AHC: Make the Falklands War more lethal

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We were not at war with anyone when the Belgrano was sunk, and no British ships had been attacked.

People where I lived universally loathed Thatcher, and sinking the Belgrano did not endear her to them. It was an clear act of provocation to stymie a peaceful but embarrassing resolution.

Just because there was no formal declaration, doesn't mean the UK wasn't at war. And there was no chance of a peaceful resolution; unless you mean the UK abandoning the islands, because Argentina sure wasn't going to.
 
It was an clear act of provocation to stymie a peaceful but embarrassing resolution.

Really? So the recapture of South Georgia including the loss of a few helicopters and the attack and running aground of a submarine, Vulcan and Sea Harrier bombings and ngs bombardment of Stanley and shooting down of several aircraft was all ok?
 

Wimble Toot

Banned
For most British people, the Falklands War was a meaningless struggle over some rocks in the South Atlantic, that they had never heard of until they were invaded and occupied. Another story on the news. Like Northern Ireland, only six thousand miles away.

Victory has a thousand parents, defeat is an orphan.

Just another post-colonial humiliation, another lost vote of confidence, more resignations, another general election.
 

Wimble Toot

Banned
Really? So the recapture of South Georgia including the loss of a few helicopters and the attack and running aground of a submarine, Vulcan and Sea Harrier bombings and bombardment of Stanley and shooting down of several aircraft was all ok?

Just rejoice at that news! In the queue at the Jobcentre.

How many Giro cheques does it take to buy a new Sea Harrier, or a new Type 42 destroyer?
 

Nick P

Donor
The Falklands weren't covered by NATO and no formal request was made by the UK to have the Americans fight for Britain.
Britain got those super-duper Sidewinders and the US was kind enough to let Britain use their airbase at Ascension when it was British territory.

Britain got quite a lot of help via NATO...

Foreign help regarding the Falklands:

Portugal offered use of the Azores for refuelling under a treaty dating back to 1373.
Spain blocked a covert attempt by Argentine forces to sabotage ships in Gibraltar.
Dutch listening sites at Curacao and Eemnes (previously a US base) passed on intercepted diplomatic and maritime messages.
Germany also picked up and passed on Argentine signals. The code was of WW2 German origin, captured by the French and sold to Argentina....
France passed on signals intercepted at their spy base in French Guyana. They stopped a number of arms dealers who were selling to Argentina. French security forces blocked Exocet missile sales and told the RN how to spot and intercept them when inbound.
Norway picked up images and messages beamed down from newly launched Soviet satellites flying over the South Atlantic and passed them to the RN, helping us track the General Belgrano.

The Sierra Leone government allowed the troopship Canberra to restock and refuel in Freetown. This may have more to do with making money...

Chile secretly allowed British forces to use their bases and provided details of Argentine military forces. A Sea King helo crashlanded after dropping off an SBS force in Argentina, the crew were caught by Chile police and well-treated and sent home quite quickly. It is possible a few Nimrods flew from Chile on recon missions.

The US gave us new versions of the Sidewinder missile and lots of ammo delivered from NATO stocks in Europe to Ascension Island by Galaxy aircraft and plenty of intelligence. There was an offer of a full-size aircraft carrier if ours got sunk, more to do with the NATO role in reality. They also helped stall for time with the famous Haig negotiations.

New Zealand sent ships to take over the Persian Gulf patrol from RN ships which then sailed to the South Atlantic.

And this is just the stuff we know about....
icon_biggrin.gif
 

Wimble Toot

Banned
Argentina had a pretty despicable government, even by the low standards of South America at the time.

Not so despicable the French and British state would forbid arms sales to them, however.

It's not surprising the UK's economic and military allies came to its aid.
 
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Just rejoice at that news! In the queue at the Jobcentre.

How many Giro cheques does it take to buy a new Sea Harrier, or a new Type 42 destroyer?

That sounds like a bit on Yes Minister, something like if Polaris costs a billion pounds and it cost 2 pounds to feed a starving child, how many starving children could be fed if polsris was scrapped?

Of course the answer was: none, we'd spend the money on conventional weapons.

The dact of the matter is that despite Thatcher being hated that wasn't enough to stop her party from holding a majority in the house of Commons.
 
We were not at war with anyone when the Belgrano was sunk, and no British ships had been attacked.

People where I lived universally loathed Thatcher, and sinking the Belgrano did not endear her to them. It was an clear act of provocation to stymie a peaceful but embarrassing resolution.

That feeling fell away when HMS Sheffield was attacked in revenge, but not by much.

Not at war? So I guess the recapture of South Georgia on 25 April doesn't count. Antrim had certainly been shot at, albeit without effect. The submarine Santa Fe had been combat killed. People had died in combat. Haig's attempt at shuttle diplomacy had fallen apart and came to an end on 28 April.

I rather think your memory of the chronology is slipping.

If it's really the case that the sinking of the Belgrano was considered an act of provocation in your neck of the woods, because of a loathing of Thatcher, and one that was only a little bit assuaged by the deaths of British servicemen, then I confess to a little disappointment.
 

Wimble Toot

Banned
If it's really the case that the sinking of the Belgrano was considered an act of provocation in your neck of the woods, because of a loathing of Thatcher, and one that was only a little bit assuaged by the deaths of British servicemen, then I confess to a little disappointment.

My Dad lost his well paid job repairing RAF and NATO military aircraft in the Thatcher defence cuts of 1981. He never got his job back.

What were the benefits of recapturing the Malvinas, again?

Remind me, what did the UK get for all that blood (906 dead, plus all the post-war PTSD and suicides) and treasure, apart from eight glorious years of Thatcher?
 
A bit of gunboat diplomacy always helps when you are behind in the polls, inflation is at 8%, and unemployment is at 2.5 million.

