The Falklands Conflict

[Dixie]

The first time I've ever got angry on the forums, probably because I'm so tired....[:@]

[Terminus]

That does tend to increase your vulnerability to trolling... Believe me, I know...

[EUBanana]

Ike, you are a raving lunatic, and people like you were the ones who Galtieri played like a banjo back in the 80s. If the 60 million Brits decided one day that the 40 million Argentinians needed to be placed under the bootheel of 'proper government' then presumably you would support this, given all your arguments are about numbers. 

If ever the islanders want to be a part of Argentina, then they will promptly become a part of Argentina, until then, too bad, Argies. 

[Ike99]

You're the first person to earn my ignore button. Congratulations.

[&:]

ahhhh well excuse me.

Just thought I`d offer a glimpse at the otherside of the issue between the images of Argentines goose stepping for no reason through the Malvinas conjured up by some here and British chest pounding about the war. Not you JD but even you have said some enticed. I just responded.

I wasn´t trolling either do I wish to.[:-]

So I`ll leave this thread and allow you all to carry on with what you seem to want. To slap each other on the back on a job well done and very one sided view on the conflict and what it was really about.

edit-an error, Not what the conflict was about...what the conflict is about.

[GreyFox]

What the conflict was about: A military dictatorship needed to distract the people with a good war and so stoked up an obscure claim that because they once owned the Falklands for a seven year period between the Spanish and British ownership, they should have it now.
 
What Argentinians want: The Falkland Islands.
 
What the people on the Falklands want: to live on their islands under the British flag, not the Argentinian.

[USSAmerica]

ORIGINAL: Ike99

Hertston-That is certainly one 'defence' (none is needed) - Feel free to step outside to the Steakhouse..

Last comment from me on this thread MODS, I promise, I promise, I promise. [&o][:D]

Ahh...no defense is needed? I see. So I assume this position too then, the Malvinas are Argentine...uuhhh...period.[8|]

Feel free to step outside to the steakhouse? Haa.
That´s funny. Looks to me like you boys got a little
more than you can handle right now in Iraq mate.[;)]

ORIGINAL: Ike99

Of course... But the people on those islands are, and have chosen to be, a part of the UK. Too bad for the Argentinians, who aren't exactly 2 miles away either.

The Islanders will not let Argentines go there, I bet you can guess why. It's pure speculation on my part but I`m guessing they would have 40,000 plus people living on them if they did and not 2,000 inbred sheep herders.

[Dixie]

ORIGINAL: USS America

You 'stole' my picture [:D][:D]

[USSAmerica]

I told you I was going to save it in a very handy place to use frequently.  [:D]

It just took me a while to stumble onto a useful place for it. [;)]

[EUBanana]

The fact you can even argue about the morality of the war honestly confuses me. 

Either you believe in self determination and freedom or you don't.  Either you uphold a democratic nations right to defend it's citizens - people who believe they are its citizens - or you choose to back a war of aggression waged by a military junta for the laughably transparent reason to prop up it's unpopular regime on a wave of newly stoked nationalist sentiment.

There is an 'other side' to the story but Galtieri's other side is hardly one to be preaching, and I frankly couldn't care less about the arguments of tyrants.

[7th Somersets]

edit-an error, Not what the conflict was about...what the conflict is about.

 
Ike99 - You really do need to educate yourself before taking stances like this.
 
You ignore posts on the history of the Falkland Islands and the dates of foreign settlements on them, you ignore others comments on why Spain thought it had a right to cede the Falkland Islands to Argentina, you are completeley ignorant on the issue of war crimes (I speak as a lawyer who deals in this area of law).
 
It is sad that you believe that there is still a conflict. I hope that your view is not shared by others.
 
Whatever your opinion of the British, you seem incapable of understanding the motivation of British people in the modern world and seem to have completely deluded yourself as to what British views of the war were in 1982.
 
I hope that you are confusing quite understandable respect for the soldiers who fought the war, with some blind nationalistic jingoism that seems to come across in your postings.
 
I am sure that if you were to put forward facts to support your comments then you would get people to consider them properly. I am interested in seeing alternative opinions, especially if, as you suggest, they may raise themselves as a continuing conflict that would innevitably involve British forces again.
 
 

[Cap Mandrake]

Remember the General Belgrano?

