Will we witness another Falklands War ?

nicensleazy

As things are begining to hot up between Argentina and the UK about drilling for oil off the Falklands Islands, do you think Argentina will again take the military option? The UK has already sent a small task force of Royal Navy destroyers and subs to the region. Whilst the UK is playing down the situation, could we see another 1982?

Pokerface

Doubt it. Can't afford it. Wars ain't cheap.

shockedsoshocked

When I applied for the Royal Marines (4 years ago now!) we were told there'd be 3 places in the future we'd be fighting. Iraq, Afghanistan, and and more than likely the Falklands. The Armed Forces seem to have been aware of the situation for a good few years.

As for wars not being cheap, you have to consider paying for a war vs losing revenue from oil/gas.

Slapshot

There are more forces in the Falklands now than at any time since 1989, my first trip south, 91 that had dropped by 30% but it's now back up. Full flight of Tornados, early warning radar that covers as far a Chile, naval presence that would have stopped the Argentinians last time. I don't think it's a foregone conclusion but I wouldn't be surprised if there was another scrap.

softlad

We can't afford it - and the Argentinians certainly can't afford it. Their air force is still using largely the same hardware it operated in 1982...

verylonglegs

I don't think the Argentinians could really afford it last time either but it didn't stop them. There are plenty of books about saying wars will be fought over such energy resources in the future and you could argue that about past wars anyway.

Buckled_Rims

The Argies have probably heard we are over extended, in huge debt and that 20% of our soldiers are unfit so I wouldn't bet they'd have a test of our resource.

I'm totally against the Afghanistan war, but the Falklands is part of Britain and I would support it's protection.

pedylan

Neither the UK nor Argentina declared war on each other in 1982 so technically there wasn't a Falklands war. It was described at the time, if I remember rightly as the Falklands Conflict. So we can't have another war.

Didn't stop it killing nearly 1000 armed services personnel though.

The Argentine Junta invaded partly due to strong and historic Argentine public feeling about the Malvenas and as a diversion to horrificv domestic conditions. UK screwed up by withdrawing support vessels and generally sending the wrong messages in the months before invasion.

Same set of basket case justifications could endear themselves to Argentine leaders in difficulty anytime in the future.

tlw1

it would help the steal industry if we have to build more ships!

pedylan

matthew h wrote:

it would help the steal industry if we have to build more ships!

Are we going to war with a knock off navy?

spen666

matthew h wrote:

it would help the steal industry if we have to build more ships!

Is that based in Liverpool?

Mr_Cellophane

matthew h wrote:

it would help the steal industry if we have to build more ships!

If only we had any shipyards left.

tlw1

:oops:

six hours cycling and too much beer!

freehub

Who would win, Argentina or the UK? There's only one way to find out.....

deptfordmarmoset

matthew h wrote:

:oops:

six hours cycling and too much beer!

Faultless explanation!

softlad

matthew h wrote:

six hours cycling and too much beer!

you drink beer while you're cycling..?

nolf

freehub wrote:

Who would win, Argentina or the UK? There's only one way to find out.....

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!

Also I would bet a fairly substantial sum of money that the UK would wipe the floor with them.

Fighting defensively, from strength, with newer equipment, with (hopefully) political backing esuring we would see it through.

Also internationally I would have thought we would have the upper hand.

Jez mon

Aren't our armed forces overstretched as it is?

Aggieboy

Apparently, Argentina have WMD's. There, that should seal it!!

Buckled_Rims

Aggieboy wrote:

Apparently, Argentina have WMD's. There, that should seal it!!

But only if they can operate them within 45 minutes!

Aggieboy

Buckled_Rims wrote:

Aggieboy wrote:

Apparently, Argentina have WMD's. There, that should seal it!!

But only if they can operate them within 45 minutes!

I'll go and check with Dr Kelly. Oh, wait a minute...................

Lagavulin

Aggieboy wrote:

Apparently, Argentina have WMD's. There, that should seal it!!

