Ok, let say I accept the explanation of BDL.
I only hope that the “merciless killing” is just an insulated incident of the war and the shooting down of unhealty prisoners were not the rule in the British Army.
Before taking the moral high ground, it’s wise to make sure that you’re not just exposing yourself to withering fire.
It’s all very well making clever comments about ‘merciless killing’ and ‘unhealthy prisoners’, but the problem for you is that your country killed its own soldiers in true ‘merciless killings’ and showed no sign of mercy to them, and made them decidedly unhealthy. If shooting unhealthy Argentinians was British practice, there’d be a lot more dead Argentines for you to complain about.
"From around 100 former troops who still live in Corrientes, the government collected a total of 10 hours of videotaped testimony. A 200-page report was also produced, containing accounts of different kinds of torture and even cases of murder, and identifying both the victims and the aggressors.
One of the cases of abuse is that of Juan de la Cruz Martins, who weighed 62 kgs when he went to the Malvinas/Falklands and came back weighing just 29 kgs.
In the report, Martins says he was mistreated by a Lieutenant Baroni, and reports the death of one of his fellow soldiers.
Another person to speak out was Oscar Núñez, who told of a blow to his ribs from an officer with the last name Malacalza. He said that the blow and an eight-hour stake-out was the punishment he suffered for stealing a sheep to eat after watching conscript Secundino Riquelme starve to death.
Germán Navarro testified having seen a Corporal Cabrera kill one of his subordinates with a burst of machine-gun fire, after an argument with him.
“It’s a complicated issue because in war, international humanitarian law protects combatants against abuse by the enemy, but there aren’t any laws against systematic abuse of soldiers by officers of their own side,” Vassel said.
…
“We are the last collective victims of the dictatorship,” Orlando Pascua of the Centre of Former Combatants from Corrientes told IPS. He, too, went to Tierra del Fuego to file the lawsuit. The veteran told how he had seen a navy officer order the stake-out of a conscript for an alleged lapse of discipline.
This punishment consisted of tying down the “prisoner” stretched out on the ground with stakes. Sometimes the victim would be naked, and at other times covered with a blanket. He would be left there for eight hours or more in the middle of the southern hemisphere winter, at the mercy of the islands’ low temperatures, strong winds, snow, and enemy fire.
“One soldier was staked out on the mainland, before the troops embarked for the Malvinas, for arriving late at the line-up, which shows that it must have been a very clear operational instruction,” Vassel said. “That’s why we say that the dictatorship treated soldiers in the Malvinas the same as civilians on the mainland.”
According to human rights organisations, the abuses visited on civilians during the military regime included 30,000 forced disappearances of political prisoners who had been held in 500 clandestine torture centres around the country.
Pascua pointed out that among the officers who abused their own troops, some are also accused of crimes against humanity involving civilians. They include Captain Julio Binotti, former Colonel Horacio Losito, former navy captains Alfredo Astiz and Antonio Pernías, and former General Mario Benjamín Menéndez.
The statements all agree that the vast majority of the soldiers were hungry and cold. “Conscripts who were doing their military service in the southernmost provinces, with the coldest climates, had adequate clothing, but those who came from the north of the country, where it is much hotter, went to war with the same clothes they used all year round at home,” Pascua said.
Likewise, food was short or unavailable for the troops in the trenches. In fact, most of the disciplinary punishments were meted out to conscripts for stealing food or sheep in order to survive. In the worst cases, soldiers actually starved to death.
“What is most abhorrent and appalling is that this was like a planned extermination, because the Rattenbach Report (produced by a military commission presided over by an officer of that name, which investigated the conduct of the armed forces during the war) showed that the invasion was planned over a period of a year and a half,” Pascua said.
“This proves that there was no improvisation involved. That’s why we are calling them crimes against humanity,” the former combatant said. "
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=37337
See if you can find any evidence of similar treatment of troops in the British, or any other English-speaking, army.
If you can’t, you’re in no position to criticise a British soldier for doing a mortally wounded Argentinian a most unpleasant but necessary favour.
Do not make us laugh mate:)
There a lot of cases of brutal treatment of young soldiers in the Britis or any other Englis-speaking army.
http://www.inforos.ru/?id=4919
British parliamentarians insist on the creation of the independent commission for the investigation of abuses in the armed forces. Statements about this were sounded in the course of the session of parliamentary committee on defense, which in straight ether was transmitted on the British television.
The need for the study of this problem arose in connection with the numerous complaints about the mockeries above the recruits in the British army, and also with the results of investigation about the sexual solicitations of senior soldiers to the young.
