welcome to the board you disrespectful twat!

A really really ugly disrespectful tw@t!!!!

What's the slut been upto now????

Please don't say she's apologised about the Falklands....it wouldn't surprise me with this Government!!!!

ugly venomous fuckin cow

Whats she done now, the caravan dwelling dingbat?

Apologised to Argentina for their losses in the Falklands.

This Fecking Country!!!!



We'll be apologising to the Germans next!!!!

And all this while we are fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan!!!!

NOT ON MY F***KING BEHALF!

There is hell on in the members area of the Falklands veterans site.

Can't non-members read the board????

Half of it. You can't see the other bits, its a sort of inner sanctum.

What's one of them????

Inner sanctum = area for privileged members.

And even though I wasn't alive for the Falklands, I certainly don't apologise for my country killing those who invaded what was ours.

Ohh right!!!!

I remember it very well cos it was the year that QPR got to the FA Cup Final v Spurs and there was a bit of a ding dong about Ricky Villa and Ardiles playing!!!!
In the end neither of them played but Ossie wanted to but Ricky didn't!!!!

I'm gonna' try and find the full story on it....I remember it but I was only 9 so I didn't understand all the politics about it!!!!

I did a lot of reading on it after I met a couple of veterans at University who are mature students, as well as a fella at the council. Some of the stories they told me were unbelievable.

The falklands...... a pointless war instigated by a Prime Minister needing friends.

Cant see the harm in apologising, i'm sure the Argies have done the same and the sinking of the Belgrano was a foooking disgrace!

So say the French invaded Jersey or the Spanish invaded Gibraltar....it would be pointless going to war trying to get them back????

"'continuing regret' for the loss of life on both sides during the conflict. "

Whatever way you paint it John, that is tantamount to an apology. I don't hear any noises of 'regret' coming from the Casa Rosada in Buenos Aires. She is implying that the whole was was 'regrettable' for both sides as if both sides were to blame.

Had she followed it up by saying that the deaths were ultimately due to Argentina's illegal occupation of the islands then it would be a little more palatable.

war
what is it good for?

I'm sure the residents of the Falkland Islands do not share your sentiments. For them the War achieved a lot!

Wasn't there quite a lot of evidence that it could all have been resolved by diplomacy, but that Thatcher chose not to do it that way? She always was very good with policies where other people suffered consequences she didn't herself

Absolutely none. Diplomacy had been tried by Haig who shuttled between Argentina and London, Galtieri and Anaya took the piss out of him. Besides, who would have resolved it, the UN? Sorry but Galtieri had already ignored resolution 502 which order Argentina to leave immediately. The Argentines would still be there today had they not have been forced to leave.

Removing dictators. Booting out armed agressors.

... and thats why the Americans sent their foreign secretary all over the place trying to negotiate a settlement?

Its easy to paint a slant on these things tweny five years later but at the time the Junta in Argentina knew it would be thrown out of power unless it made some dramatic gesture and this was it. There was no way they were ever going to back down.

Whether it could have been avoided by placing a few more Marines and Ships in the area is a differnt question but there is no way diplomacy would have stopped the invasion!

A few more marines wouldn't have helped, you would have needed a brigade. A few more submarines would have been a better idea like Callahan did in 76.

It really boils my blood when people talk about diplomacy and negotiations as if we were dealing with reasonable people. Honestly, I could tell you stories of Argentine abuse in the Falkland Islands that would bring tears to your eyes. Read this and then judge what kind of people we were dealing with and the danger that the Islanders were in.

http://www.yendor.com/vanished/junta.html

Astiz was a typical latin coward, strong with the weak and weak with the strong. He threw his hands in the air before a shot had been fired. Geneva convention on not, he should have been handed over to the Swedes or the French.

If anyone has seen the excellent 'dirty War' film 'Imagining Argentina' then you might recognise Astiz who is portayed as the young naval officer who tortures the women in the disused warehouse.

Doing some reading on Wikipedia, there had been diplomatic talks going on for a long time (like since the 50s) about the Falklands, Argentina has always argued they should have them and has consistently said so for about 200 years. The main reason it escalated when it did was (as Mr I has pointed out) Galtieri and the rest of the Junta could see the writing on the wall and thought taking the Falklands would be a good way of tapping into Argentinian Patriotism and saving their skins. The big mistake they seem to have made on the invasion was thinking that the UK wouldn't go to war to get them back.....

What I think I remember (will have to look it up) is that Haig DID achieve some sort of climb down by the Argies, once they realised the task force was really about to set off. There was a reported incident that he'd sent a message to Thatcher to this effect and the message had 'gone astray'. And of course the war suited Maggie, politically

Mr I, I don't support S American dictators in any form, but no politician ever suggests going to war on moral grounds like civil rights, which in my view would be more justifiable than most reasons for going off to fight.

The last thing I want is to argue with you or anyone else who gets caught up in war politics and, in many cases, has to live with the scars afterwards

What about the 'civil rights' of the islanders...?

But what I'm questioning is whether Mrs Thatcher ever cared about anyone's civil rights.....she certainly didn't in her home policies.... and therefore was that the real reason for her going to war? (or rather for her sending other people to war).

