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| Britain | |
| 'White House team is betraying Britain by staying neutral over Falklands' | |
| 2010-04-02 | |
By asserting its neutrality in the latest dispute over oil in the Falklands basin the US has handed Argentina a diplomatic victory, according to Lawrence Eagleburger, who helped to persuade President Reagan to throw American intelligence and logistical support into the war on Britain's side. He said that Britain's role alongside the US in Afghanistan since 2001 had only made the situation worse. "Under the circumstances, with Afghanistan, I can't see why we'd be doing anything other than being very pro-British because you are putting troops there," Mr Eagleburger told The Times in an interview in which he also recalled that Margaret Thatcher won over the Reagan Cabinet partly because "people were afraid to argue with her". To mark today's anniversary of the Falklands invasion President Kirchner of Argentina will walk to the edge of the Beagle Channel, on the southern tip of Patagonia, and sprinkle petals on the water in memory of the 649 Argentine soldiers and sailors who died in 74 days of fighting. The war claimed 255 British lives but it is in Argentina that the human cost of the war has remained a potent political weapon. Mrs Kirchner is expected to reassert Argentina's claim to sovereignty over the islands today at a ceremony in the world's southernmost city of Ushuaia, and to attack recent British efforts to develop oilfields in Falklands waters. In Buenos Aires a service will be held in the central Plaza de Mayo to highlight successive governments' neglect of war veterans since their defeat nearly three decades ago. America played a vital role in that defeat, not least by opening a US base on Ascension Island to British Forces, but its support was by no means a foregone conclusion. "There was a strong feeling that British control of the Falklands was anachronistic," Mr Eagleburger, 79, said, referring to public backing for Argentina from the Republican right but also to a pro-Argentina lobby in the US State Department that he was forced to confront. Jeanne Kirkpatrick, then the US Ambassador to the United Nations, was an ardent anti-communist who saw General Galtieri's junta as a bulwark against Soviet influence in Latin America -- and therefore to be supported in spite of its horrific human rights record. "But her biggest problem on the Falklands issue was that she was Irish," Mr Eagleburger said. "That really hung over her. She was not actively antagonistic but she was not anxious to smooth the way for the British in this or any other crisis." Mr Eagleburger, then the third-ranking official at the State Department, also had to face down Thomas Enders, the department's senior regional policymaker. Mr Enders was "very much an Anglophile" by inclination but as Assistant Secretary of State for Latin America he had "figured out where his bread was buttered. I was p***ed off with him for wasting everyone's time because I knew damn well where Al Haig [the Secretary of State] was going to end up on this." Mr Haig, like Mr Reagan himself, was an admirer of Mrs Thatcher and a natural believer in a special Anglo-American relationship, hesitating only because of what came to be known as the Kirkpatrick doctrine of Soviet containment. In the end Mrs Thatcher prevailed by sheer force of personality. "The fact that she was Prime Minister made a great deal of difference in Washington if for no other reason than people were afraid to argue with her," Mr Eagleburger said. "The admiration for her was truly great. The disdain for Galtieri was pretty substantial, too, but she overwhelmed people in terms of her abilities and her willingness to express herself. Reagan had to come off the fence but from the very beginning he had an inherent sympathy for the British cause [and] he went to great lengths to help her." Twenty-eight years later David Cameron faces a more equivocal US Administration as a potential Conservative prime minister. In an interview this week he said that Britain should "frankly and candidly say we're disappointed" with Washington's call for negotiations on the Falklands' future even though the islanders do not want them. The Obama Administration's desire to stay neutral is not surprising, Mr Eagleburger said, but it should not have made neutrality the issue. "Both sides are now trying to force us to 'vote'," he said. "If Argentina knew we were pro-British it would be much easier for us to stay pro-British." Things were simpler in 1982, when he settled the argument with five words: "An ally is an ally." | |
| Posted by:Bulldog |
| #8 'White House team is betraying Britain FTFY. |
| Posted by: Barbara Skolaut 2010-04-02 19:16 |
| #7 Maybe so, but sometimes when the kids are squabbling, it helps for Dad to offer a stern look and a "Don't make me come over there!" to help events resolve themselves peacefully. Even if Dad has no intention whatsoever of getting off the couch. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2010-04-02 16:04 |
| #6 This isn't a change in policy, relax, this has been US policy since 18-longtime ago. You may recall President Reagan mediating. Granted, after mediation failed out came the AIM-9z and the largest US airlift between NickelGrass and Desert Storm... but still... |
| Posted by: Shipman 2010-04-02 15:14 |
| #5 One HUGE drawback to the Argentinian claim is that British citizens have lived on the islands since 1833. It's one HARSH place to live - cold, damp, windy, with frequent storms. Trees won't grow there. The Argentinians have lost two wars over the Falklands - one in 1832 and one in 1982. The Falklands are usually brought up by the Argentine government to take the mind of the local folks off the incompetence of the current administration. The base on Ascension Island is a British base used by the United States. Ascension Island is another British colony in the Atlantic, along with Tristan da Cunha and St. Helena. The US uses the base on Ascension Island to track satellite and space shuttle launches. The runway was beefed up and extended at US expense to handle C-141 aircraft, but the US has NEVER taken possession of the base, the runway, or any part of the island. Practically the only industry on the Falklands is sheep raising. The islands provide a significant amount of lamb and wool to Britain, in exchange for just about everything else. The current occupants are descendants of British settlers from the late 1830's. Argentina's claim is at best extremely weak. Unfortunately, the British Labour government has allowed the British military to deteriorate to the point where it may not be possible for them to protect their investments in the Falklands or elsewhere. A weak, self-centered US president only encourages the Argentinians. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2010-04-02 13:14 |
| #4 Agreed. The headline is a bit misleading, it was my opinion that the public quick-quotes from the administration after the initial Agentine claim tilted, even if just slightly, towards Argentina. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2010-04-02 12:14 |
| #3 Mrs. Kirchner needs a good, stiff bitch slap. Anything less will encourage her to do something reckless and dangerous. If she does, the blood will be on Obama's hands. |
| Posted by: Ebbang Uluque6305 2010-04-02 12:01 |
| #2 Bueller? Bueller? So much for 'sophisticated European' opinion. Hated the "cowboy" didn't they. Well, you got what you wanted. Enjoy. In the last desperate years of WWI, the German General Staff orchestrated Lenin's return to Russia to fuel a revolution to buy peace on the Eastern Front. They got Lenin, and then socialism, Hitler and Stalin and the misery of WWII. In 2008, hundreds of thousands of untraceable small donations flooded in from Europe to the Obama campaign. As Ye Sow, So Shall Ye Reap. |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2010-04-02 08:54 |
| #1 Show of hands: who's shocked? Anyone? Anyone? |
| Posted by: eLarson 2010-04-02 07:45 |