Falklands War, 1982, Thread

[Jeff Head]

I would truly like to see England and Argentina working together to develop the South Atlantic oil fields. Just think of the economic advantages to both nations.

I can dream.

Amen to all of that, my friend...and a good dream it is.

 

[Miragedriver]

And yet the bombs were effective...even if a number of them malfunctioned.

They sunk five ships, and damaged 12 others.

I am pretty sure that rocket pods would not have sunk the vessels the way the bombs ultimately did.

The argentine use of, and capably to have those iron bombs sink and damage so many ships surprised the world.

The Argentine pilots displayed and exhibited great skill in attacking a much more powerful nation with what were meant to be the cutting edge technology air defenses at the time on their ships.

In addition, they sank two vessels with Exocet missiles and damaged a third.

The UK paid heavily for taking the island back...but then, to their own credit, they were willing to do so, and would have lost more if necessary to retake the islands.

All politics and national pride aside on either side...the fact is that both sides military forces fought very strongly. Particularly the Argentine air forces and the Royal Navy.

The conflict on land was not nearly as close a thing...though both sides still fought hard.

Agreed Amigo.

There were many new lessons that were learned from the war. While the Royal Navy of the Napoleonic Wars didn’t have to deal with attacking jets, The Royal Navy had a clear understanding of the basics of moving a fleet long distances, blockading an objective, and landing a force to take control from an enemy.

On the other hand. Logistics were wrongly planned by the Argentine High Command; they cannot be Improvised, under those circumstances Argentina proceeded this way, and suffered the consequences.


Back to bottling my Grenache

 

[bd popeye]

Did you fellows know that the US was prepared to lend the RN USS Iwo Jima in case one of the RN carriers was lost?

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While publicly claiming neutrality between Argentina and the U.K. during the 1982 Falklands War, President Ronald Reagan’s administration had developed plans to loan a ship to the Royal Navy if it lost one of its aircraft carriers in the war, former U.S. Secretary of the Navy, John Lehman, told the U.S. Naval Institute on June 26.

Lehman and then Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger agreed to support U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher with the loan of the amphibious warship USS Iwo Jima, he said.

“We agreed that [Weinberger] would tell the President that we planned to handle all these requests routinely without going outside existing Navy channels,” Lehman said in a speech provided to the U.S. Naval Institute he made in Portsmouth, U.K. “We would ‘leave the State Department, except for [Secretary of State Al] Haig, out of it.’”

Reagan approved the request without hesitation and his instructions to Weinberger had been simple, “Give Maggie everything she needs to get on with it,” Lehman said in the speech.

At the time, the Royal Navy had deployed HMS Invincible and HMS Hermes to the Falklands. Each carrier fielded five vertical takeoff Sea Harriers armed with American Sidewinder missiles — all major components of the U.K.’s air war in the Falklands.
The contingency plan to provide a replacement carrier was developed at the Royal Navy’s request.
“As in most of the requests from the Brits at the time, it was an informal request on a ‘what if’ basis, Navy to Navy,” Lehman said.

Retired U.S. Navy Admiral James “Ace” Lyons, commander of the U.S. Second Fleet at the time of the conflict, helped develop the plan to supply the Royal Navy with Iwo Jima if the Hermes or Invincible were lost. Though primarily a helicopter carrier, at least one Iwo Jima-class ship was qualified to operate the American version of the Sea Harrier, according to the 1982 edition of Combat Fleets of the World.

“We decided that the USS Iwo Jima would be the ship that would be the easiest for the British to operate and would make for a smooth transfer,” Lyons told the U.S. Naval Institute on June 26. “We also identified ‘contract advisors’ who would be on board to help the British with some of the systems.”

The contract advisors needed to help operate the USS Iwo Jima would have likely been retired sailors with knowledge of the ship’s systems, said current Combat Fleets editor, Eric Wertheim on June 26.