Do they have oil? Otherwise it's a wasted trip.

We've only got one Vulcan (or has its certificate of airworthiness been revoked too?) if anyone fancies bombing Port Stanley's runway. That's if it doesn’t clash with an air show.

Aren't our armed forces overstretched as it is?

Does the army need to form a huddle to watch Trident D5s smash into South America? :twisted:

Fighting defensively, from strength, with newer equipment, with (hopefully) political backing ensuring we would see it through.

That didn't seem to work the last time as I remember (I was minus 1 at the time mind). The U.S government of the time gave us f**k all support. We had to beg the French and Aerospatiale, from what I've read, to stop supplying Argentina with their Exocets.
Anyone know how many Argentina have now? I'd be bet they have more anti-ship missiles than we have Royal Navy surface ships nowadays.

Have the Argentineans really stood still. Do we think we could maintain combat air patrols and air superiority with a handful of Harrier GR.9s?

Not to be pessimistic or anything but, with troops committed in numbers around the world, I figure now would be as good a time as any to test our government’s resilience to hold the Falklands.

Ollieda

Didn't the "defence" fail last time as there was only a small number (platoon or company) of marines based there and they were ordered to stand down as we were trying to play down the situation at first.

Might be wrong, I wasn't around at the time either!

Eau Rouge

Mr_Cellophane wrote:

If only we had any shipyards left.

Britian does, this is the Navy's biggest problem. The government uses the Navy budget to prop up the BAE Systems shipyards by ordering lower grade ships from them at premium prices. If they Navy were allowed to spend it's acquisition budget in the open market it would be a more potent force for less cost.

Militarily this would be a good time to think about invasion. HMS Illustrious is out-of-action being refit in Fife, for the next year and a half at least. That just leaves HMS Ark Royal, who could well be on duty elsewhere and unable to be diverted on too short notice. Her aircraft, long-in-the-tooth Harriers are essentially all flown by the RAF now anyway, and the RAF don't much like the idea of the Navy playing with planes. HMS Ocean, despite sharing the same basic hull, can only handle helicopters.
Both the current two and the two planned aircraft carriers actually don't have much in the way of ship-board defence systems. They rely on Destroyers for that. The Type 42's are past their best now, but the two new Type 45's, £1bn each, don't actually have any anti-aircraft/missile systems. They will have, it's just the weapons don't actually work yet, and probably won't be working and installed for months at least. For other navies this would be less of an issue, their AWACS coupled with the ships fighters being adequate. The Navy, alas, is forced to use helicopter-based AWACS, and they don't fly as high as fixed-wing options, and so don't see as far, and so aren't as good, especially if they only have a bunch of Harriers to guide anyway. This was the exact problem faced in 1982, and even the new carriers won't address it, because the catapult launchers needed to support fixed wing AWACS costs too much, despite the carriers themselves being designed to allow them to switch to it later.
So the new destroyers can' really do any more than act as dummy targets, which leaves the remaining Type 42's that haven't been taken out of service, all 5 of them. Might there be a window when the 42's are gone but before the 45's weapons are working? That would not be good for the Navy, leaving HMS Ark Royal very vunerable.
There are very good RADAR stations on the Falklands of course, but if you need them it's because the Argentinians have invaded and you can't actually use them.

On the other side, the Argentinians don't have a Capital Ship, just Destroyers and Frigates. The 4 destroyers are more "big frigates", and not much younger than the 42's. There are 6 frigates and 3 Corvettes, All 13 ships carry Exocets. Their Air Force though, doesn't seem to be as potent.

Nearly 30 years later, yet this Falklands War might well be fought with basically the same hardware as the last one. :shock:

(this is what Wikipedia and the Register tells me anyway. I don't know any better)

Anonymous

nolf wrote:

freehub wrote:

Who would win, Argentina or the UK? There's only one way to find out.....

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!

Also I would bet a fairly substantial sum of money that the UK would wipe the floor with them.

