Cokecan (Well off topic)
I suspect the LGB option was not tried because the weapon had never been dropped from the bomb bay of a Vulcan, thus a rapid amount of trials would have to be done (Though the Vulcan boys didn't train for conventional attack, the aircraft had been cleared to do it!). Also would a PWII actually fit on the Bomb racks? I suspect the maximum amount of bombs would have been 2 or 3 and then there were the operational limitations of the targeting pod (Pave Spike) which were daylight and good weather only. Thus the attack would have had to be done in daylight and with hopefully good weather when the aircraft got down there, which in the Falklands is very unlikely. The only other options would have been a US pod like Pave Knife or Pave Tack (if the latter was operational by then). Both were quite large and draggy so their carriage may have been a problem and of course weather would have been still an issue. Night time radar attacks promised the best chance of success. Martel was trialled on both the Victor and the Vulcan from what I have heard and it was found that a number of issues caused the weapon not to be viable. Thus the supply of Shrike to the UK which resulted in three attempted anti-radar missions. One was aborted (either HDU failure on the tankers or head winds (I can't remember which) while the other two resulted in a very near miss on the Argie's best radar and the destruction of a Skyguard on the other. LGB's were available for the Harrier force well before the end of the conflict, the main issue was lack of designation. The Harrier boys were mistakenly informed that the LRMTS could be used as a designator and a couple of attempts to bomb the airfield were done from high altitude with total no success before they were told that the previous information was BS. Then when ground forces with designators did get within laser range of targets, the attacks had to be aborted when the man on the ground found that the batteries on the designator were flat!!! It was only on the last day did everything come together and the whole system worked. Shrike was supplied to the Harrier force and I think an aircraft modified to use it was flown down there, but the war ended before it could be used. I suppose somebody should have thought of putting a Pave Spike on a T-bird and got it down there (though there may have been issue's that stopped the idea in its tracks, like elevator size or some other deck operating issue), but it has got to be remembered that members of the Staff on Hermes were totally against flying replacement GR3's from Ascension to the Task Force. It's ironic that in Sharkey's book the only praise he gives to the Tanker Force was getting replacement Harriers down to the Task Force, when its delay was caused by the Naval Staff refused to support what they considered to be a highly dangerous 'Crab' Stunt (mentioned in more than one aircrew account of the war). It was only when 1 Squadron was totally on it's backside as regards serviceable airframes that forced the reinforcement plan to be put in place.