Was the Belgrano story not related to some peace proposal involving the Peruvians, as in: why sink the Belgrano, when there were talks underway?

I seem to remember your Prime minister later saying, that they had not recieved any indication of such a peace plan. Although it according to the Peruvians had been send to London 14 hours earlier.

I’m not trying to fan any flames, i simply seem to remember something like that, when i think of the Belgrano.

My own private idea about it, is that its war. Ships are sunk in war.

I think that was the case, but (probably) the ongoing negotiations did not necessarily preclude any military actions by either side – by this time Argentine forces had already been engaged (and killed) by UK forces during the invasion – so it was already a shooting war.

I also believe that the UK (and possibly the Argentines) had already concluded that the negotiations were heading nowhere before they oficially ended… after all the US government were suupling Sidewinders to the UK even as their peace envoy was shuttling back and forth between London and BA.

I seem to recall that the carrier was also at sea at the time but returned to harbour after the Belgrano was sunk and never sailed again for the duration of the conflict so the sinking of one ship actually took two out of theatre. Reduced the threat to British forces and actually did save lives.

Don’t quote me, but I think 25th May was at sea for the duration of the conflict – but a long way away from the Falklands in Argentine territorial waters…

horrific as it was, sinking the Belgrano saved lives (IMO). What was truly awful, was watching a programme engineered by C4 where Carole Thatcher argued the point with some Belgrano widows – she was right but didn’t express her views with any tact or supporting fact – not that this would make a difference to the poor widows. It was cringe-worthy, voyeuristic TV at it’s worst – I’m sorry I saw it.

Was sinking the Belgrano controversial or a ‘war crime’? Only to those ignorant of some key facts…

The most telling testimony I’ve read about the sinking of the Belgrano was by someone who was there – on the bridge – Captain Hector Bonzo.

He knew that the British had amended the rules of engagement as he was in receipt of a message to that effect that had been passed from the UK to Argentina via the Swiss.

He does not find the sinking controversial and indeed seemed to be expecting it before the fact.

Was Belgrano a threat? Probably not a big one – but UK intel on Argentine capabilities at the time was almost non-existant. It ‘could’ have fielded a ship-mounted Exocet which you can launch from practically any stable platform including lorry trailers.

Oh, and I nearly forgot – it was war. Call it a conflict, emergency or whatever but just because the formalities of declaring a war were not adhered to doesn’t change the nature of the beast.

So Elvis Costello, Tam Dayell etc… RTFM – which is…

‘The Argentine Fight for the Falklands’ by Martin Middlebrook

The best book I’ve read on the subject, and draws from many first-hand interviews with the Argentines…

A tragic story of miscalculation and brinksmanship by the Argentines that cost many lives on both sides:

1. The junta never thought the UK would react as they did and were aghast when the Task Force sailed

2. The junta never thought they would have to defend the islands and sent troops from the tropical north to the islands while their relatively elite mountain troops stayed at home to defend the border with Chile.

3. The only thing worse than UK intel on Argentine capabilities was Argentine intel on UK capabilities they were (rightly) paranoid about submarine threat and (perhaps wrongly) in awe of the Vulcan and it’s capacity to cause significant damage on the mainland.

I cannot see a likely scenario (after the troops invested San Carlos) where Argentina would be victorious… them running out of Exocets and planes as UK air defences got their eye in after the Rapier shakedown of the first 48 hours.

If they’d have gone in with fewer, better-trained, better-equipped troops in the first place and if their planes had flown high enough along San Carlos water to allow the bombs to arm – might have been completely different story but that’s conjecture.

What’s left of an ekranoplane would be my guess too, some of those were really strange looking beasts

Ekranoplane alright…

and here’s how it used to look:

http://www.strange-mecha.com/ship/wig/vva14.JPG

think it crashed on it’s maiden trip IIRC and was consigned to a grassy corner of Monino.

Good news: The UK’s independent nuclear deterrent handed back to V Force
Bad news: Red Arrows reduced to a Hawker Hurricane solo display team

or

‘Now if this doesn’t scare Putin I don’t know what will’

or

‘If we don’t find that Victor soon we’ll have to push this thing all the way back to Scampton’

or

‘Excuse me, is this Rio de Janeiro? No? Boy, are we lost’

or

‘Huh, Who needs the JSF – we can fit dozens of these things on the carriers’

My Dad recalls reading in one of the mags (in the past couple of years) that there is a Heyford (or, more correctly, the earthly remains of a Heyford) buried at the end of the runway at Cosford…

Be interesting to know if it’s really there… can anyone confirm this?

That ‘plane’ looks like a heavily photoshopped airport passenger terminal. The question now is ‘which airport?’ 🙂

My guess is CDG