“The arrangement would have probably been a similar operation to The Flying Tigers, when the U.S. sent surplus aircraft to China and then recruited former pilots to fly the planes,” Wertheim said.
“Once the British took over the ship, the crew would have likely been supplemented by privately contracted Americans familiar with the systems.”

Iwo Jima would have functioned well as a replacement for the Invincible as both ships were close in size and function. “Even though the Hermes was a larger ship with more capabilities, Iwo Jima could have filled the gap,” Wertheim said.

 

[janjak desalin]

[...]The British, or rather, Argentine experience from the Falklands is a good case study here.

The Argentine forces were so fixated with trying to take out a British carrier, they tried to ignore other lesser defending assets, which exposed their attackers to far more risk and defensive fire (because they were always trying to hit the very centre of the RN task group's defensive perimeter so had to get within range of the picket ships and RN air cover), resulting in more losses and zero carriers ultimately hit.

Had they taken a more systematic and conservative approach of methodically stripped away the RN task force's surface and air defences by specifically targeting and killing British warships on picket duty and hunting down Harriers as an end in itself, that could have left the carriers far more vulnerable, and could potentially have allowed them to pick one or both off eventually, or forced the British to withdrawn if they feel their carriers are being put at too much risk.[...]

The way I interpreted it, the Argentine error was not simply in not focusing on attacking carriers, but specifically in not on focusing attacking the one resource that the British would have had the most difficulty justifying the loss of, i. e. British soldiers. From a strategic perspective, Argentine air assets should have offered resistance minimally sufficient to keep the British carriers at a stand-off distance and waited for the British to begin their landing. At that point, once the landing force was in place, and its location was known, the full force of Argentine air assets should have been committed to the diminution of the British landing force, attacking naval troop transports as they neared land and disembarking amphib transports (both helo LC) and as they attempted their landings heavy-laden with troops.
However this error was quite consistent with Argentina's dismal strategy, overall, for the Guerra de las Malvinas.

 

[Equation]

The way I interpreted it, the Argentine error was not simply in not focusing on attacking carriers, but specifically in not on focusing attacking the one resource that the British would have had the most difficulty justifying the loss of, i. e. British soldiers. From a strategic perspective, Argentine air assets should have offered resistance minimally sufficient to keep the British carriers at a stand-off distance and waited for the British to begin their landing. At that point, once the landing force was in place, and its location was known, the full force of Argentine air assets should have been committed to the diminution of the British landing force, attacking naval troop transports as they neared land and disembarking amphib transports (both helo LC) and as they attempted their landings heavy-laden with troops.
However this error was quite consistent with Argentina's dismal strategy, overall, for the Guerra de las Malvinas.

Easier said than done. The Argentine's first has to find those troop carrying ships and where they are at in real time situation. I'm not saying they lack the intellect, just the equipment and intelligence and data gathering information necessary to conduct it.

 

[Jeff Head]

The Argentines did find the troop carrying ships.

Folks need to read the history of this war in a little more detail.

One of the troop ships was sunk, the Sir Galahad, three others were damaged, one slightly, one moderately, and one severally.

On the 24th of May:

RFA Sir Galahad - damaged in bombing and out of action for a several days (Later Sunk)

RFA Sir Lancelot - damaged in bombing and not fully operational for almost three weeks,

RFA Sir Bedivere - slightly damaged in San Carlos Water probably by A-4C Skyhawks of FAA Grupo 4.

On the 8th of June:

RFA Sir Galahad hit again mortally, and ultimately sank.

RFA Sir Tristram - badly damaged off Fitzroy and abandoned, but later returned to UK and repaired

As I say, the Argentine Air Force did a very credible job given the circumstances.

 

[Equation]

The Argentines did find the troop carrying ships.

Folks need to read the history of this war in a little more detail.

One of the troop ships was sunk, the Sir Galahad, three others were damaged, one slightly, one moderately, and one severally.