Furthermore, in a number of the military garrisons VS of Great Britain were recently registered several deaths of young soldiers.
" last years were undertaken effort in order not to leave unpunished similar cases, but mockeries continue, and about them they will quiet until changes the overall level of “- it was said at the session of the committee.
" In armed forces, and especially in ground forces, is similar, they do not understand, until now, that the hierarchy established there leads to the continuation of abuse” - noted one of the parliamentarians.
For this very reason at the session of the committee it was proposed to create the independent commission for complaints of the abuses in the army. Besides this, the parliamentarians propose to increase the minimum age of recruits in the British armed forces from 16 of up to 18 years
http://www.newsru.com/world/05apr2006/dedib.html
the 17 years recruit of Americ Hayer described that two months of mockeries in the British army did end for it by brutal slaughter from the side of corporal, 25- years Lee Orgile, as a result of which it nearly became blind. Child abuse occurred in the last day of the study of the basic course of instruction on the base of Ketterik in North Yorkshire. Hayer, whose father on the nationality Hindu, described that the corporal thrashed by his feet and pressed to it head. As a result he obtained the cut of century and the gap of lacrimal duct, it reports
And now a some for the fun
http://www.mk.ru/blogs/idmk/2005/11/29/mk-daily/65535/
“ritual mockeries above our young marines” - under this title left the British publication “World news”, which published personnel of the ritual of “dedication” in marines. Video was taken secretly by one of the participants in deystva during May on the base of elite subdivision “42 commando” in the barracks near Plimouth.
Person, who removed these personnel, smelled to powder in Afghanistan and Iraq, but even the seen forms veteran struck the actions of “brothers on the weapon”
. Young recruits the old-timers (one it dressed for a joke in the blue dressing gown of surgeon and other into the form of schoolgirl) forced to arrange a kind of the gladiatorial combat between themselves - in the naked form. The rolled up from the mats tubes, put on to the hands of naked soldiers, served as the instrument of battle.
That of the participants in the duel, who did not maintain battle even it fell, “grandfathers” thrashed.
One of the recruits hardly remained living after these mockeries. However, to slaughter elder “comrades” did not limit, from the recruits of real men. Recruts made it necessary to swallow, without chewing, boiled eggs and the large pieces of meat, to the “causal places” they joined electrodes, they forced youngs to jump from the windows of the second floor. Similar traditional entertainments in the troops are named Sprog Olympics
A similar practice is not something from a number by there emerging for the armed forces of the United Kingdom. In the past year the government, perturbed by an increase in the harassment in the troops, even was ordered to direct into the subdivisions, where serve recruits, independent inspections. This was after in one of prepeared base in the county of Surrey perished several recruits.
If such things are created in Great Britain itself, it is easy to visualize which occurs in the garrisons, scattered on the different corners of peace, removed from Britain.
Several years ago into the metropole brought whole group of injured soldiers, who served on the the Falkland islands- it was “work” of theirs own colleagues. Then under the tribunal burn several ten instigators of slaughter house. In THE MEDIA the information about the harassment in the British parts, which carry service in Iraq, also repeatedly appeared.
I’m always amazing of the british feeling of humore;)
The surgeon and schoolgirl, Sprog Olympic… ha ha ha.That’s a nice;)
So my friend indeed the army harrasment exist in any English-speaking army ( as and any army in the world).
And this is a qiute common situation in a piace time.
Cheers.
@Chevan. Whilst there may be a problem of bullying in the British Army, its a problem that has been openly discussed in the free press and they’re doing something about it. Its also the case that the problems are not endemic and much of what you’re quoting is taken out of context.
In the Falklands, the Argentine army treated its conscripts appallingly. The brutal punishments that were handed out bear no relation to anything referred to above. And this was an Army that was responsible for the murder of 35,000 of its own citizens.
@Panzerknacker. Your remarks about the British Army were insulting and foolish. Your prisoners were treated well, when it came to medical treatment casualties were treated according to need not nationality. Commander Rick Jolly was decorated by both sides for his humanity.
Also, since you claim there was no Argentine “war crimes”, the detention of 115 civilians in cramped conditions, with no separate accommodation for woman, no attempt to provide protection against stray fire, in accommodation that was not marked. Use of search lights mounted on a hospital ship. Stacking ammunition amongst civilian shelters. Deportation of civilians. Mock executions.
All against the Geneva convention, all committed by Argentine soldiers.
I dont know if you noted but this topic had a question mark, since I am not sure if was actually war crimes. That is the idea to investigate about.
