UK & Argentine Falklands Rapprochement
 

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/...-falklands-war

Britain and Argentina appear to have made significant headway towards improving relations after reaching an agreement to identify the bodies of more than 100 unknown Argentinian soldiers buried on the Falklands Islands after the 1982 war. The two countries also agreed to increase the number of flights between Argentina and the islands, which they claim as the Malvinas.

The 74-day war, which began when Argentina seized the islands and Britain sent a taskforce to retake them, saw 649 Argentinian and 255 British soldiers, as well as three Falkland islanders, lose their lives.

Under the agreement announced on Tuesday, the Red Cross will assemble a team of forensic experts, including two Argentinians, who will retrieve DNA samples from 123 unidentified Argentinian combatants buried at at Darwin Cemetery on East Falkland. The samples will then be compared against the samples taken from the volunteer Argentinian families. Work on identifying the remains will begin early next year, according to the Argentinian foreign ministry’s statement.

The two governments also announced that talks are proceeding smoothly for the opening of extra flights between the South American mainland and the islands. FCO minister Sir Alan Duncan tweeted that Argentina and Britain had “agreed a way forward on new flights from Falkland Islands to Latin America”. Press reports in Argentina indicated that these could include a flight from São Paulo, Brazil, and Mount Pleasant airport near Port Stanley, the capital of the islands, stopping over at Argentina’s capital city, Buenos Aires. The Argentinian foreign ministry said in its statement: “Both countries will negotiate with the air authorities in Brazil and Chile to determine what the stopovers will be.”

At the moment a twice-weekly flight is operated by the British ministry of defence from the United Kingdom to the Falklands, as well as a weekly flight from Punta Arenas in Chile that makes a monthly stopover at Rio Gallegos in Argentina.

Relations between London and Buenos Aires have improved significantly since Argentina’s president, Mauricio Macri, took office a year ago. Macri abandoned the confrontative attitude of former president Cristina Kirchner, who restricted hydrocarbon exploration in the area around the islands and at one point barred sea cruisers bound for the Falklands from docking at Argentinian ports.

The agreement was signed in London by Sir Alan Duncan, minister for Europe and the Americas at the Foreign Office, and Argentinian foreign deputy minister Pedro Villagra Delgado. The signing was attended by Falkland Islands officials.

I wonder if the MOD will start prosecuting Falklands vets for "murdering" Argentinians, you know, as part of the healing process :hmm:

ORAC,
Yes, things are easing diplomatically, but some of my friends in the Falklands are more fearful now of this new administration. They say the last one was looney, but this is more suave and subtle. The overall aim to take over the 'Malvinas' still remains.

Quite. When Spain jabbers Gib...Gib...Gib as the price of its Vote to endorse a Brexit settlement, Arg will gently ask its cousin to add Las Malvinas...

People I know in the FI always said that if the Argies had kept up their softly softly approach in the 70's they'd be part of Argentina now - and those around at the time thought it was a realistic option as HMG couldn't give a stuff about them........

The idiots in the Foreign Office missed their golden opportunity when Spain was allowed into the EU without them formally denouncing all and any claims on Gib.

Orsini - you never know....

I think the offshore oil, fisheries and proximity to Antarctica will guarantee our interest for many years to come................

[Cynic]

Arc

A long way to go BUT the idealist in me would hope that a pragmatic approach from Argentina could provide Argentina with some fiscal stability and the means to improve their society and most importantly bring political enlightenment...as I said, a LONG way to go..

Well how many Argies actually want to go and live in the FI? Probably count them on the fingers of one hand - I can see them replacing the Chileans and Saints who work there for the high wages and then bugger off home but live there permananetly?????

By what means have you arrived at this conclusion?

West Coast, I dare say Heathrow Harry has been there hence his conclusion

I've been to North Dakota many times where today it is exceedingly cold and typographically boring. You can watch your dog run away for a week it's so flat. Despite having been there and and finding reason to cede it to Canada, the growth rate is enviable.