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/voting-intention-1979-1983

Drowned Argies don't matter. Rally round the flag, and advertise potential (arms) exports!

Without wishing to detract from your enthusiasm, you might recall that it was the Argentine forces who invaded and attacked the Falkland Islands, rather against the wishes of the people living there. If one is accusing either side of gunboat diplomacy, I'm not convinced that it can usefully be laid at the door of the Thatcher Government. The invasion caught the British Government by surprise, and was hardly a planned event designed to boost the government's popularity. It undoubtedly had that effect (although if events had fallen out differently and Corporate had failed, the consequences for the government might well have been different), but that wasn't the intention.

My Dad lost his well paid job repairing RAF and NATO military aircraft in the Thatcher defence cuts of 1981. He never got his job back.

What were the benefits of recapturing the Malvinas, again?

Remind me, what did the UK get for all that blood (906 dead, plus all the post-war PTSD and suicides) and treasure, apart from eight glorious years of Thatcher?

I damn near lost my life in 1982 Down South, and I did lose my job as a consequence. The issue was really quite straight-forward. The people living in the Falklands wanted (and still want) to be part of Britain rather than part of Argentina. The Argentine forces invaded and captured the islands by force of arms. One either accepts that, or one resists that. If one believes that conquest of bits of land by force of arms against the will of the people living in those bits of land is acceptable, then one moves into a fairly dodgy situation with regard to international relations. Resisting may take the form of persuasion or by an armed response.

I don't have any particular fondness for the Thatcher Government, but one has to remember that the response of the British Government to the invasion was supported by Michael Foot, who can hardly be classified as a cheerleader for Thatcher.
 
A bit of gunboat diplomacy always helps when you are behind in the polls, inflation is at 8%, and unemployment is at 2.5 million.

http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/voting-intention-1979-1983

Drowned Argies don't matter. Rally round the flag, and advertise potential (arms) exports!

Unpopular wars will topple governments, popular wars will strengthen them. If the majority of voters felt like you do then Thatcher would have been voted out. But alas they didn't and what's more supported her agenda at the polls for 8 more years. No point being bitter about it.
 

Wimble Toot

Banned
Kick
I damn near lost my life in 1982 Down South, and I did lose my job as a consequence.

Wear your badge with pride! Being just ten years old I supported the home team all the way. Like the World Cup only without all that boring football.

I couldn't find an adult at home or at school who thought it was worth the effort, however.

South-Atlantic-1982-Falklands-Medal-203.jpg


Best days of your life, no doubt. Just another story on the news, for fifty-five million Britons. Small fracas in the South Atlantic, not too many dead.
 
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My Dad lost his well paid job repairing RAF and NATO military aircraft in the Thatcher defence cuts of 1981. He never got his job back.

What were the benefits of recapturing the Malvinas, again?

Remind me, what did the UK get for all that blood (906 dead, plus all the post-war PTSD and suicides) and treasure, apart from eight glorious years of Thatcher?

Hum a reinforcement of the minor norm of international relations that invading a place is not a good way to resolve a territorial dispute? That sort of thing is hard to calculate the lives saved benefit but the evidence is that it does tend to be substantial over the long run.

Now I can only speak from the POV of an exceptionally young rodent in 1982 whose main take away from the sinking of the Belgrano was that the Captain was named Bonzo which was the family nickname for my little brother so the RN sinking him just struck me as cool. But ignoring the budding little fascists in the playground my father had stood as a Labour Party candidate for Parliament in the previous General Election and he saw no problem with the sinking of a cruiser in the South Atlantic belonging to a nation engaged in invading one of our dependencies. My mother, who was also at the time no fan of my father, was and would be again a Greenham Common marcher and I never got a sense from her that she thought it anything other than the normal ugliness of war. As for the folks in my rural village in North Devon, as far as I can remember not an eyebrow was batted.

Nowadays when a ship sinks my first thought is most probably an urgent one for the safety of those involved but the sinking of the Belgrano was entirely within the rules and usages of war at sea and was seen as a specific priority for the safety of the Task Force.

Also worth taking an opportunity to extend condolences to any Argentine readers for the sad loss of the crew of the ARA San Juan, an all too recent tragedy.
 
I lived in the north of England in 1982, near ports that supplied STUFT ships to the Task Force - I was ten years old. I could not find one adult (not even relatives who were WW2 veterans, RN veterans) who could explain, much less justify, why we drowned 320 sailors.

Maybe it was different in Westminster, Romford, Birmingham or Swindon.

Well, it was certainly different where I lived, just down the road from Romford.

I was about the same age at the time and as I recall it was the first item on the news every night and front page (and about the next six pages as well) in every paper, not as you claim in your other posts just another news item about which no one in was bothered about.

Personally, I didn't know one adult (and still don't) who thought there was any issue with sinking the Belgrano. Everyone I knew seemed to think that a warship, at sea, belonging to a nation which had used military force in an act of unprovoked aggression to invade islands where the inhabitants were quite clearly opposed to such an invasion, whilst a RN task force was on route to the area, was a legitimate target.

But maybe that's just because I lived In some sort of fascist state in Romford?
 
My Dad lost his well paid job repairing RAF and NATO military aircraft in the Thatcher defence cuts of 1981. He never got his job back.

What were the benefits of recapturing the Malvinas, again?

Remind me, what did the UK get for all that blood (906 dead, plus all the post-war PTSD and suicides) and treasure, apart from eight glorious years of Thatcher?

The benefits of recapturing the Falklands?

Showing that the UK (and democracies in general) still had the integrity and moral courage to stand up to those who would use aggression and force to win their arguments.

Plus a lot less nuns took parachute lessons sans parachutes from helicopters as a result.
 
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