FALKLAND losses

Didn't help Jones' too much though, ultimately he lost...

 

whats so useful about the Islands anyways? I mean you can use it a jump off station on Antarctica, but then the Penguins might fight back and we couldn't win

 

Nothing at all really, it was mainly a prestige thing. As far as the Argentines were concerned they were rightfully theirs being just off their coast (Although they were British owned for centuries) and it was a useful tool to distract from an unpopular government at home.

As far as the British were concerned they were ours, had been for centuries and no-one was just going to decide they could just march in and take over any of our territory or our people. The Empire might have been long gone, but we were out to show the world we were still no push over. (...and it was a useful tool to distract from an unpopular government at home).

In years gone by it was useful to have a maritime South Atlantic base, but by 1982 that was no longer really valid.

 

There was also the priniple of resettelmemt and compensation for the Britsh citizens of the islands and the precedent that it may have set for the then upcoming 1999 transfer of Hong Kong to the Chinese.

 

I noticed GB has alot of Islands all over the place (such as St. Helena) do people actually live on these Islands?

 

Yes, mostly in quite small numbers though.

 

There was also the principle of self-determination at stake as well. The people of the Falklands wanted to be ruled by Britain, not Argentina. And given the differences in the two (especially in 1982), I can't say that I blame them.

 

I think that it should be noted that the Royal Navy showed that it still had the courage and determination to carry out its mission, even in the face of determined opposition. The story of the Task Force of 1982 has always reminded me of the Royal Navy off Crete in 1941, with the RN doing what it had to despite losses and other adversities. Granted, the Argentinian air forces did not have 1982's equivalent of the Luftwaffe's striking power, but I think that the analogy holds up.

 

I fully agree.

 

At one point during the war, the BBC aired a report stating that many of the Argentine bombs were not exploding. Admiral Woodward was furious, since he was certain that Argentina would take immediate steps to correct the problem, since that was what he would have done. Ond does wonder which side the BBC was on. :roll:

 

Apparently the Argentines were aware there was a problem (the jets were coming in so low the bombs didn't have time to arm) but couldn't change the fuses because the Americans hadn't given them the manuals.

 

Good for us!

 

Allso,RN was scared by excorist performances,and stoped the try from argentina to buy them more.RN had not much chance if Argentina had like 30 excorist missiles in arsenal,and Mirage III planes who could use them.

It is the price of bad planing.

 

They way I heard it from RN contacts was that we weren't tremendously bothered by Exocet, because it was weapon we'd had for some time and knew its capabilities. Granted it was something to keep an eye out for, but scared? Not really.

 

Indeed. In any case Exocet's capabilities get a bit overstated I believe, of the two ships were sunk by Exocet, Sheffield had her anti-missile countermeasures inexplicably turned of IIRC and in any case was not damaged by the warhead which failed to detonate but by the fires caused by the rocket motors, and the Atlantic Conveyor, which was just a requisitioned merchantman. Against a warships with active countermeasures it's performance would have probably been less impressive.

 

Supposedly because of typical MoD parsimony - the sat-link communication system was on a frequency that could be interfered with by the radars that were used to spot AShMs - therefore the defensive systems were turned off. Shiny Sheff was talking to London when she was hit.
But the tars had a good sing-song later, IIRC - a friend who was there showed me photos of the crew being taken off - nearly all of them were lined up on deck with linked arms singing "Always look on the bright side of life"

 

They had 2 r 3 exocet ,and sinked 2 ships with them....it is impressive to me :kill:

 

Bear in mind one of those ships was Atlantic Conveyor, a civilian ship with no defence whatsoever. HMS Glamorgan was also hit but survived. Another Exocet was shot down by an RN's main gun but I can't remember which ship.

 

Personally I don't think sinking an unarmed merchantman and having the missile that hit Shefield's warhead failing to explode is that impressive a statement on the missiles. The skill and bravery of the Argentine pilots is beyond doubt. The importance and capabilities of Exocet tend to be a bit overstated though.

The Argentine's had more than 2 or 3 Exocet's BTW, they had quite a few of the ground launched variety too, it was just the air-launched ones that were in short supply.

 

True enough about the Atgentine pilots, although I saw a Sea Harrier pilot interviewed for a documentary, and he said that the Argentinians did things that the British pilots were told not to do the first day of training. I wish he'd specified what they did wrong, but time limits prevented this.