On the 24th of May:

RFA Sir Galahad - damaged in bombing and out of action for a several days (Later Sunk)

RFA Sir Lancelot - damaged in bombing and not fully operational for almost three weeks,

RFA Sir Bedivere - slightly damaged in San Carlos Water probably by A-4C Skyhawks of FAA Grupo 4.

On the 8th of June:

RFA Sir Galahad hit again mortally, and ultimately sank.

RFA Sir Tristram - badly damaged off Fitzroy and abandoned, but later returned to UK and repaired

As I say, the Argentine Air Force did a very credible job given the circumstances.

Apparently they didn't hit enough of it to prevent the British forces from retaking the island.

 

[Jeff Head]

... waited for the British to begin their landing. At that point, once the landing force was in place, and its location was known, the full force of Argentine air assets should have been committed to the diminution of the British landing force, attacking naval troop transports as they neared land and disembarking amphib transports (both helo LC) and as they attempted their landings heavy-laden with troops.
However this error was quite consistent with Argentina's dismal strategy, overall, for the Guerra de las Malvinas.

They did do this. And they found the troop carrying ships.

As I say above, folks need to read the history of this war in a little more detail from the numerous, credible books that have been written of it.

One of the troop ships was sunk, the Sir Galahad, three others were damaged, one slightly, one moderately, and one heavily (and that one was in fact abandoned and then later repaired).

On the 24th of May:

RFA Sir Galahad - damaged in bombing and out of action for a several days (Later Sunk)

RFA Sir Lancelot - damaged in bombing and not fully operational for almost three weeks,

RFA Sir Bedivere - slightly damaged in San Carlos Water probably by A-4C Skyhawks of FAA Grupo 4.

On the 8th of June:

RFA Sir Galahad hit again mortally, and ultimately sank.

RFA Sir Tristram - badly damaged off Fitzroy and abandoned, but later returned to UK and repaired

And this was done while having to wade through the escorts, and sinking several of them and damaging many others. The troop ships were not unprotected.

As I say, the Argentine Air Force did a very credible job given the circumstances.

 

[Jeff Head]

Apparently they didn't hit enough of it to prevent the British forces from retaking the island.

Nope...they did not stop the UK.

The aircraft that attacked the landing vessels had to get by and through the escorts...not to mention Harriers that were covering them. They sunk three of those escorts and damaged several more.

But they also took heavy losses.

Thirty-eight aircraft (not including helicopters or transport aircraft) were shot down, including at least 17 A-4s.

And the UK had many more troop vessels, including healthy reserves of men and equipment...and were able to absorb the pretty heavy losses inflicted on them by the Argentine forces.

 

[janjak desalin]

Actually, the Argentine Air Force did not use the strategy I suggested.

Had they, the need to get either by or through any naval escorts would have been obviated as attack routes from south-southwest did not necessitate any engagement either north of West Falkland or east of Falkland. Campaign maps illustrate that the predominant majority of British Ships were deployed to the north of the islands, and that the Argentine Air Force chose to engage them there, a tactical error.
The only ways that British naval escorts would have been able to provide cover from attacks overland would have been either to interdict the routes by deploying west-southwest of West Falkland, which would have put them dangerously close to the Argentine mainland, or by deploying to the center of Falkland Sound, which would have been tactically unsound, for obvious reasons (for surface vessels, but optimal for submarines, another oversight by the Argentine battle planners). Yes they would have had to contend with the Harriers (and Rapiers), but that was a given in any scenario.

The assumption that one is "better read" is always an amusing assertion as it has no rational basis but reveals a pretense to authority. A better question might be that of who has more expertly read their sources, however many or few. I'm sure that some, here, are familiar with the significance of both the concept and the practices of an expert reader, as it is an essential skill for those that seek advanced degrees in scholarly disciplines aimed at generating new knowledge. Although bean counting does have its place, bean counting does neither a scholar, an analyst, nor a strategist make!