Some people of influence in the US, such as Jeanne Fitzpatrick, were so blinded by their politics that they stood alongside the murderous dictatorship in Argentina. Al Haig tried to play peacemaker between the sides and failed, and Caspar Weinberger ended up getting an honorary knighthood for his help. It’s a mixed bag, and it’s clear that there was no consensus in Washington. However, the US did break out its strategic fuel stores on Ascension (a UK dependency in the South Atlantic which the US has a leased base on), and fast-tracked the Fleet Air Arm supply of the latest Sidewinder missiles. These were a great help.
Well, a bigger aircraft carrier can carry more airplanes. At any rate, aircraft from Hermes and Invincible were used in the war. Like I said, the very long-range bombing raids from Ascension Island were a fairly small part of the war.
Marc Jones has a short e-novel called “The Fireflies of Port Stanley.” Alt-history and a pretty good read. Think I’ll have to pull it up on the Kindle this weekend and raise a toast to all who fought, on both sides.
My question is: why didn’t the Argentine AF base their fighters at Port Stanley? To attack the British, they had to fly in from the mainland (which gave them very littler service time over the islands). Was the runway at Stanley too short? If the Mirage and Dagger fighters were at Stanley, the RN would have been in serious trouble.
Yeah, the runway at Port Stanley really wasn’t up to scratch for fast jets. The Black Buck raids only dropped one bomb on it as I recall (although others took out radar positions), but it was also under fire from naval units.
Just found this and thought it worth mentioning: Torture, Hunger and Anti-Semitism in the Falklands War - War Is Boring
If this is how officers treated their own men, Britain was right to save the Falklanders from the tender mercies of the regime.
Read up on Argentina’s Dirty War sometime: they “disappeared” - that is, abducted, tortured and murdered - people in the tens of thousands. With the knowledge and collusion of the United States because communism.