@Panzerknacker. Your remarks about the British Army were insulting and foolish.
What remarks ? BDL almost convinced me, the only thing who is left is the Bramley claims about the executions of prisoners.
But this is foolish, the 35 000 dead figure you ve posted when actually were 9800 desapeared and killed in the dirty war, and a important number were not civilians but guerrilla fighters.
If somebody want to talk about the dirty war in Argentina there is a topic in off-topic militaria.
Any post starting from now wich try to derail the original Topic on this thread with the desaparecidos questions will moved there, If SS Tiger is not available I will move myself.
So, given that context and your OP, is this a thread about alleged war crimes in the Falklands, or just alleged war crimes by the British in the Falklands?
Well Lone Ranger.
True althou this problem openly discussed but as it was mentioned in comitete report above - the situation is not improving.
BTW there are only a few cases of harrasement that actually come up to the surface in Media. As we could think the real situation is more worst.
And this is IN PEACE time ,independently of context;)
In the Falklands, the Argentine army treated its conscripts appallingly. The brutal punishments that were handed out bear no relation to anything referred to above. And this was an Army that was responsible for the murder of 35,000 of its own citizens.
.
Excuse me by why need you to increase the victims of WAR in several times?To present the Argentinian army is the herd of monsters and killers?
Cheers.
Interesting how he is steering well clear of the following:
Unmarked minefields laid by the Argentines
misuse of the Red Cross symbol to disguise an ammunition dump
use of unmarked civilian vehicles at Goose Green
placing of potential targets in built-up areas
use of searchlights on a hospital ship
mistreatment of the civilian population (albeit mild in comparison to e.g. World War II)
These are all war crimes, and are proven facts. Strange how he concentrates on allegations which were later investigated under the watchful eye of the press and proved wrong. But, I guess, if he believes it to be true, then it must be!
@Panzerknacker. Interesting, most human rights organisation put the figures of the number of people murdered much, much higher. For example on Wikipedia the figure quoted is 30,000.
In 1976, one of the generals predicted, “We are going to have to kill 50,000 people: 25,000 subversives, 20,000 sympathizers, and we will make 5,000 mistakes.” The National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons (CONADEP) researched and recorded, case by case, the “disappearance” of about 9,000 persons, though it was made clear that many more could exist; today, the most commonly accepted estimate by human rights organizations places the number at 30,000.
I only post this because you’ve disputed the figures I quoted. I believe I’m entitled to a riposte, removing this would be an abuse of Moderator powers.
Now the figures I quote from are from organisations independent of both Argentina and the UK. Why would you only be prepared to accept “official” figures posted by the Argentine Government? Also interesting was the way you provided the excuse that most were guerillas. Does that make the murder of innocent civilians for having the wrong politics acceptable?
Now, returning to the topic, since you claimed there were no Argentine war crimes in the Falklands would you care to address the points put to you.
@Chevan. Two points.
-
I addressed your allegations putting them into context. There has been a problem of bullying in the British Army, its being dealt with. Now for some reason you’ve introduced this as a counterpoint to Argentine army abuse of its own soldiers in the Falklands. Does this mean that you view it as somehow acceptable?
-
I’ve never claimed all of the Argentine Army were thugs and killers. I’ve acknowledged on other threads that many behaved with basic human decency. So given that I already have a track record here of recognising that why do you seek to take this down a rabbit hole?
Panzerknacker
As they all raise specific issues directly relevant to war crimes in the Falklands War, could you let us have your responses to posts #24, 28, 29, & 30?
As there is in many armies. Not least yours, although generally they don’t speak English :D.
Some apparently brutal treatment is no more than very harsh but appropriate and good training which has to be done to make good soldiers and to weed out those not suitable for some units. Some people may be hurt, physically or mentally, in that process. This is most unfortunate but it is not the purpose of the exercise. Some brutal treatment is just very bad behaviour and bullying of no training or military value which should be stopped and the offenders punished.
However, if you go back to my quoted piece about the Argentines, it was to do with things like staking out their soldiers naked in freezing temperatures and starving and shooting their own soldiers to death.
I’m not aware of any English-speaking army doing this, or condoning it, in training, barracks or the field at the time of or since the Falklands War.
The points you made about problems in the British army don’t equate to such conduct. Some of them just reflect the inability of many soft and cuddly civilians to appreciate the realities of how armies need to train men to endure war and to kill in defence of the civilians who get all prissy about nasty men being toughened up to protect them. Being the same soft and cuddly civilians who will get all nasty about deficiencies in training if their army gets rolled and the enemy ends up on the civilians’ doorsteps.
