The falklands islands

[Huguenot]

A nation state is all about inequality isn't it?

The drilling rigs in the Falklands will be affiliated to, and paying into the British social fund. Unlike an Argentinian one. We give ourselves an unequal and undeserved advantage.

So by supporting the 'British' case for the Malvinas we elevate ourselves above the Argies in terms of rights and rewards for activities we never contributed to or took part in. By participating in this socially acceptable fraud we have no greater moral standing than the Sheriff of Nottingham (who we were brought up to revile).

So 'our country right or wrong' is merely self-interest. It ensures the continuity of succession and perpetuates the parsitic leeching of our planets resources whilst providing a sound moral foundation.

A nation state is about organised armed robbery in a gang. In that sense 'glorious' moments in any national history must be exceptions rather than the rule.

It's a sour joke.

[Marmora Man]

Santerme Wrote:

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> I expect a Trafalgar class submarine is sailing

> South as we debate, with a load of Spearfish

> torpedoes and Tomahawk missiles, it kind of tips

> the balance

Tho' to date there have been no leaks or rumours to that effect. For a submarine threat to be effective you need your opponent to believe there is one, or more, submarines in the vicinity. During the Falklands war the submarine threat to Argentinian ships was magnified by judicious rumours when in fact at leSt one of the suspects submarines was 8,000 miles away looking at an entirely different problem.

[Huguenot]

And there you go, the difference between left and right.

Whilst the left fiddles in a moral quandary over this act of violent robbery, the right merely discusses how to execute it most effectively.

You can see how it appeals to chest thumpers. It's a wonder the left get elected for anything ;-)

[Santerme]

Marmora Man Wrote:

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> Santerme Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

>

>

> > I expect a Trafalgar class submarine is sailing

> > South as we debate, with a load of Spearfish

> > torpedoes and Tomahawk missiles, it kind of

> tips

> > the balance

>

> Tho' to date there have been no leaks or rumours

> to that effect. For a submarine threat to be

> effective you need your opponent to believe there

> is one, or more, submarines in the vicinity.

> During the Falklands war the submarine threat to

> Argentinian ships was magnified by judicious

> rumours when in fact at leSt one of the suspects

> submarines was 8,000 miles away looking at an

> entirely different problem.

We both know how this works MM.

Our military attache, probably a cavalry officer considering the country, will nip out and have a few Pimms on the Polo ground with his oppo and whisper quietly in their ear something about impending sea trials, etc, etc.

Plus there are 4 Typhoons at Unpleasant, they go aloft with full armament and the 40 odd servicable Argentine reconditioned Skyhawks and Mirages fall out of the sky just off the Argentine coast.

I did a staff course at the US War College with one of the Argentine Marine officer who defended Tumbledown in '82.

I asked him, how in hell he managed to lose the position.....he said, 'Lack of interest'.

[SimonM]

we went to war in 1981 to defend British Citizens from a facist regime, and it is an insult to the soldiers who died to say it was all about oil.

Yes quite. The ones who died for the sake of oil were those who rescued Kuwait from Saddam. The Falklands Conflict (never officially a "war") was about wiping the egg off the Foreign Office's face, reviving Thatcher's rock-bottom unpopularity and allowing her to wrap herself in the flag at the subsequent General Election. The islands were not worth the death or serious injury of a single soldier then. You only have to look at a map of the world to see which country has the sounder claim to the Falklands. If the Falklanders (or the "Bennies" as the UK troops termed them) want to be British then pay them to resettle in the UK: it'd work out far less cheaper now there's no longer the Hong Kong precedent to worry about.

[Marmora Man]

Simon M said

You only have to look at a map of the world to see which country has the sounder claim to the Falklands.

On that basis Alaska would be Canadian, Monaco French, Gibraltar Spanish, etc etc. A foolish basis for establishing sovereignty.

Regardless of who actually first settled the islands the British took occupation of previously unoccupied islands in 1833 and have been living there and administering the Falklands continuously since then supporting UK shipping and Royal Navy interests as they rounded the Horn. UK therefore has the best claim to sovereignty. Additionally there is no undersea geological link between the islands and Argentina, the islands being a unique entity rising from the ocean bed and not from any extension of Argentinian geology.

[Narnia]

I believe the French, Spanish and the Argentine all had claims to the islands pre 1833.

This seems very sensible to me. On what sensible grounds do the UK have rights to Northern Ireland for example? If my ships/army are bigger than yours then we can establish sovereignty wherever we want? Is that it?

[Huguenot]

Ho ho.

On what basis do any people have rights to any territory? Most people have been alive less than a hundred years.

If you don't get sent to jail because your Dad was a bad boy, why should you get land just because he ploughed it?

[mockney piers]

"If my ships/army are bigger than yours then we can establish sovereignty wherever we want? Is that it?"

Historically speaking that would certainly prove a correct statement.

Whether in this day and age we should have got past that of course, is another matter entirely.

[mockney piers]

*~warning, rampant historical parallels of really limited use*

The Roman republic considered that everything was due to it because of its vast superiority over anyone else; but they didn't like the whole idea of actually having to rule anywhere else; they considered that not only beneath them, but a drain of efforts and economics.

As they grew, mostly down to the naked ambition of powerful men, it squared the circle of its de facto move towards empire by persuading itself that it had a moral duty to civilise other peoples through direct control.

It proved a diversion of it's (far more successful) trade, commerce and industry energies into a vast military industrial machine that eventually collapsed under its own weight once said empire over extended and came under pressures from outside populations.

The parallels with the British empire are only too easy to see.

We should never kid ourselves that any justification of empire lends any legitimacy at all.

