My bold.
Sounds like someone has more than a passing acquaintance with the Role of the Inf.
That’s odd!..I thought it was the ‘Tars’ that had sunk it, not the ‘Tommies’? 
Wrong post ! 
Perhaps…but a good one!
Well, I know they play rugger - so you could be right!
Well, this topic has become too british for mi taste I stay away for a time :rolleyes:
Why not just lock the thread ?
panzerknacker wrote
Well, this topic has become too british for mi taste I stay away for a time
Does that mean you have no answers to the questions posed by this sinking or just a steadfast refusel to believe the facts that these questions bring to light?
ie. That Belgrano was a fair target and that Argentina had fair warning of the actions that would be taken if she was found to be interfereing with the task forces.
Her Capt was unaware of these rules, and for some inexplicable reason was sailing back towards the mainland as if on some pleasure cruise on a lake, rather than on a warship in what was shaping up to be a war, in the middle of an ever worsening South Atlantic.
Maintainence of the ship and training on board was lacking. The annual refit was cut short, and it is highly likely the crew were not up to the task of keeping such an old craft properly maintained at sea. The fact that she neeeded and annual service tells us much, very few other ships require 40 odd days a year alongside.
Her destroyers left her and her crew for dead. A communique sent by the British that the DDs could return to collect the survivors was not acted upon, and then stupid reasons of the DDs were too far away or the sea was wet were given to explain the time taken to rescue the survivors. (Actual reason was that the sea was too rough for rescue ops).
This was the first taste the Argentines had had, of modern war. And it was a bitter pill to swallow after the joy and jubilatoin of the invasion of the Falklands… and for the Junta it was the first indication that the British were not sticking to the plan they had devised.
The fun part, for the Argetnines, was over.
Nah, that’d be too sophisticated for me.
I thought the role of the ground huggers was to protect armour which was protecting artillery which was protecting the cooks who were fighting the service corps to get the food to feed the ground huggers which the depot staff had been stealing to sell to the occupied civilians, far from the sound of gun fire. :evil:
Having come in late, I’ve read this thread from the start and have formed these opinions on the basis of those comments and wider history.
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The Belgrano had significance for Argentinians far beyond its naval capacity.
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The sinking of the Belgrano consequently had much more significance for Argentinians than the sinking of British ships did for Britons in the same conflict.
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Argentinian sensitivity to Argentine losses was, and is, a consequence of Argentinians having no experience of modern war before the Falklands, having played no active part in the hostilities in either World War or since.
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Argentinians consequently had no experience of the losses associated with modern wars.
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Argentina’s military experience was limited to internal conflicts where the ruling forces could prevail over weaker enemies.
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Argentina’s military leaders therefore developed a conceited and wholly unfounded belief in their military ability and capacity.
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The net result of Argentina’s isolation from the realities of modern wars was that it embarked upon a war with a nation with vastly more experience and ability in modern war. Argentina duly lost. It still cannot comprehend that the causes of its loss were wholly to do with its own deficiencies in beginning and fighting the war rather than anything untoward in the way Britain conducted the war.
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To avoid Argentina’s responsibility for starting the war and then losing it, the sinking of the Belgrano has been elevated in some Argentine thinking into something akin to the Japanese sneak attack on Pearl Harbor so that Argentina by convoluted reasoning is now presented, rather like Hiroshima and Nagasaki, as the victim of a beastly act by an unprincipled and ruthless enemy in a war it started. In reality, judged against the experience of Britain and other nations with serious experience in 20th century wars, sinking the Belgrano was just a routine naval event in a modern war and is completely undeserving of any more attention than the sinking of countless ships in any other 20th century war.
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To avoid Argentinian responsibility for starting and then losing the war, there is an evident desire to shift blame to Britain for sinking a legitimate target which results in facile and irrelevant claims that, for example, it was an old ship with not a lot of big guns with not a vast range and no or limited missile capacity. This is despite the fact that if competently commanded and crewed (of which there seems to have been little prospect) it could have cleaned up most of the British ships in the area without putting itself at risk.
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[i]The sinking of the Belgrano was a necessary part of the successful maritime campaign to repossess the Falklands after its unprovoked seizure by Argentina. The elimination of the latter’s fleet inside territorial waters was a precondition for British victory.
Those really responsible for the deaths of the Argentinian sailors on board the old cruiser were the military junta led by General Galtieri. In 1994, Buenos Aires concurred with the Thatcher administration that the Belgrano sinking had been a ‘legal act of war’, and the Argentinian governments since have not had change of heart on this matter.[/i]
http://www.channel4.com/history/microsites/H/history/a-b/belgrano.html
Why not just lock the thread ?
I dont see any reasons to do that.
Does that mean you have no answers to the questions posed by this sinking or just a steadfast refusel to believe the facts that these questions bring to light?
No, it means than I dont like to discuss with you, because knowing your style we probably end talking about anything else and I should have to go mad deniying things I never posted.