She didn't care about the civil rights of the returning service people either. They'd served their purpose and could sod off, whatever the damage was. So why would she care about the Falklanders?

I think you are referring to the Peruvian inititive. This essentially called for the British fleet to stop heading south and the British and Argentine governments to get round the table.

It was a red herring. Peru were a close ally of Argentina. All this inititive would have achieved would (because it did not remove a single Argentine boot) was to allow the winter to set in thus making recover almost impossible.

This war was about civil rights, the civil rights of the British people to live a peaceful existance without having a murderous dictatorship invading them. It was about the civil rights not to be terrorised, about the civil right not to have your door kicked in and a gun put in the mouth of your toddler as a threat to you. Whatever you might think of Thatchers internal politics, no-one cany deny that she was fiercely patroitic. This along with the rule of international law was what motivated her not any bolox about oil or elections - they were incidental (and at the time very much theoretical by the way).

Despite what I seen down there I do genuinely believe that this is was a just was, fought for the right reasons. That is why the entire country was behind it. It's also the last time we went to war to remove an invader. These days we tend to be the invader.

Yes, it was the Peruvians....I was just about to do a bit of copy and pasting when I saw you'd already posted.

I think you fought the war on a civil rights issue, Mr I, I don't believe Mrs Thatcher did, or that she cared about civil rights at all. Surely patriotism had nothing to do with civil rights?

Also, there were many incidents during her 'reign' that indicated she cared nothing for international law, or for any law at all(as witness, her promotion of her son's business interests, without any moral scruple whatsoever.)
And, I feel it's not quite right to say the entire country was behind her as regards the Falklands War

Other than Tony Benn and the tedious Tam Dalyell, I can't remember any detractors. Even Michael Foot supported Mrs Thatcher on this one.

But you didn't know me then

I'm no Maggie fan...but I don't have a fit when she appears either... but I suspect that if she tried to rescue Peter Pan and a bus load of blind nuns from the Devil, there'd be someone with a 'theory' about her intentions

BOLLOX

If we applied the same PC rules we've been applying to war reporting since the Falklands we'd be apologising for the Battle of Britain... The whole Belgrano thing is a prime example...an enemy cruiser in a war zone is a target. It's course is irrelevant, any vessel can change its course in minutes, that I can vouch for.

Mr I
time for your memoirs i think
please
would make good copy

I agree.....and someone is sometimes correct

Had that ship made it to Stanley harbour - which is where it was going, we would definitely, not maybe or probably, definitely, have lost the war.

That ship had massive firepower and could have sat there in the harbour pounding our land troops to oblivion with its 15 x massive 6 inch guns, each with a range of around 20 miles. We would not even have got close to Stanley. Two of her five banks of guns are shown here:


Incidentally, in a previous life the ship was called USS Pheonix and had survived Pearl Harbor.

Technically the General Belgrano was an obsolete bag o shite that was not going to be allowed to get any where near Stanley and was sunk at the first opportunity. It looked impressive both visually and on paper, but it was an outdated irrelevance. The sinking of the vessel was justifiable, but more importantly it sent our a very clear signal to the Argentinians that nuclear 'powered' submarines (as opposed to armed) were operating in the area and that the Argentinian naval involvement was now effectively over, which it was after this and the aircraft carrier Vincento d mayo remained in port after that. It wasn't just the sinking of a ship, it was the point at which the Argentinians were shown the consequences and pegged back, it's political impact was greater than its military impact.

i was just gonna say that!

been on war watch on the old satelite and saw something re naval battles with my favourite ships captain on there Sam Salt.

Snowy, I don't often argue with you but 15 x 6 inch guns will never be obsolete. You are speaking from a matlot's perspective where I am talking as a soldier. That cruiser alone outgunned every artillery piece on the islands and every gun on board any of our ships. Had it have been stationed in Stanley harbour, it would have shot us to shit.

The point I'm making is, that a 6" gun is only effective when it gets within range, it was never gonna get within range of anything in reality because the navy wasn't gonna let it .... FACT.

NOWADAYS...the navy would be expected to give the Argies counselling while human resources arbitrators were airlifted out to the location along with a crack unit of outreach co-ordinators to find a common ground.....

Spot on....and Like Mr.Katcha....I was just gonn....!!!!

Very true, but back to the point I was making. Had then placed the cruiser in the harbour at the point of invasion or had it have got through..........

Hence it was sunk.


Mind you I guess SB or the Navy divers could have stuck something on it.

The 'mighty' Belgrano was a bit of pure theatrics...it was also a training vessel and had a large percentage of conscript 'sailors' in its crew...it was the latin naval equivalent of a posing pouch. As for mooring it in Stanley, it would have had to have been there from day one and become a target for air strikes as a priority.

On a lighter note, I hope Pools never get drawn away to Port Stanley in the first round of the Cup!!!

PS Wasn't there a French team that once had to play in the south Pacific against a French Colonial island, which had been allowed to enter the French Cup?? Or am I imagining this??

I know Madeira play in the Portuguese league halfway across the Atlantic, and Tenerife are in the Spanish League, so it's not a new concept!!!