Reyals wrote:Actually it was some what of a balanced war.
Argentina was closer but wasn't as well armed or trained, but Britain was so far away that it couldn't bring as much power as was needed to do the job 'properly'
But all and all it was a pretty pointless little war and from what I've read wasn't very well executed by either side IMO.
As for a current battle for the islands. If Argentina actually executed a well developed plan they could probably give Britain a run for it's money, but would lose in the end.
/shrug
actually the argentinian forces had way better equipment in terms of clothing and acomodiation.
after a few days in the field many of the british troops boots would begin to fall apart because of the swampi landscape and the cold and rainy weather.
also the british forces were outgunned 2:1 if not higher but they had the advantage of having the harriers covering their backs from the carriers (which argentina had none of, therefore they had to take of from the mainland (that is most of their planes)and due to the bad weather and fog at this time of year it was very hard to operate effeciently (and afterall the argentinians used french equipment))
also britain could easily have lost the war if it hadn't been for the weather, first: the only reason that the paras survived the battle of boca house, was that the earth was chilled by the weather and therefore the huge argentinian minefield they ran over didn't blow up.
secondly: BBC warned the argentinians of the arrivals of the paras in the nearby hills before the british had won at goose green and therefore they got reinforcements send in by choppers, actually the british forces were outgunned by 4:1 at this point, the british forces could easily had been killed since they were low on ammo and their morale was low, the only thing that saved them was that the argentinian commander thought that the british paras group outside of goose green was bigger than it actually were and therefore surrendered.
if it hadn't been for good luck and fortune the british could easily have lost the fight against this mandatory army.
and just found this on wiki.
Sir John has revealed that France provided Mirage and Etendard aircraft, identical to the ones that it supplied to Argentina, for British pilots to train against. It is also disclosed in Sir John's memoirs that France provided intelligence to help fight the Exocet missiles that it had sold to Argentina, including details of special electronic countermeasures that at the time were only known to the French armed forces. In her memoirs, Margaret Thatcher says of Mitterrand that "I never forgot the debt we owed him for his personal support...throughout the Falklands Crisis". As France had recently sold Super Etendard aircraft and Exocet missiles to the Argentine Navy, there was still a French team in Argentina helping to fit out the Exocets and aircraft for Argentine use at the beginning of the war.
the british was indeed lucky.