the UK is a historical colonial power, and Argentina is a victim, so this is ok.\

P.S. while making that assumption please ignore Argentina's long role as an at least attempted colonial power.

The long role of the Falklands in Argentina is to serve as a distraction when this are going badly at home.

if Argentina were to secure the islands, the government would no longer have a big shiny thing to wave at the electorate when inflation hits 30% and the Presidential aircraft can't fly overseas because bailifs will impound it to pay for Argentinas debts - this would be a disaster for Argentine politics, as it might finally dawn on the electorate how utterly mis-governed they are, and how every government they've elected in the last century has done little but burn the economy to the ground.

http://www.france24.com/en/20130108-argentina-cristina-kirchner-british-plane-debt-seizure


Despite a bitter war of words with London over the Falkland Islands, Kirchner's government is paying British air charter firm Chapman Freeborn $880,000 for the trip to Cuba, the United Arab Emirates, Indonesia and Vietnam.

The government's concern is very real: last year, a court in Ghana impounded the Argentine navy ship "Libertad" for two months following a request from NML Capital, a Cayman Islands-based investment firm.

The company, denounced by Argentina's government as a "vulture" fund," says Buenos Aires owes it $370 million stemming from the nation's debt default a decade ago.

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Even though using the official plane would be 20 percent cheaper, the foreign ministry advised against using it "due to the aggressive posture of vulture funds," he said. A government source said the trip begins in Havana on Thursday.



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Amusingly ironic story. I am guessing that in addtion to paying her last respects to Hugo, one of the purposes of her 4-nation trip is to shore up support for her Falkland Islands claims and attempting to organize international opposition to the FI referendum in march.

2nd only to the state of their military

i'm a little more guarded about the state of the Argentine military - i know that they are in something of a mess, but i find the recent outpouring of both media articles and official/political briefings about the state/capabilities of the Argentine military a little suspicious.

if i were being paranoid, i might think that the Argentines were undertaking a political campaign that said 'we're utterly useless, drop your guard...'.

yes they are flying 1970's aircraft, yes they have little in the way of PGM's/PGM capability, and yes and their ships are at a mid-1980's level - but if they hit the international spares market (and if they can pay a UK charter company $880,000 up front, and in cash, for CFK's LatAm trip, they can hit the international spares market...) they can probably produce something like a mixed air group of 30 airworthy A-4AR's/Super Etendards/Mirage III/5's on a short term basis.

yes she despises the Military - reasonably - and doesn't want to give them any legitimacy, but that has another side in that she is less likely to respect their porofessional opinions about the wisdom/efficacy of an attack. and she's getting desperate...

i would say that Argentinas greatest national embarrassment are its politicians - generations of them.