I just learned she was sunk with unguided torpedoes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARA_General_Belgrano

Ah..I see it has already been brought up in the thread.

[dinsdale]

ORIGINAL: Ike99
The sinking violated the Hague convention of 1907 on the conduct of war. Why else would Mrs.Thatcher consult lawyers before making trips abroad after that?[;)]

Once again I agree with your assessment of British tax payers subsidizing the South Sea haven of a few sheep farmers. But again, it's not part of the war.

Could you cite the exact violation of the Hague Convention. There's nothing which jumps out as making it illegal to sink a capital ship during war.

Further, is there evidence for your assertion that Thatcher consulted lawyers. I'd find it remarkable, seeing as there was no international court in 1982 with jurisdiction to prosecute such matters.

[Cap Mandrake]

Here is an interesting exchange between Thatcher and the BBC.

Some details of the action were later leaked to a British MP, Tam Dalyell, by the senior civil servant Clive Ponting, resulting in the unsuccessful prosecution of the latter under the Official Secrets Act.

In May 1983, Margaret Thatcher appeared on Nationwide, a live television show on BBC One, where Diana Gould questioned her about the sinking, claiming that the ship was already west of the Falklands and heading towards the Argentinian mainland to the west. Gould also claimed that the Peruvian peace proposal must have reached London in the 14 hours between its publication and the sinking of the Belgrano, and the escalation of the war could have thus been prevented. In the following emotional exchange, Thatcher answered that the vessel was a threat to British ships and lives and denied that the peace proposal had reached her.[11] After the show, Thatcher's husband Denis lashed out at the producer of the show in the entertainment suite, saying that his wife had been "stitched up by bloody BBC poofs and Trots."[12][:D] Thatcher herself commented during the interview "I think it could only be in Britain that a prime minister was accused of sinking an enemy ship that was a danger to our navy, when my main motive was to protect the boys in our navy". [:)] She is probably wrong. US media were all over Schwarzkopf because Hussein dumped some oil into the Persian Gulf in the middle of a war.

In 1994 the Argentine government conceded that the sinking of the Belgrano was "a legal act of war.[13]

Admiral Enrique Molina Pico, head of the Argentine Navy in the 1990s, wrote in a letter to La Nation, published in the 2 May 2005 edition that stated that the Belgrano was part of an operation that posed a real threat to the British task force, that it was holding off for tactical reasons and that being outside of the exclusion zone was unimportant as it was a warship on tactical mission.

[Terminus]

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake

Remember the General Belgrano?

I just learned she was sunk with unguided torpedoes.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ARA_General_Belgrano

Ah..I see it has already been brought up in the thread.

Yup, good ol' Mk VIII's...

[Culiacan Mexico]

ORIGINAL: Ike99The sinking violated the Hague convention of 1907 on the conduct of war. Why else would Mrs.Thatcher consult lawyers before making trips abroad after that?[;)]

Which Article?

Below is a link to 'The Avalon Project' and lists every article in the 1907 Hague Convention. I am curious as to which you believes applies in this situation.


http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/lawofwar/hague04.htm

[Terminus]

Yeah, I'd like to know that too...

[dinsdale]

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake
After the show, Thatcher's husband Denis lashed out at the producer of the show in the entertainment suite, saying that his wife had been "stitched up by bloody BBC poofs and Trots."[12][:D]

Lol, the legacy of Guy Burgess lasted a long time for opponents of the BBC

[GreyFox]

Which Article?

the Argentinian edition of the 1907 Hague convention, published May 1982, chapter 56, verse 29: "Any British warship that sinks an enemy combatant is guilty of a war crime".

[Cap Mandrake]

ORIGINAL: dinsdale

ORIGINAL: Cap Mandrake
After the show, Thatcher's husband Denis lashed out at the producer of the show in the entertainment suite, saying that his wife had been "stitched up by bloody BBC poofs and Trots."[12][:D]

Lol, the legacy of Guy Burgess lasted a long time for opponents of the BBC

I think I just figured out what a "Trot" is. Trotskyites? I am afraid to ask what a "poof" is. [:D]

[Culiacan Mexico]

ORIGINAL: GreyFox

Which Article?

the Argentinian edition of the 1907 Hague convention, published May 1982, chapter 56, verse 29: "Any British warship that sinks an enemy combatant is guilty of a war crime".

[;)]