying.
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From Wiki:
The Belgrano was sunk outside the 200-nautical-mile (370 km) total exclusion zone around the Falklands. Exclusion zones are historically declared for the benefit of neutral vessels; during war, under international law, the heading and location of a belligerent naval vessel has no bearing on its status. In addition, the captain of the Belgrano, Héctor Bonzo, has testified that the attack was legitimate (as did the Argentine government in 1994).
 
mjs020294 said:
From Wiki:
The Belgrano was sunk outside the 200-nautical-mile (370 km) total exclusion zone around the Falklands. Exclusion zones are historically declared for the benefit of neutral vessels; during war, under international law, the heading and location of a belligerent naval vessel has no bearing on its status. In addition, the captain of the Belgrano, Héctor Bonzo, has testified that the attack was legitimate (as did the Argentine government in 1994).
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They admit that because they know where it was going. A pincer movement was underway. Hermes and Invincible were kept well away from the islands as the loss of either would have been the end. Illustrious was still being fitted. The greatest failure of the Argentines was not taking out one of the carriers.
 
Apparently the Falklands are just like the Shetland Islands, only with penguins.
 
rednev said:
Apparently the Falklands are just like the Shetland Islands, only with penguins.
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Nah, the Falklands are next to Argentina which makes them cool...The Shetlands are next to Scotland, need I say more.
 
Didn't realise they want South Georgia islands as well. Well tghey can feck off, we need those for the BBC's natural History programmes.
 
I'm not, he's damn right no matter how much I think that he's an incompetent turd. On this issue and of the European issue he's been bang on IMO. In this day and age people should have the right to self determination.
 
WeasteDevil said:
I'm not, he's damn right no matter how much I think that he's an incompetent turd. On this issue and of the European issue he's been bang on IMO. In this day and age people should have the right to self determination.
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I was only joking, my position on The Falklands hasn't changed.
 
A British Prime Minister accusing someone else of colonialism? Got to love it.

I wish someone had stood up for the self-determination rights of the Diego Garcians. There was no-one to create a fanfare and go to war for them though I guess.
 
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