New horizons will always attract new comers, be it for adventure, for profit or escaping a past life. That's human nature. In no way saying the Argies have a right to, but if offered the opportunity, there'd be more than a handful showing up.

Regardless of the political situation, I think this rapprochement is long overdue and the soldiers need to be put properly to rest and there families informed. I always found the "soldier known only to God" markings as being very saddening.

West Coast,
The Falkland Islands are not in any way like North Dakota except for the big sky. The typography, flora and fauna are certainly very interesting. The climate is actually quite pleasant, the only drawback being the wind. Most of my friends there have come from many generations of British settlers. It is their land and they want it to remain so and keep their strong link to the UK. If you are from the USA, you would certainly fight to keep it.
Great news that the Argentinians can finally identify their dead, God knows we certainly lost many of our own.

You're aiding my point Mach. The thought that Argies wouldn't want to move in if offered the chance is laughable.

I would suggest that there are more similarities with Alaska.

Inhospitable climate, low permanent population, servicing the needs of a much larger oil, gas and mining economy.

Tourists and temporary economic migrants doeth not a settler make.

I expect that FI would become more of a tax haven than a viable industrial economy kept alive by overly large ego's

Imagegear

Argentina has no claim whatsoever to islands out in the South Atlantic which are British territory.
By all means let them identify and repatriate their dead whose demise is entirely the fault of Galtieri but no rapprochement is possible whilst their leaders try to use such a bogus claim to ingratiate themselves with their Argentinian citizens.

Galtieri was a destroyer who ruined a good relationship between our two countries.

there's plenty of identical country to the FI in Southern Argentina which isn't exactly overrun by people either.... my FI friends tell me they reckon the wages would be a major attraction but otherwise why would they go there?

If & when the oil kicks in the FI will be a very rich place - like other suddenly rich places you may well find the other generation decide to give up traditional practices and live the high life with all the menial tasks (like running the place) out sourced to Brits, Saints, Gurkhas, Argies and Chileans.........

PS before I'm accused of being a fully fledged surrender monkey - for the record the Argentinean Claim to the FI is probably one of the least credible "claims" to other people's territory floating around World Politics...................... they were wrong (and stupid) to invade and we were right to take it back

Dream along! Oil will take decades, if ever, to reach the $100+/bbl of recent years. I cannot think of a more expensive place to extract and transport oil than the Falklands Islands and I've been to a few.

They may continue to explore, assess and plug for a few more years yet but I cannot see any bonanza materialising.

Fareastdriver, you are spot on. If it was economically viable it would have been exploited many years ago. With the current glut of oil extending into the foreseeable future, I find it difficult to foresee the FI ever being a rich oil based economy.

Nevertheless, why give away a possible asset even if not valuable until the future?

Why did we sell the Harriers? :rolleyes:

For the record, Argentine claim has some grounds. Last time I´ve check the majority of the international community supports Argentine position...even US backed the claim before 1982.

I don´t want to convince anyone here, just I think is appropiate to mention it.

Regards to all,

Forget the oil, the associated islands to the south gives the UK it's historic rights to its territories in Antarctica - which whilst currently unexploited for environmental reasons, are worth untold trillions in the future.


https://www.bas.ac.uk/about/antarcti...ection/mining/

https://www.princeton.edu/~ota/disk1...926/892606.PDF

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brit...ctic_Territory

https://www.theguardian.com/news/200...ca.sciencenews

Courteously put, as I'd expect from an Argentinian gentleman.
The whole thing was a disaster for our relationship.

Good post by Marcantilan

But the rest of us should be careful about saying the oil price will "never" recover - it has done so many times. It takes about 3-5 years for the projects approved and started at $ 120 a barrel to finally be completed. After that the oil companies start again, and their supply chain readjusts to $ 50 a barrel - less gold plating, less specialisation, wage cuts and job cuts (the UK oil business has lost tens of thousands of jobs in the last 2 years).