Of course having grown up just off the icknield way I'm pretty sure these Isles should actually belong to the Italians ;-)

[Narnia]

I couldn't have put it better myself. We don't have rights per se as it's not our planet and we are just visiting. Governments will say differently of course but we change those every so often as we get fed up with them.So we can't rely on either them or us as we vote them in and out. How much do we know?

I heard an ex Army or Navy guy on the radio the other day stating that the UK does not have the resourses now as they had in 82 to defend the Falklands. If oil is at stake I'm sure the resources will be found.

[SteveT]

Mockney Piers wrote:- I've been there, indeed my brother used to live there, and we Brits are suprisingly popular there.

It doesn't surprise me, they must have had a bellyful of all those Nazi war criminals making fast and loose with their women, jobs, and lousy sense of humour.

[SteveT]

Huguenot wrote:- On what basis do any people have rights to any territory?

That refers to the greatest theft of all time, the London lawyers making it possible for 'fencing off' the common land.

Those lawyers have a lot to answer for.

[SimonM]

On that basis Alaska would be Canadian

,

Or, moore probably, Canada would belong to the USA:only neither country has expressed any claims or desires along these lines

Monaco French,

which, in many ways it de facto is

Gibraltar Spanish,

etc etc.

Yes indeed - and your point??

A foolish basis for establishing sovereignty.

It is at least as morally defensible and logical a way as the "might is right" method..

[Narnia]

Getting Our Way part 3 on BBC 4 tonight at 9 should be interesting. It's exploring the troubled history behind the the idea of an 'ethical foreign policy'. I just saw part two re relations with China over the centuries, recorded in the early hours. So if you can't catch this you'll probably find it repeated if you want to watch it. The one I watched was very interesting and educational.

[mockney piers]

I think it only fair that I should point, in the light of arguments about rights to claims based upon residency, and the unanimous latin american solidarity in support of Argentine (argentinian? are these interchangeable or is only one correct?) claims *deep breaths, get to the flippin point*, that Argentina has a pretty torrid history in terms of its own native population.

It has a smaller native population than any other country in latin america (less than 1% compared to 55% in bolivia (plus another 30% mestizo or mixed descent), and most 'indios' that you see in the streets of Buenos Aires will be immigrants from Chile, Peru, Bolivia etc. The destrucion of the native culture for farming land clearances, could almost certainly be considered genocidal, and most of this occured post independence from Spain, so they don't even have the old 'under the conservative government...' style cop out for this.

I just thought that as I was portraying the Brits as, not necessarily unreasonably, at worst immoral and at best cynical imperials, that I shouldn't by implication be painting the Argentines as lovely cuddly types; historically at any rate, may I say as individuals and as a people they are pretty wonderful, if a little bit bonkers...mind you that's what I think about the Brits too ;-).

Never in the field of human debate have so few sentences lasted so long to so little end.

[Santerme]

Too much flowery rhetoric for me.

It is very simple.

We are there, the Islanders want to remain British, job done!

I always remember Costa Mendes being asked about the Argentine claims after the war saying, 'I was a diplomat, I was paid to lie for my country!'

[Brendan]

Suppose if the Norway decide it wanted Shetland Britain would do similar.

[mockney piers]

I was just saying the argies are no angels, direct enough for a military man ;-P

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"I was paid to lie for my country"

Isn't that just a definition of diplomacy full stop?

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You don't think the argies could make it effectively impossible or at the very least cost inneffective to actually get oil out of there should they up the stakes (and lose the moral high ground)?

Wouldn't a great British compromise be the best way forward, that way everyone (well, the oil companies and the banks as usual) is a winner?

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

Norway are welcome to it. Have you ever worn an itchy shetland jumper or tried riding a Thelwell pony?

[Brendan]

Can?t say I have. What if Shetland decided they wanted the Falklands?

[mockney piers]

For that matter what if the chagos islanders wanted to go there?

They'd get rich from the oil revenues making up for the insulting 'compensation' we gave the Mauritian authorities for having put them into unemployment and squalor, it would end us having to politley ask the US to leave (or send an armada to kick them out, yeah right) and it would stop all that troublesome use of royal prerogative to overturn a series of high court judgements in their favour.

Everyones a winner again. As long as they bring some clothes, perhaps we could send them all our itchy Shetland jumpers.

Or does lapdog Britain not nobly stand up for our plucky island folk when they're not white ... err or US strategic interests are at stake?

[Brendan]

Do you suppose Argentina would take Shetland in payment for the Falklands?

[????]

Annoyingly we can't give Gilbratar away (strategically now of little importance) as it's a dive and a half (though and odd and slightly fascinating place) but given that in the last referendum a grand total of 7 out of 23,000 of the population voted to go back to Spain, no chance. Technically the moors had it far longer than Spain ever did anyway.

[Magpie]

Ok to summarise, some of us believe that Britain's claim to the Falklands is the strongest either because it has the stronger claim, is currently in possession and the islanders want to remain British, or solely because the islanders want to remain British, but Britain is very naughty and (according to Brendan) Britain holding the Falkland islands is similar to Norway invading the Shetlands. Apart from Narnia, Simon M and Huguenot who seem to think that all property is Theft, and no one really owns anything, they just look after it for a bit. Mockney then thinks that Britain should abandon the FLs, because the country screwed over the Chagos Islanders a few years ago.

All this is irelevent as the Argies don't have the capability to take the island militarily, although we probably don't have the capability to retake it should they take it but might be able to defend it from being taken, and we are unlikely to give it up through diplomatic channels as there is lots of oil there, and thats all we care about.

Cover everything?