Falkland Islands: Tensions Rising

[Alan Fry]

Originally Posted by Damien

Can we move on from the nuclear weapons discussion? Everyone knows where everyone stands on it and it's being going on in a circle for a few pages now.

Sorry!

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Tim Deegan

They haven't launched them with warheads. They have launched the missiles, and they have detonated the warheads. But not at the same time, and not in an attack on another country.

That wasn't Alan's question...

Can we now please steer this discussion back on topic. No more posts about nuclear missiles, they are pointless and do not advance the discussion of the actual current events unfolding between the UK and Argentina.

In today's Guardian - link

Argentina names top football league after ship sunk in Falklands war

And here is, imho, an empty gesture reported in yesterday's Telegraph

The eight member countries of the Bolivarian Alliance bloc, or ALBA, met to approve an agreement barring any boats flying Falkland Island flags from docking in their ports.

I wonder if any actually exist?

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Alan Fry

Well can we at least send some more of our armed forces to the Falklands after Afgansitan!

claptrap we don't have enough armed forces left thanks to cuts

Originally Posted by Hugh

In today's Guardian - link

And here is, imho, an empty gesture reported in yesterday's Telegraph I wonder if any actually exist?

Their loss financially..

Breaking News from AFP: Argentina says it will present a formal complaint in the UN over what it calls 'Britains Militarisation' in the Falklands.

http://news.sky.com/home/world-news/article/16165366

Is there any substance to their complaint?

No ... it's British sovereign territory, military movements there are nobody's business but ours.

That's what I was thinking.

[Osem]

Times really must be hard in Argentina. I feel sorry for the ordinary people there who're being manipulated in this manner.

[Tim Deegan]

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

That wasn't Alan's question...

I wasn't answering Alan, I was answering you and DocDutch

---------- Post added at 09:30 ---------- Previous post was at 09:28 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris

No ... it's British sovereign territory, military movements there are nobody's business but ours.

Agreed!

Originally Posted by Osem

Times really must be hard in Argentina. I feel sorry for the ordinary people there who're being manipulated in this manner.

I almost feel sorry for Kirchner as well. She has made this her key foreign policy objective, which displays either shocking ignorance or hopeless naivety .... having set herself an aim that anyone outside of Argentina can see is unattainable, all she has actually achieved is to lay the foundations for her downfall. When the voters start to realise she can't deliver, they will simply judge her weak and ineffective.

[Tim Deegan]

Originally Posted by Chris

I almost feel sorry for Kirchner as well. She has made this her key foreign policy objective, which displays either shocking ignorance or hopeless naivety .... having set herself an aim that anyone outside of Argentina can see is unattainable, all she has actually achieved is to lay the foundations for her downfall. When the voters start to realise she can't deliver, they will simply judge her weak and ineffective.

She will probably drag the negotiations out for as long as possible, just to stay in office.

Originally Posted by Tim Deegan

She will probably drag the negotiations out for as long as possible, just to stay in office.

As of right now she's riding a wave of public patriotism. Apparently there were crowds outside El Presidente's palace last night after her speech to veterans about how they're going to get the Falklands back. Mind you, General Galtieri enjoyed similar support for as long as the population thought his 'policy' on the Falklands was a winner. It turned sour for him pretty quickly after HM Armed Forces brought the policy to a rapid halt.

The key thing to remember, however, is that there are no negotiations, and nor will there be any. The British Government has made clear that as far as it is concerned, there is nothing to negotiate. The Falklands are legally held British territory inhabited by British citizens whose occupation and government is every bit as legitimate as the overwhelmingly ethnic European occupation and government of South America (which Kirchner herself describes as Latin America, a term I think I'd be slightly peeved at if I were an Amerindian native of that continent).

Argentina's territorial claim over the Falklands is at odds with its disinterest in pursuing claims on the mainland over territory that was at one time or other governed by the Spanish Crown's Viceroy based in Buenos Aires - such as, for example, most if not all of modern-day Uruguay.

Kirchner's gambit can continue for only as long as she can convince her people she is making progress. As they are not going to get what they actually want - negotiations, leading to control of the Falklands - all she can do by way of a convincer is to continually ratchet up the rhetoric and pull stunts like grassing the UK up to the United Nations for having the temerity to send the Queen's grandson on a mission to rescue drowning fishermen, or for sending a shiny new naval vessel to replace the venerable but slightly creaky old frigate that's currently in the South Atlantic.

[Tim Deegan]

Originally Posted by Chris

As of right now she's riding a wave of public patriotism. Apparently there were crowds outside El Presidente's palace last night after her speech to veterans about how they're going to get the Falklands back. Mind you, General Galtieri enjoyed similar support for as long as the population thought his 'policy' on the Falklands was a winner. It turned sour for him pretty quickly after HM Armed Forces brought the policy to a rapid halt.

I'm afraid to admit, that I do remember it