Unless you can find evidence of English-speaking armies starving and shooting their soldiers to death in the field in that era (and I very much doubt it as I served in one of them a dozen years earlier where we were trained for a shooting war and punishments could be severe but, unless the soldier had some very rare and undiagnosed medical condition, not life-threatening), they have different standards to those applied by the Argentinian army in the Falklands.
Comparing naked rollmat wrestling to starving and shooting conscripts is a bit of a trite comparison, no?
Go to the QM and return your “straws, for the grasping at, L35” immediately. 
One would think so, but in Argentina there has been a bit of confusion due to a translation problem They do naked rollmops wrestling. 
Which just confirms suspicions about there being something fishy about the Argentinian position in this thread.
Panzerknacker
I fail to see why my post questioning your inconsistent positions on the mercy killing of a wounded Argentinian and the killing of 9,800 of your countrymen by your army is now post #44 in the Los Desaparecidos thread.
My post was squarely on topic in this thread and responded to your post #25 where you chose to question the number killed in the Dirty War.
My post was not dealing with the Dirty War or the disappeared but with the inconsistency of your positions expressed in this thread. For that reason it should have stayed here.
If you’re going to be consistent with moving my post, you should move your #25 to the Los Desaparecidos thread. Then nobody reading this thread will have any idea what subsequent posts responding to it are about. Just like nobody reading my post that you moved to the other thread will have any idea why it is suddenly talking about issues which have nothing to do with that thread and which were not raised in it.
By deleting my post you have altered the post numbers so that my post #30 now asks for a response to a question in post #30, which does not raise any question because #30 originally was the post which is now #44 in the LD thread.
I don’t mind looking like an idiot when I do it myself, but I object to having my posts moved into irrelevant threads by somebody else to make me look like an idiot.
Sorry man but I will not allow the poisoning of this thread mixing up the two topics , I you think I am out of line moving your post you can send a complain to Gen.Sandworm or WW2admin.
Any other complain about this subject please by Private message to the names above.
I think they’ve probably got better things to do than sort out minor squabbles.
I’ve made my point.
You’ve made yours.
That’s the end of it.
Others can judge which of us has more merit in our position.
And what is the “independent human right organisations” and who do sponsor them?How do you think? And why those the “most of himan right organisations” keep the silence about violence above the civils during recent attack of Lebanon and the in the Iraq?
And when has the Wiki been the “reliable source”?
@Chevan. Two points.
- I addressed your allegations putting them into context. There has been a problem of bullying in the British Army, its being dealt with. Now for some reason you’ve introduced this as a counterpoint to Argentine army abuse of its own soldiers in the Falklands. Does this mean that you view it as somehow acceptable?
This is not the conterpoint for the critic of the Argentinian policy.This is just my respons to the Rising Sun who clamed the any English-speaking army as a holy;)
Just kidding…
- I’ve never claimed all of the Argentine Army were thugs and killers. I’ve acknowledged on other threads that many behaved with basic human decency. So given that I already have a track record here of recognising that why do you seek to take this down a rabbit hole?
Indeed my point was not agains whole British Army too.
As i said the harrasment in Army is the bitch of all armies including Russian( and i know a some of worst cases too from my personal army experiece).
I just wish to notice you the problem of you one-side point toward the Argentinian gov.
The victims of dirty war is not only the single resault. You simply ignored the fact that the the Agrentinians had the right to save its own state from the civil war by the all of the methods ( although it was a brutal methods).
In fact in in the comparition with the possible victims of civil war in Argentine the 9800 “dissapeared” is not too much, believe me.
We clearly know it now when in the “democratic” Iraq perished MUCH MORE people every week then it was during the “brutal ruling of Saddam”.
So my point is the EVERY state has its own rights to protect its living interests despite of the possible victims.
From this prospect the Dirty war was not so dirty as it try to present in western media.
At least the Argentinians could save the own state from a desintegration and bloody civil war.
Cheers.
Hmmm… funny how the moderation buttons are jumped for whenever a discussion doesn’t go PK’s way…
Well i see the most amazing ( and cynical) justification of army harrasments;)
Its interesting what should say the human right organisaitions and parents of the young soldiers who lost the health of thrashings or got the damage of mental from the sexual harrasement of senior soldiers and officers.
What the parents of those kids must get as explanation- it was for them to be “good soldiers”.
