AHC: Brazil attempts to seize British South Atlantic islands

Source Jane's Fighting Ships 1980-81

Personnel, 1980: 45,500 (3,900 officers and 41,600 men) including 12,000 marines and auxiliary corps

One year's national service

Maritime Aviation
Navy (a fleet air arm was formed on 26.01.65)

Brazilian FAA 1980.png


Air Force (Comando Costiera)

Brazilian Coastal Command 1980.png


These are the relevant warships and auxiliaries of the Brazilian Navy in 1980

Brazilian Warships 1980.png


That's a total of 8 submarines, one small aircraft carrier, 12 old destroyers, 6 new frigates, 2 LST, 4 transports and one tanker.

There were also 35 minor landing craft, made up of, 21 LCVP, 7 EDVP, 4 LCU 1610 type and 3 EDVM (LCM type).

So it's rather a mixed bag. The best warships would be the 3 Oberon class, the aircraft carrier and the 6 new frigates.

The tanker had a displacement of 10,500 tons, deadweight and a capacity of 14,200m3. Her maximum speed was 13.6 knots and she had a range of 9,200 miles at 13 knots.

The De Soto County class LST could carry 575 troops and the LST 511 class ship could carry 147 troops.

The 4 transports are interesting. They could carry 497 troops with commensurate medical, hospital and dental facilities. They had 15,500 cubic feet of refrigerated dry cargo space and could carry 4,000 tons of cargo.
 
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So, the Argentine surface fleet, which started the war, sits in port while the Brazilian Navy, which we don't yet know why it got involved into the war in the first place, takes a daring action in support of Argentina? I don't know how plausible that would be, but the first thing the Brazilians should do is to ask the Argentines to get their asses up north and join them.
Let's try to figure it out. I've once read the Brazilian government had told the British they'd declare war if they attacked continental Argentina, but I don't know if it's true. I'm going with a series of PODs:

Wideawake Airfield is, by 1982, British owned and operated. Officially, no American soldiers garrison or serve in Ascension Island at all - this won't work if attacking Ascension brings the Americans into the war.
Instead of being on the brink of war, Argentina and Chile solve their border differences through the 1960s and 1970s and become diplomatically and military closer. That means the Argentine Junta wouldn't be worried about an attack from Chile. It also means they have less of a reason to equip the Armed Forces, so let's say that not only they've secured peace and friendship of sorts with Chile, but that they've been planning a war for the Falklands for ten years. The CIA and/or the MI6 would notice, so the Falklands would be better defended by 1982.
Regardless, the war starts in 1982. Brazil remains neutral and Chile refuses to help the UK.
Now, Brazil has to join the war, which is tricky. A few ideas: the British Vulcan bombers bomb Buenos Aires or Mar del Plata instead of the Falklands. Or the British manage a commando raid on the Rio Grande airbase and the Brazilian government finds that's enough of a reason to go to war. Or Operation Algericas (a planned commando raid of Gibraltar to be done by exiled Argentine insurgents so the Argentine military could claim plausible deniability) goes into effect at the start of the war; NATO doesn't initially want to join the fray (Argentine propaganda previous to the war, pretending to buy the Argentine denials, fear of a Soviet attack if the Warsaw Pact is doing exercises) and someone at the Brazilian government decide it's a good idea to raise the stakes and join the war in order to deter the world's most powerful military alliance (and probably also thought it was a good idea to write that memo while drunk) so Brazil joins the war.
Either Brazil has an embarked air group at this time, or the Argentine Navy sails north while the British Task Force is still occupied around the Falkland to join forces with Brazil, and the Brazil or maybe combined fleet assemble for an attack on British Atlantic islands to disrupt the British logistics.
The attacks fails to British land based air power and becomes the biggest naval defeat in the Brazilian and maybe Argentine history. Hundreds, or probably thousands, die.

EDIT: If we go with an ATL war for which the Argentine military has been preparing for a decade and which is set to start against a reasonably defended Falkland Islands, then let's say the Argentine military stages a reasonably believable false flag attack, and calls in the Rio Pact. The USA is not going to go to war against Britain but if the world, and Latin American specifically, public opinion buys the false flag, Brazil joins the war and the USA finds itself in a complicated position and may have to ditch the Rio Pact.
 

Deleted member 94680

During the Falklands War, Brazil joins with Argentina and attempts to seize the scattered British islands in the South Atlantic (St. Helena, Ascension, Tristan da Cunha). Will they be successful?

