Malandro wrote:

IM not sure here but I thik the postal service havent had a good justification …Anyway help me on this question.

The postal service case is not clearcut, it was one of the first privatizations and the contract awarded to a local investor (Grupo Macri, you may know who they are) obliged the privater operator to keep all former state employees. About a year ago they defualted their payments (the bad economy and the unflexible employment conditions caused the bankrupcy of the private operator). The state took control again last November, IRCC.

The Thales case is very obviuos. They were supposed to invets 300 million in a new radio frequency surveilance system (the state outsourced the surveilance and control of the comercial radio spectrum) but Thales never invested a penny, the new surveilance net is inexistent and they continued using the old equipment inherited from the state.

What happened there? I havent read anything abot Jamaica for a good time .

I may be echoing “left-populist” propaganda a little to much, but for what I’ve read and seen on TV, during the last 10 years has followed IMF recomendations. Before Jamaica had a wide farming base composed of mainly small single family self-sustaining landowners. Jamaica produced all its food and a little surpluss of some commodities to trade (mainly sugar, tobacco and rhum). After ten years IMF “intervention” Jamaica has lost a wide portion of small land owners, mcuh of the arable land is now owned by off-shore companies and Jamaicans depend on food aid programs and importing frozen chicken and potatoes at dumping prices from the US.
As I said, this may be the left-eye version, but for sure there is some truth to it.

Well Brazilian navy claims the carrier will be used for airsuperiority mission over Brazil’s coast .

Well, I’m glad our navy aviators can now get their deck qualification on the Sao Paulo. Its a good thing to see Turbo Trackers and Super Etendarts operating along with the Marinha A-4s’ Falcaos.

King Jester

We have gone almost completely OT, so may be we should go on on the General Discussion area? Anyway, I’ll try a last post here…

m.ileduets wrote:

the problem with practically all such “military adventures” is that the agressive party has some legitimate claims. I’d rather leave PC aside and call Saddam’s “military adventure” to Kuwait and Galtieri’s “landing party” to the Malvinas expansionism and (attempted) conquests.

Its an oxymoron to write both things into the same sentence. Expansionism is the deliberate policy to gain territory in detriment (at the expense off) their original rightfull inhabitants. Recovering a territory you can legitimately claim yours, is not expansionism. Expansionism evokes images of European colonialism, (or its post-colonial cousin, Monroes gun-boat policy), Tojos Panasiatic Empire campaign, the nazi Lebensraum theory, or the Israeli settlement practice. The same word aimed at a country with no foreign wars for a century, no matter if the specific military action was justified or not, is brushpainting the whole country and historical development of that country with a rather anti-social stigma.

As pointed out before it was not intended to describe Argentine claims in general but specifically the juntas ideas at the time prior to the Falkland war involving the use of their potentially offensive weapons, specifically the carrier……..
But if “expansionist dreams” really hurts you so much and if you always associate it with the Malvinas claims in general, I’ll refrain from using it.

Thank you, I’m glad we could work this out. It’s the semantic and associated concepts that upset me so much to begin with.

the British had occupied it (Hong Kong) before, but the Chinese negotiated and struck a deal with the British. Then they waited patiently 100 years and finally got what they wanted without the use of military force. It shows at least that GB sticks to agreements occasionally.

Obviuosly the Chinese had what it took to drag the brits onto the negotiation table in 1899. Its about balance of power. Mutually satisfying agreements only come about if both signers have enough power to hurt each other. GB wasn’t taking Argentina any seriously for the previous 150 years, and I don’t see a reason they would have changed their minds for. Certainly “military occupation” was not the most fitting action course at that moment. As you said, going to war was plain stupid.

Yet GB seemed willing to compromise prior to the war. (If they are a little more headstrong now, it’s not entirely their fault. )
They might still want a military base there however. Why not give in?

In the end, its probably going to look like that, but there is still a long road ahead. Latest developments are not encouraging, with GB setting unilaterally an extended EZZ delimitation which overlaps the argie rightfull continental EZZ. I see a sequel to the halibut conflict coming.

If you really want to delude yourself that the carrier would have had any chances surviving soviet attack subs in a conflict, go ahead. Look how well the fleet did against the British subs.

Certainly in a full scale war against the URSS (quite bizarre indeed) it would not have had any chances (some 350 SSKs on the soviet arsenal in the 80’s, IRCC). But during a Northern Hemisphere confrontation, an escort carrier of the type could have kept away errant subs from harbours and shallow waters, creating a safe refuge for commercial shipping.
In any case, it’s the second time you imply the carrier was useless in 1982. Sure, it turned around and stayed in safe waters. What could have been gained by risking the ship and her crew, if the Malvinas are in range of land-based fighters anyhow? You correctly pointed out that the Navy A-4s operated from the main land. They did so risking only a crew of five and a tanker aircraft, instead of a whole carrier and 1200 men aboard. They could even take off with a bigger payload, and reach their targets further away than launched from the cat. What to risk a carrier for? There was no landing force to cover, nor merchant convoy to protect…
There is no dishonor in choosing when to stay put and when to run…Sandy Woodward also run away with his carriers on May, 4th when Sheffield was hit, and again on May, 25th when Atlantic Conveyor was hit. He took both his carriers 150 miles to the East, to stay out of the range of land based fighters. And he would have landed his Harriers on some rock if there would have been one somewhere close enough, and taken his ship to a safe port if possible. Its about minimizing risks.