Those really responsible for the deaths of the Argentinian sailors on board the old cruiser were the military junta led by General Galtieri.
I think is more a responsability of the Navy high Command.
The point in my quote was sheeting home the responsibility to the Argentinian government for starting the war.
Why is the Navy high command more responsible than the national government?
The point in my quote was sheeting home the responsibility to the Argentinian government for starting the war
Sorry but I wont get caught in there.
Why is the Navy high command more responsible than the national government?
Easy one, bad planification of the attack against the RN.
Basically Panzerknacker, Rising Sun* is spot on.
I applaud you RS for putting your thoughts forwards so well and so clearly.
Panzerknacker, read, learn and absorb. YOUR country started it, MY country finished it. Any losses on your side, were caused (ultimately) by your own leadership.
Belgrano could well have caused severe damage to the RN task force. Her guns and her armour were from another era, one that we had forgot. That she was sunk is indeed unfortuante, but a key part to OUR winning of the war.
Or you could sulk.
Again madam Tatcher confronted with the Belgrano sinking, questioned by a strong opinioned british lady.
Incidentally this lady bring to the table the peruvian peace proposal by the President Belaunde Therry, thing that I already had forgot.
By the way, nobody come to me any more with the war crime bullshit, I never,ever wrote that this Cruiser was not a legal target for the HMS Conqueror.
The woman in the call (not Maggie) is just a hand wringing apologist.
As Maggie says, she was a danger to the British. She was sunk end of.
Mrs T… What a lady.
Like I say, the Argentinians had ALREADY planned and attempted to execute an attack on the Royal Navy. Thus did the British scupper the peace attempt? Or had the Argentines already scuppered them?
Panzerknacker
No one neccesarily beleives YOU personally don’t believe the sinking is wrong. Eagle had some pretty extreme views on the matter (to the point of even trying to say the Belgrano was never a threat with his pop guns and no exocets) and you have different views also. The fact remains though that the concenous of opinion in Argentina is that we Brits behaved in some way underhanded in sinking the belgrano.
Bearing in mind that Argentinians have tried to take the Royal Navy to court.
You are Argentinian, thus you have to shoulder some of these claims occaisionally, in the same way other people will carry our countries actions and beleives.
Panzerknacker
No one neccesarily beleives YOU personally don’t believe the sinking is wrong. Eagle had some pretty extreme views on the matter (to the point of even trying to say the Belgrano was never a threat with his pop guns and no exocets) and you have different views also. The fact remains though that the concenous of opinion in Argentina is that we Brits behaved in some way underhanded in sinking the belgrano
My dear 1000yds, you are free to believe whatever you like, there is different opinions here as also seems to be in your country…or is that you agree with the lady confronting Madam tatcher ?.. NO you definately dont.
And just to the record, I am not Eagle, I know the town where Eagle lives but that is all.
I’ve scanned this thread again, to try to understand the Argentinian position and the strength of feeling behind it which seems to affect Argentinian objectivity.
I don’t see anything in this thread that alters this clear statement by the OP in post #1.
I can appreciate that Argentinians may have invested their big ship with a lot of national pride; that they were profoundly shocked and wounded by its loss, particularly after seeming to be so victorious in their land assaults; and that they understandably want to blame Britain for somehow doing something underhand rather than accept the fact that their ship was at worst incompetently commanded and at best simply outfought.
I’m not an Argentinian so I can’t understand their national feeling.
I am even more perplexed by the strength of Argentinian feeling as in the quite possibly unlawful sinking of one of our cruisers, HMAS Sydney, in WWII my nation lost about the same number of men as Argentina lost in the whole of the Falklands war. http://www.awm.gov.au/Encyclopedia/hmas_sydney/action.htm
There remains considerable debate in the very limited circles interested in the Sydney’s sinking about whether the Kormoran revealed its true colours before opening fire. Or even whether Sydney was sunk by a Japanese submarine, which is not supported by any serious understanding of the event. But we have only the German survivors’ versions to go on.
Be all that as it may, Australia and Australians generally (but not all the crews’ families and others closely associated with it) had drawn a line under the sinking of the Sydney long, long before 25 years had passed from the sinking.
Maybe learning to accept war’s terrible misfortunes and gross injustices is part of the acquired character of Australia and other British dominions which, like but to a much lesser early extent than Britain, are among the few nations that have been involved in long and sapping conflicts in two world wars from start to finish (not just a couple of months like the Falklands), and that, like America and Britain, were involved in another one in Korea less than a decade after the end of WWII and, like America, was involved in another one in Vietnam well before the 25 year mark from Sydney’s sinking. When a nation gets used to losing ships and men, the sinking of something like the Belgrano is a great but passing misfortune. It is not grounds for a sense of national persecution and eternal whingeing.
Whatever the reasons for drawing a line under things, it’s 25 years since the Belgrano went down, so isn’t it time to draw a line under it, and move on?
Wasn’t the General Belgrano originally a United States Navy WWII cruiser?