From what aims the two idiots has dressed as surgeon and schoolgirl during this “procedure” - to make the good soldier and educate the “patriot of Britain” from those guys?
However, if you go back to my quoted piece about the Argentines, it was to do with things like staking out their soldiers naked in freezing temperatures and starving and shooting their own soldiers to death.
I’m not aware of any English-speaking army doing this, or condoning it, in training, barracks or the field at the time of or since the Falklands War.
Mate when the British army without any doubt shoted the traitors during the WW2 it was not the reason to call it as the crimes right? Coz this was the war FOR the fate of Britain.
So why if the Argentinians shoted its own traitors ( it not a fact they were innocent) you have a biased point?
The points you made about problems in the British army don’t equate to such conduct. Some of them just reflect the inability of many soft and cuddly civilians to appreciate the realities of how armies need to train men to endure war and to kill in defence of the civilians who get all prissy about nasty men being toughened up to protect them. Being the same soft and cuddly civilians who will get all nasty about deficiencies in training if their army gets rolled and the enemy ends up on the civilians’ doorsteps.
Unless you can find evidence of English-speaking armies starving and shooting their soldiers to death in the field in that era (and I very much doubt it as I served in one of them a dozen years earlier where we were trained for a shooting war and punishments could be severe but, unless the soldier had some very rare and undiagnosed medical condition, not life-threatening), they have different standards to those applied by the Argentinian army in the Falklands.
I/m not deny the Argentinian army had a different behavior in that period- but i think its wrong to compare the one of the best army in the World - the British army with the ancient traditions with relatively young Argentinians.
Thue this army is not standart for the imitation, but it has the right to be.Whatever does somebody like it or not.
Cheers.
I don’t condone anything that is not reasonably directed towards proper training aims or that inflicts unnecessary physical or mental distress on soldiers.
I haven’t said anything approving thrashing young soldiers; sexual harassment by seniors, officers or for that matter equals or subordinates; or anything that is not reasonably directed towards proper training objectives. Because I’m opposed to that in any service, and in particular in the Australian services where there have been several suicides and other deplorable and avoidable incidents caused by bad treatment of service people by individuals, groups and the military system as a whole.
But it has to be remembered always that armies are training people to kill and to endure war and battlefield conditions. It’s not like running discrimination sensitivity sessions in the public service to make sure that, for example, no fat sheilas get upset because they misconstrue a tub of butter accidentally left out of the tea room fridge as implied criticism of fat people.
Mate when the British army without any doubt shoted the traitors during the WW2 it was not the reason to call it as the crimes right? Coz this was the war FOR the fate of Britain.
So why if the Argentinians shoted its own traitors ( it not a fact they were innocent) you have a biased point?
I don’t recall anything in this thread about Argentinians shooting their own traitors. The only specific instance I gave was in post #22:
Germán Navarro testified having seen a Corporal Cabrera kill one of his subordinates with a burst of machine-gun fire, after an argument with him.
That’s just murder. As for what the British or anyone else did in WWII, it’s irrelevant as we’re talking about what happened in a different world in a different war in 1982.
I/m not deny the Argentinian army had a different behavior in that period- but i think its wrong to compare the one of the best army in the World - the British army with the ancient traditions with relatively young Argentinians.
Thue this army is not standart for the imitation, but it has the right to be.Whatever does somebody like it or not.
Cheers.
I disagree.
Panzerknacker constantly makes the point that Argentina owns the Falklands by ancient title. Argentina has been a republic for some 170 or so years. That’s a lot older than the various nations created and extinguished and altered in Europe over the same period. Germany didn’t even look like existing when Argentina declared its independence from Spain. Also, Argentina was occupied by Spain previously and derives its military traditions from Spain, which was a mature European monarchy at all relevant times, and a superpower for much of that time. Argentina is not a young country, nor are the sources of its military traditions young.
At the time of the Falklands war the Argentinian army was just different to Britain’s, in five main ways. First, the army was an extension of a military dictatorship. Second, the way their army treated their own civilians. Third, they way they treated their own soldiers. Fourth, they way they conducted the war. Fifth, the way they treated civilians in occupied territory.
But I’d better not get into any of those things or I might poison this thread, so I’ll just content myself with saying that armies run by military dictatorships have a rather worse history of misconduct compared with armies run by healthy democracies. The problem isn’t the army but the dictatorship which runs it, because a regime which doesn’t recognise or isn’t forced to recognise human rights for all will produce a military with the same attitude. Which is more likely to produce war crimes according to international standards which are routinely ignored by military dictatorships in their internal military activities.