Carriers are preferably used in a completely different way: In a position of naval superiority to project air strikes or support for landings. It’s more of an offensive weapon by its nature.

Attack carriers that is. Huge monsters like the American CVNs. Escort carriers are defensive weapons, IRCC Canada and Italy operated ASW carriers for a while, Brazil did the same with the former Minais Gerais. Granted, 25 de Mayo could do a lot more than just chase subs, and with 14 SUEs aboard as planned, there was no match for it in the region. But still it was only a sea-control carrier.

Originally posed by King Jester: Argentina, Brazil and Chile get along today because we all had big enough sticks in the pasts when we sat down at the negotiotion table and bargained out our differences. You think the Beagle Channel would have been a negotiated agreement if not for the balance of power (both sides too scared to loose more than it was worth to begin with?).

That’s your interpretation. The Argentina side probably went to the negotiation table because it had learned a lesson in the Falkland war, namely that such disputes are best solved there. One could also look at it from that angle.

Well, yes one could, but the Beagle Channel quasi conflict took place in 1979, 3 years prior to the Falklands/Malvinas war. And it did not get to a fire exchange, cause both sides made a considerable show-off and movilization to impress the opponent. The final agreement was indeed signed in 1985, after referendum.

I agree (about Kirchner). Coming from the left and being not quite as populist as Menem,

Menem may have looked populist cause he run his campaigns that way, but the most liberal period in recent history was set off by him. He betrayed every one of the campaign promises, and put the country up for auction. He also managed to give us some 100 billion (American billions, 100.000 millions) more foreign debt and destroy about 2/3rds of the local industrial basin.

given the failure of the IMF “medicine” prior to his election. After all Argentina basically went bankrupt despite sticking to the IMF recipe.

Exactly, they saw it coming. Why would they have let it happen?

BME330 wrote:

Argentina operated all that Daggers before than 1982, the replacement for all their looses in the Malvinas, were 23 Mirage IIICJ, ex-IDF/AF.

That’s correct, the last Daggers arrived in September 81 IRCC. The CJ’s came in 1983, and were a crash-course purchase to make up numbers. They only lasted about ten years in service.

Mirage V -received from Perú in the war-

The 5P’s arrived in late June, a few days to late to see combat. There was a shortage of trained pilots anyhow, and the squadron became operational a year later.

King Jester

steve rowell wrote:

If the actual exchange rate is lower, then the BigMac theory says that you should expect the value of the Euro to go up until it reaches the PPP exchange rate. If the actual exchange rate is higher, then the BigMac theory says that you should expect the value of the Euro to go down until it reaches the PPP exchange rate.

Let me get this, hmmm?

Big Mac exchange index
Country BigMac Price Actual Exchange Rate
1 USD = Over(+) / Under(-) Valuation against the dollar, % Purchasing Power Price
in Local Currency in US dollars
United States $2.65 2.65 1.00 – –
Argentina Peso 3.85 1.3071 2.9454 -50.7707 1.45

So, the argie peso should go up to match the 1.3 PPP? Please good Lord, don’t let that happen again…sure it would be a blizz like the 1990’s (when even an office worker could afford one month vacations in Europe, or a weeks shopping in Miami with the whole family), but it would sink us for ever now. The little growing of the economy (8% estimated for 2004, after a 35% downfall in 2001) is mainly cause of the low value of the peso.

Just hope your Big Mac theroy doesn’t always work…

King Jester

m.ileduets wrote:

There’s no need to become emotional or offensive.

You should then ask yourself if your original comment (“ Well, the Falkland conflict was really the end of expansionist dreams involving aircraft carriers, wasn’t it.“) sounds offensive, or rather infuriating…the way I see it you made a clearly false and unsubstantial accusation, and added a little to much sarcasm for my tastebuds. With your original statement you tainted Argentinas long-standing and valid claim on the Falklands/Malvinas as being a baseless and gratuituos agression campaign, which it was not. You have been implying all the time that Argentina deliberatly scaled weapons purchases to satisfy expansionist ambitions. This is a false accusation, and I feel offended by it.
BTW, there is nothing wrong with sarcasm if you can back it up with facts, if not its totally missplaced.

Comments like (quote from King Jesters post)don’t really contribute to a good conversation and come across as rather arrogant.

