Falklands: Argentina ambassador calls for Britain to hand back 'colonial enclave'

Telegraph UK ^

[Perdogg]

Alicia Castro tried to pull Argentina's immediate neighbours into the dispute, claiming UK diplomatic and business relations could be damaged if the islands were not handed over to Buenos Aires.

She said Las Malvinas – Argentina's name for the Falklands – would be better off if they cut their ties with the UK.

[WMarshal]

"Guam and the Northern Marianas: Give them Back!"

I totally agree. If England caves on this one I expect China or some eastern Pacific power to start asking for the independence of Hawaii. There is already a very active independence movement on the island.

People would do well to remember that England has ruled the Falklands since 1833, roughly 180 years. The isles have been conquered, abandoned, reconquered and envied in successive occupations by the French, Spanish, Argentinians and English up to the war of 1982.

A short history lesson.....

They were discovered by the English navigator, John Davis in 1592 but not explored until 1690 by another Englishman, John Strong. The isles were not inhabited until 1764 when some French sailors from St-Malo first colonized them, hence the French name of “Malouines”.

They were thrown out of the islands in 1766 by the Spanish who were already masters of most of South America. In addition to the Spanish implantation, a British colony had already been established on part of the western isle in 1765 without suspecting that the French were living on the eastern isle.

In 1774 the English left the islands, for financial reasons, to the Spanish who were in charge of the archipelago until 1811 which was the beginning of the revolution of South America countries.

At this agitated time Spain left the Isles which became then officially no man's land. In 1820 Argentina, no longer under Spanish domination set up a colony and a governor in the Falklands.

In 1833 the English navy threw out the Argentinians and took sovereignty of the isles. There was then a period of 150 years of peace apart from the two world wars in which the strategic value of the Isles was demonstrated. In December 1914 a squadron of the British navy based in Stanley fought the German navy and retook control of the South Atlantic. In December 1939, the battle of the River Plate was won by a group of Royal Navy cruisers and after the battle one of the ships docked at Stanley for repairs.