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Sunday 28 February 2010

Falklands – Can’t Pay, Won’t Fight (3)

The level of general cluelessness over the Argentines’ grumbles at oil exploration starting off the Falkland Islands extends beyond the blogosphere, as an article on the Mirror website demonstrates.

The author, one Mark Austin, thinks that the chances of military intervention by Argentina are “slim” and “unlikely”: he could make a more certain definition by taking on board the information that the Government in Buenos Aires has ruled out such action, as I pointed out recently, mainly because they’re skint.

But such details do not detain Austin, who tells of “pressure exerted through the UN”, while forgetting that the Argentines have been trying to get attention via the UN for several years now without success, not least because the UK is a permanent member of the UN Security Council, and can therefore veto whatever Argentina or its supporters proposes.

However, more serious, Austin believes, is that the US have taken “no position” on the issue. This could be because, right now, all that is happening is Argentina trying to get attention. Austin’s article is supposed to point out that wars in future may be fought over scarce resources: if it really did come to a shooting war, the USA, with its appetite for oil, would have no trouble at all siding with the UK.

After all, the Reagan Administration was supposed to be neutral when the 1982 conflict kicked off, but they were giving the UK access to intelligence. It would be no different with whoever might be in the White House in the future.

Especially if they wanted the oil.

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