Your reply (“Did I step on your toes, or what?“) sounded quite arrogant to me. In any case you would be stepping on my toes if your analysis would be closer tied to reality, but by brushpainting the issue and hence Argentinas policy and recent history as “expansionist dreams” you are simply flaming…

You’re not in a position to judge my knowledge.

In a forum you are what you post, and your knowledge is judged by what you write (unless you are deliberatly playing a deception). Talking about expansionism and invasions in regards to an unsolved colonnial problem, and providing a link to a crappy website (the one in Deutsch) as your backup leaves only three options open: you are either ill-informed, agenda-driven or simply soft-brained. I kindly assumed in your own benefit you are “only” ill-informed.

Concerning the use of words like “invasion” or “conquer”: Well, I’m going to stick to them.

Something I learned in another forum is that if you know better, but still stick to childish oversimplification, then its your own fault if you get treated like an idiot.

Interesting: You claim that carriers are essential for peace and stability in the South Atlantic region:…..[…]…..
The region looks a lot more stable to me now than at the time of the introduction of the ARA 25 de Mayo with neither Argentina nor South Africa wielding a “carrier stick”. There are better ways to preserve peace and stability in the region. Try opting for a democratic government that is respected worldwide, “getting along with your neighbours”, and international cooperation. Could this be beyond your grasp?

Now you also are going to teach me about how my own backyard should look, or what?
So, in your words, the region is safer cause no regional player is able to protect it anymore and the biggest (I should say strongest) military presence is a non-regional, non-hemispheric former colonnial power? Sort of PAX ROMANA, hum?

Malandro wrote:

Argentine tried to buy weapons for the Falklands conquest . It tried to buy F16s from US , latter bough some israeli fighter as well as Super Etandarts and Exocets . But argentinean pailots had very little time to train on those israeli stuff , what justifies their porr performance in the war .

The Daggers were bought to replace the F-86 Sabres, and mainly to compensate for Chiles purchase of Mirage 50s. The deal for the Daggers and the deal with the french for the SUEs was done long before Galtiere came to power. It was part of a re-equipment plan dated back to 1974. If anything, the Falkland/Malvinas campaign of 1982 was totally improvized and no piece of equipment was bought specifically with this scenario in mind. The equipemnt bought was always to keep balance with Chile and Brazil.
If there is a branch of the argie militar that deserves recognition its the fighter pilots for achieving what they achieved with the equipment at hand.

Flex wrote:

Buddies, I would noot like to offense you, but about upgrading your fleet a bit? Well, A-4AR and Mirage III (even the rusty CJs), that is not quaite the out scream of the hi-tech generation..

There’s only one CJ still flying for the CEASO (sort of radar calibration duties). The A-4ARs where supposed to bring some interesting ordenance along as BME already said, but it never happened. Half of them are stored anyways.

Are there any plans for modernisation or even new hardware? Would love to see somethin new in FAA colors.

As mentioned already, some effort is being done to get some ex-USAF ( or ex-ANG) F-16s (Block 15 plus some MLU program, likely).
BUT, with 130 million PESOS (about 40 million US dollars) allocated in the 2004 budget for new hardware for ALL three branches of the military there is little room for manuevering, I guess.

but does Argentina have an urgent need for weapons?

For the FAA I would rather see the C-130 fleet upgraded, the F-27 and Guarani’s replaced by C-295s, a decent CSAR helo fleet put together (EC-735s or NH-90s, but upgraded Jolly Giants will do fine) and a second batch of Pampas build to ground the MS-760s than a penny spend on “high tech gear” right now. Well, may be a batch of Derbys, or some other 4th gen AAM along with the minimal upgrade of the delta fleet would be nice.

m.ileduets wrote:

Well, the Falkland conflict was really the end of expansionist dreams involving aircraft carriers, wasn’t it

What is that supposed to mean? Care to explain how a ASW (S-61 and S-2 Trackers) and ASuW (SUE+Exocet) escort carrier involves any “expansionism“?
And BTW, ARA 25 de Mayo was mothballed in 1988 (and scrapped in 1998) cause of machine problems, which turned out to be impracticable to solve due to a combination of lack of funds, lack of political will, excess of foreign political pressure and most of all excess of years on the ships ribs and beams…

King Jester

Arthur wrote:

-10-
Which training aircraft has the US military purchased over the last 25 years from non-US design?
[red] One recent ‘foreign’ trainer, in large scale service, hasn’t been mentioned yet.[/red]

Wild guess, the Agusta 139 helo? Sure, it does mainly other things, but I’m sure its used as a crewtrainer as well…

King Jester

I like to shout the word “claisomania” at random, which BTW is the name of the mental disorder that makes you raise your voice involuntarily…

CLAISOMANIA!!!!!!

King Jester

CLAISOMANIA!!!!!