More British submarines get to fly the Jolly Roger.

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There were American forces on Ascension Island at the time so if Brazil tries to grab that, then Brazil very possibly finds itself at war with the United States.
 
In the World Combat Aircraft Directory edited by Norman Polmar, published 1975 the FAB has 15 A-4F Skyhawks and a footnote says that they were carrier capable.

Was Polmar correct? The entry on the A-4 in the aircraft section doesn't mention Brazil in the list of operators and the FAB didn't have any in 1981 according to Flight International's Air Forces of the World for that year. The only Brazilian Skyhawks I can find on the internet are the Kuwaiti aircraft that were purchased much later.
 
The Brazilians didn't have a helicopter carrier in 1982. They had a light fleet carrier.

Mina Gerais formerly HMS (and HMAS) Vengeance was a Colossus class aircraft carrier completed in 1945 and a sister ship of HMS Venerable which the British sold to the Netherlands as the Karen Doorman and the Dutch sold on to Argentina as Veinticinco de Mayo.

It was rebuilt at the Verolme Dockyard, Rotterdam 1957-60, which had recently built the Karel Doorman and to a similar standard. Both ships received a steam catapult and an 8½ degree angled flight deck.

Her air group in 1983 (source An Illustrated Guide to Modern Naval Aviation and Aircraft Carriers, by John Jordan) was 8 S-2E Trackers, 4 SH-3D Sea King, 2 Bell 206s and 2 SA-530 Ecureuils.

So for all practical purposes it was a helicopter carrier. Propeller S-2s aren't jet figthers.

The FAB did have a number of A-4F Skyhawks. I don't know if they were carrier capable, but Minas Gerais was perfectly capable of operating them if they were. She was also perfectly capable of operating the Argentine Navy's A-4Q Skyhawks if there were any to spare.

The air force pilots weren't trained to operate from the Minas Gerais.

Now, much of this depends on how one reads "during the Falklands War, Brazil joins with Argentina...". My own reading is that this is a very bad spur-of-the-moment idea (ASB, but hey). Therefore, no preparation. Therefore, that's a helicopter carrier, the A-4 pilots don't know the next thing about operating from it, and the British are already deploying, or hacve already deployed, forces to Ascension.

If OTOH this is a joint plan, with preparations lasting months (at least), then yes, the Brazilians may have trained the pilots, adapted the aircraft, planned the operation, and be ready to strike as soon as the Argentineans do.
 
The air force pilots weren't trained to operate from the Minas Gerais.
Strictly speaking FAB pilots were trained to operate from Minas Gerais because the S-2s belonged to the air force and not the navy.

However, see Post 25, which says that the FAB didn't have any Skyhawks at the time of the Falklands. I think Polmar's statement that the FAB had 16 A-4F Skyhawks in 1975 is wrong.

Edit

I had forgotten that I had a copy of the Putnams McDonnell Douglas Aircraft since 1920, which was published in 1979.

It makes no mention of Brazil buying Skyhawks. So there were no Skyhawks in Brazilian service until they bought the ex-Kuwaiti aircraft in 1997.
 
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They aren't helicopters either so it was more than a helicopter carrier.

Very well.

I notice that someone mentioned the A-4 Skyhawk as available. I notice you acknowledge they weren't. When I talked about the FAB pilots not being trained to operate from the Minas Gerais in the 1980s, of course I was talking about fighter pilots.
I also notice that the Minas Gerais, in its long career, spent years and years (!) in refitting, often having problems with its catapult.
I also notice that the Independencia, a ship in the same class, should have been able, in theory, to have its catapult handle F9s - but in practice it wasn't.
I notice the catapult of the Veinticinco de Mayo should have been able to handle Super Étendards - but in practice it wasn't.
I notice that A-4s were indeed - very much eventually - landed on the Minas Gerais, a grand total of 3 (three) A-4s, and the Brazilians did not manage to produce three pilots for that, but only two (one was a civilian foreigner pilot). The result of the trials was that one of the A-4s remained trapped in the catapult. I think that result speaks for itself.

In short, regardless of definitions, this ship was not capable of providing fighter cover for most of its operational life after WWII, and, I very much suspect, that is true at the time of the Falklands War.
 

Khanzeer

Banned
During the Falklands War, Brazil joins with Argentina and attempts to seize the scattered British islands in the South Atlantic (St. Helena, Ascension, Tristan da Cunha). Will they be successful?
That is just as likely as Brazilians cheering for the Argentinean team in world cup
 
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