Governments adjust the fiscal terms to keep jobs, financiers see "bargains", and the oil fields still pump away 24/7 generating cash flow

Happened in 1986-88, 1999-2001 etc etc

It's slightly different this time. OPEC hasn't got the clout that it used to have especially when the world's largest consumer doesn't need it. The world is awash with oil and even China is using its clout to make itself self sufficient.

<a href='http://www.macrotrends.net/2562/us-crude-oil-production-historical-chart'>U.S. Crude Oil Production - Historical Chart</a>

There's a lot more bad news for OPEC in the attached graphs.

Crude Oil Prices - 70 Year Historical Chart | MacroTrends

OPEC didn't have muchclout on 1999-2000 but the price still came back

US shale oil/gas will undoubtedly have an effect but the oil companies have a very long history of re-inventing themsleves and still making money......

As this is a military forum and not a political one I would be far more interested in a professional assessment of the respective Argentinian and British forces and an analysis of the likely outcome of events should hostilities recommence today with all the unexpected suddeness that they did back in 1982.

It is interesting to me that many of the major weapon systems from 34 years ago are still in use today albeit in upgraded forms. The Type 42 destroyer wasn't new in 1982 and only saw an end to its active service just 3 years ago, the Argentinians are still flying A-4s, Rapier (which didn't work very well in 1982) is still in service, Sea Wolf, Stingray, Chinook, and Lynx to name but a few systems are still in service, amazingly even Sea Skua which must have shelf life issues at this point. Mercifully the appalling Seacat and Blowpipe missile systems are a thing of the past, along with the equally useless Tigerfish torpedo. I could bang on ad nauseam about the individual merits and demerits of specific systems but bigger picture wise I do wonder how things would play out today especially with the UK lacking any carriers and the absence of superb assets like the Sea Harrier FA2.

As for saying it could never happen again with today's more "evolved" Argentina - I don't personally subscribe to that opinion as emotions still run very hot on the subject down south.

The UK is far better off - a very large air base is the main change and a few state of the art fighters (far more effective one hopes than the SHAR) - but without any medium/long range AA missile defence it must be open to a take-out strike

Argentina is certainly less effective - the Armed Forces have been short of cash for maintenance and upgrades for a couple of decades...........

Surely the key is that about 98% of Falkland Islanders want to remain British

I think Fonsini was thinking about another invasion scenario in the future

You've got to imagine that the Brits keep at least one Hunter Killer down there ready to TLAM the Arg air bases should the need arise

They may have an SSN down there some of the time but it's to frighten off any invasion fleet

We didn't attack the mainland in the war and I really doubt we'd do so in another flare up

Fonsini,
The A-4s are scheduled to be retired.

Argentina to retire ageing A-4AR fleet by 2018 | IHS Jane's 360

We certainly had no reservations about doing so and had every intention:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mikado

SAS 'suicide mission' to wipe out Exocets - Telegraph

I appreciate the political implications of striking the mainland. But at the same time it has always struck me as odd to think that if a country is sending military aircraft to attack you, you should feel obliged to refrain from attacking and disabling the military sites (and only those military sites) that are launching the attacks because it's somehow not cricket to do so.

Yes, the A-4ARs are currently grounded with only 5 out of the original 36 remaining airworthy. Janes reported last year that they had been offered a range of alternatives including F-16s (which have long been denied to them) but that a specific request for the F-5E had been refused by the US ?!

Current favourite is the KAI FA-50, but I would say that the Mirage 2000 makes more sense for a variety of reasons.

In other news the argentine navy has also woken up of late, their Espora class corvette the ARA Rosales was out testing Exocets in February:



They still need to be watched.

never sure why S American countries spend $$$ on newish kit - it's been a while since there was any sort of war on (other than the FI of course....)

Maybe they feel it's working. A bit like the argument that there's no point in spending money on nuclear weapons, because no-one's used one for 70 years.