Fighting defensively, from strength, with newer equipment, with (hopefully) political backing esuring we would see it through.

Also internationally I would have thought we would have the upper hand.

I take it, from your post you are joining up then ?

blackpanther

freehub wrote:

Who would win, Argentina or the UK? There's only one way to find out.....

not funny you c ock

northernneil

i'd be surprised if Argentina's population had much of an appetite for a fight, they were humiliated quite badly in 82' when we had been caught unaware both in terms of defensive cover for the island and the surprise nature of the attack.

This time we are a) have the islands much better defeded b) much better intel and satellite cover giving us plenty of time (ish) to act.

The last time it directly affected the argentine economy badly which in turn led it to total collapse only 7 years later devastating the population again.

If they were dumb enough it would only be for energy sources and led by military biased politicians, I dont think the people of Argentina would themselves back such a move given the odds.

blackpanther

nolf wrote:

freehub wrote:

Who would win, Argentina or the UK? There's only one way to find out.....

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!

Also I would bet a fairly substantial sum of money that the UK would wipe the floor with them.

Fighting defensively, from strength, with newer equipment, with (hopefully) political backing esuring we would see it through.

Also internationally I would have thought we would have the upper hand.

COme on Nolf, go and collect Feehub and get joined up, youll love it, freezing weather, people trying very hard to kill you (and its real not just a ps3 game) if your lucky, youll get off a transport ship thats just been hit, if yoiure even luckier youll do it without coming into contact with melting steel.

GavH

Lagavulin wrote:

The U.S government of the time gave us f**k all support. We had to beg the French and Aerospatiale, from what I've read, to stop supplying Argentina with their Exocets.

That's not actually correct. The Regan administration (with the late Al Haig) of the time offered us one of their carriers and when Thatcher refused that, they gave us a shed load of Sidewinder missiles for the Harriers instead. That was fairly crucial. As for begging the French and Aerospatiale, that didn't actually work. MI5 had to buy as many of the Exocets known to be on the open market as they couldto prevent Argentina getting them.

The whole thing is posturing, nothing more. The Type 42 was given its orders to sail over a month ago for a whole different strategic reason so it's hardly a response to anything The Sun has said. The Argentine Navy is in no fit state to fight and certainly wouldn't last two minutes against our Sub fleet if it did sail for position around the Islands. In addition, the sub launched TLAMs that we didn't have in 82 now give us a precision strike capability that the Argies could do very little if anything about. In short, the Argentines can never lose face by giving up their claim to the Islands so every now and again they make a bit of noise to keep that claim fresh. I personally do not think I shall be deploying back to the Islands any time soon and nor shall anyone else beyond the RIC and others already there anyway.

Frank the tank

We have a nuclear "deterent" appearently :roll:

What's the point if others ignore it and we're not prepared to use it?

Just send the message any agression against the falklands or any British interests in the south atlantic by the Argentine forces and Beunos Aires get's one.

Should just about sort it.

nolf

blackpanther wrote:

nolf wrote:

freehub wrote:

Who would win, Argentina or the UK? There's only one way to find out.....

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!

Also I would bet a fairly substantial sum of money that the UK would wipe the floor with them.

Fighting defensively, from strength, with newer equipment, with (hopefully) political backing esuring we would see it through.

Also internationally I would have thought we would have the upper hand.

COme on Nolf, go and collect Feehub and get joined up, youll love it, freezing weather, people trying very hard to kill you (and its real not just a ps3 game) if your lucky, youll get off a transport ship thats just been hit, if yoiure even luckier youll do it without coming into contact with melting steel.

Pfft I know its not like a ps3 game.
Thats why i've been practising on Counter Strike and Goldeneye (N64), as I think they're a more realistic depiction of combat situations.

OMG, like the other day, I was like totally pwning this n00b with my ak, and he was like "OH NOES!" and I was like "suck it fagz rofl!". It was awesome.