Argentina withdraws from 2016 pact with UK over the Falklands, wants to restart negotiations regarding ownership.

ianh said:
To be blunt no-one cares what I think today, what matters is what the Argentine Military thought in 1982 and they were so worried by the BB raids that they moved fighter aircraft away from Falklands escort duty to protect themselves from a potential (if incredibly unlikely) BB raid, and thats a strategic win for BB, (yay!) even if Sea Harriers did a better tactical job at damaging the airfield.
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:)
 
You all realise this is all over oil? The Falklands achipeligo is the second largest oil field in the world behind Saudi Arabia, we just don't have the technology to drill that deep yet. That's why 2 countries are willing to fight over it.
 
rumple9 said:
You all realise this is all over oil? The Falklands achipeligo is the second largest oil field in the world behind Saudi Arabia, we just don't have the technology to drill that deep yet. That's why 2 countries are willing to fight over it.
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Yet we were willing to and actually incredibly close to giving the islands to Argentina just before the war…..
 
Lord-Jaffa said:
As far as im aware, Argentinas claim to the Falklands isnt even close to being as strong as that of the UK, I believe it was France who first occupied the Islands anyway? The islanders had a vote, thankfully the results of which are being upheld.
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It's a bit messier than that, but not much.

The islands were uninhabited and unclaimed.

in 1764 a French ship landed on one of them, founded a teeny tiny colony and claimed the island for the French empire.
In 1765 a British ship landed on a different island, founded a teeny tiny colony and claimed the whole archipelago for the British empire. They didn't know about the teeny tiny French colony on the other island. Neither knew about the other for over a year. Teeny tiny colonies.
A little while later, the Spanish empire claimed the whole archipelago for the Spanish empire because some time around 1500 (I forget exactly when) a pope had decided to divide all land off to the west across the Atlantic ocean between Spain and Portugal. A simple line - everything on this side belongs to Portugal and everyone on that side belongs to Spain. The Falkland islands were on the Spanish side. Not that the pope, the Spanish empire or anyone else knew that. The Falkland islands weren't discovered until much later. There's some argument about who discovered them. The first person to set foot on the Falkland islands was English, but they might (or might not) have been seen by someone else earlier. But hey, pope.

Some years later, the colonies were abandoned. Britain and Spain declared they would return and their claims were still in place. France didn't.

France never returned.
Spain never returned.
Britain did return and established a permanent and far larger colony.

Note that I haven't mentioned Argentina yet. That's because it didn't exist at the time. The French, British and Spanish claims all predate the entire existence of Argentina. The Argentinian claim is based on a chain of two claims starting with the claim that the French claim became Spanish and continuing with the claim that the Spanish claim became Argentinian and that both claims apply retroactively back to 1764 (when France made their claim) and anyway Spain owned the islands because a pope 500 years ago said so (without even knowing the islands existed) and therefore Argentina does. If Argentina's claim is upheld, that would mean that Argentina owns most of the Americas. Both of them. All the way up to the north pole. Because a pope said so 500 years ago without having a clue what they were talking about.

I'm not kidding about that. The pope's decree is a straight north-south line with no limits. North pole to south pole.
 
ianh said:
Yeap, the Sea Harriers (which are multi-role) were the first to attack Stanley airfield two days before any Vulcan raids and long before the GR3's arrived near the end.





I'd disagree with "dubious value" as the response from the Argentinian Air Force (forced by the Junta post BlackBuck) was to withdraw its fast-jet fleet from Stanley back to the mainland. So whilst the actual military effect on Stanley's runway from these raids was virtually meaningless, the perceived threat to the mainland that the Vulcans brought had a huge strategic effect overall, way surpassing the simple military value of the very few bombs which hit Stanleys runway.

So strategically the BlackBuck raids were a huge success whilst tactically the Sea Harriers did far more damage in an attempt to shutdown Stanley.

However I also like the debate, so many what-ifs to go around!
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The Argentinians never flew a fast jet out of Stanley the runway was too short and weak, the British were concerned they might despite knowing the above and also knowing how hard it would be to extend the runway.

The value of the black buck missions will always remain debatable what won’t is the incredible feat of airmanship and bravery that they represent.
 
Angilion said:
It's a bit messier than that, but not much.

The islands were uninhabited and unclaimed.

in 1764 a French ship landed on one of them, founded a teeny tiny colony and claimed the island for the French empire.
In 1765 a British ship landed on a different island, founded a teeny tiny colony and claimed the whole archipelago for the British empire. They didn't know about the teeny tiny French colony on the other island. Neither knew about the other for over a year. Teeny tiny colonies.
A little while later, the Spanish empire claimed the whole archipelago for the Spanish empire because some time around 1500 (I forget exactly when) a pope had decided to divide all land off to the west across the Atlantic ocean between Spain and Portugal. A simple line - everything on this side belongs to Portugal and everyone on that side belongs to Spain. The Falkland islands were on the Spanish side. Not that the pope, the Spanish empire or anyone else knew that. The Falkland islands weren't discovered until much later. There's some argument about who discovered them. The first person to set foot on the Falkland islands was English, but they might (or might not) have been seen by someone else earlier. But hey, pope.

Some years later, the colonies were abandoned. Britain and Spain declared they would return and their claims were still in place. France didn't.

France never returned.
Spain never returned.
Britain did return and established a permanent and far larger colony.

Note that I haven't mentioned Argentina yet. That's because it didn't exist at the time. The French, British and Spanish claims all predate the entire existence of Argentina. The Argentinian claim is based on a chain of two claims starting with the claim that the French claim became Spanish and continuing with the claim that the Spanish claim became Argentinian and that both claims apply retroactively back to 1764 (when France made their claim) and anyway Spain owned the islands because a pope 500 years ago said so (without even knowing the islands existed) and therefore Argentina does. If Argentina's claim is upheld, that would mean that Argentina owns most of the Americas. Both of them. All the way up to the north pole. Because a pope said so 500 years ago without having a clue what they were talking about.

I'm not kidding about that. The pope's decree is a straight north-south line with no limits. North pole to south pole.
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Interesting read, I wasn't aware of the Pope angle before! Even less of a valid claim than I had initially thought!
 
A helicopter tech I know has been flown to the Falklands this month to modify some helicopters and he told me that the search for oil is beginning again.
 
Hear the oil news and then suddenly a little bit of noise to divert some eyes and resource from Europe for a friend?

Not that the rest of Nato couldnt make up any shortfall (if there was any).

If they were serious they wouldnt of waited until the UK had new carriers back on the sea. I imagine we have a destroyer / some cruiser near the islands already
 
rumple9 said:
You all realise this is all over oil
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I wasn't aware of that (though it seems pretty inaccessible and environmentally risky until the world gets very desperate). I thought it was more about the UK retaining rights to the eventual and inevitable development of resources in Antarctica. The Falklands give us some adjacent coastline.

Either way, us trying to defend them now would be like Russia trying to invade Ukraine... all we have is a nuclear threat and insufficient remote capabilities. And there's no Maggie Thatcher/Ronald Reagan relationships to strengthen our case and capabilities. And while Argentina isn't Japan (in culture or capability) there's a sniff -- to me -- of WW2 "let's make the most of the distraction in Europe" about this.

I'm really not impressed by the way the 21st century's going. This isn't what my Dad's Dan Dare annuals promised me!
 
Terminal_Boy said:
There’s a load of oil down there, the problem is that it’s down at 2,500-3,000 metres below sea level and will be difficult to extract.
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That's not far to drill. My brother is the expert here and I haven't discussed this with him in a while but IIRC the issue is that the oil is so low grade it is not economic to extract.
 
Andrew_McP said:
I wasn't aware of that (though it seems pretty inaccessible and environmentally risky until the world gets very desperate). I thought it was more about the UK retaining rights to the eventual and inevitable development of resources in Antarctica. The Falklands give us some adjacent coastline.

Either way, us trying to defend them now would be like Russia trying to invade Ukraine... all we have is a nuclear threat and insufficient remote capabilities. And there's no Maggie Thatcher/Ronald Reagan relationships to strengthen our case and capabilities. And while Argentina isn't Japan (in culture or capability) there's a sniff -- to me -- of WW2 "let's make the most of the distraction in Europe" about this.

I'm really not impressed by the way the 21st century's going. This isn't what my Dad's Dan Dare annuals promised me!
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We have an aircraft presence in the falklands that could defeat all available argentine jets, the force can be quickly reinforced by tankering more jets from the uk as can significant land forces. The advent of the sub launched cruise missile would allow the UK to precision target Argentinian facilities on the mainland with zero risk to British lives and minimal risk of collateral damage. This is all just a noisy smoke screen for Argentine internal issues they currently have no way to invade the Islands and are a decade of heavy military spending away from being a relevant threat.
 
I_M_Weasel said:
France did help the UK with exocet. they carried out practice raids on the task force on the way down to show the Royal Navy what an attack looks like from a super etendard and how to best counter it. The remainder of the missiles that Argentina had ordered were on route, but mysteriosly the french supply ship encountered technical issues that meant it sat still for the duration of the war. I wish I could pick on the French, but they were a solid allie, even more than the U.S. who were busy trying to be the UK's and Argentina's friends at least at a political level. The US armed forces helped faster and probably more than they were supposed to.
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Whilst this is very true, there was also a technical team from Dassault still in Argentina that helped them tune the Excocet missiles for better performance throughout the war. This is probably how they were able to convert one of the launchers from their Type-42 destroyers into a land based version and place it directly on the islands. It was one of these land based Excocets which hit HMS Glamorgan.

The French claimed that they had no knowledge of the team's involvement until after the war, but the feeling in the UK government was that the French had played both sides. Given how we treated France in WW2, hard to blame them if true.
 
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zola25 said:
Whilst this is very true, there was also a technical team from Dassault still in Argentina that helped them tune the Excocet missiles for better performance throughout the war. This is probably how they were able to convert one of the launchers from their Type-42 destroyers into a land based version and place it directly on the islands. It was one of these land based Excocets which hit HMS Glamorgan.

The French claimed that they had no knowledge of the team's involvement until after the war, but the feeling in the UK government was that the French had played both sides. Given how we treated France in WW2, hard to blame them if true.
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I've heard that too. It's not as if the British didn't harm ourselves - We were a major arms supplier to them, bombs that were made in the UK were dropped on our ships and the BBC kindly informed Argentina that they wren't fused properly for low level attacks.
 
tlrBeta said:
I imagine we have a destroyer / some cruiser near the islands already
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Not sure if there have been policy changes since I did my last tour down there but there was always a Destroyer patrolling the Falklands as well as a Nuclear Submarine with a bunch of Tornadoes (most likely Typhoons now) based at RAF Mount Pleasant. There is also a army detachment stationed at Mount Pleasant plus the well trained, well equipped Falklands Islands Defence Force. In exercise's they used to "infiltrate" our mountain radar sites and 9 times out of 10 they were in and "killed" us all before we knew they were there. It wasn't fair really as they had night vision goggles, camo gear plus were allowed to "scope" the site out during the day!!
 
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