jamesmahon: Apparently you need to be led to water in order to drink. I did answer your question. You just don’t understand it when you compare it to your own personal goals, ideals, and ambitions. You can’t look at this in a conventional manner and apply what your logical principles would dictate. It would be like me trying to speculate why you like to play chess, role-playing games, or whatever it is you do. You are trying to get me to concede a point which is already patently obvious. Short of land speculations or economic investments in the islands that I would personally have to have, the transfer of sovereignty would not make an immediate impact on my life. The islands are a national humiliation, and to remove that stigma would restore some of the original ideals of our nationhood. In our song, the Malvinas March, it speaks of national honour, redemption, and restoration. Like yours, ours is a proud nation that is proud of our southern location, our culture, environment, and contiguity, which the Malvinas form a part. I can explain it further, but I’m afraid you still won’t get it (or choose to not want to get it). After all, you label my feelings as ‘selfish’ when I am trying to explain to you our concept of national honour and pride. Don’t try to impose your own thinking upon mine and assume that what you would naturally think or act would automatically apply to me. I grew up in a different environment and had my own set of experiences. Did your country once have Germany as a possession? Ours once had the Malvinas until they were taken from us.
cofty – It doesn’t take an apt pupil of history to know what the islanders feel. I’ve acknowledged that time and time again. Two wrongs certainly don’t make a right. Unfortunately this leaves our side as the one who makes the complaints, brings documents to world meetings, and left to ponder our actions in 1982. You might have us in check, but you made an illegal move early in the game which directly led to this advantage.
Charliko – I’m sure glad we have your superior researching skills in order to find and post for our benefit a map of South America. I don’t think I could have found one without you. I took your advice and googled the word “South America” and clicked on ‘Images’. Your map did indeed come up, but also several with the following:
Falkland Islands (Islas Malvinas)
Administered by UK, Claimed by Argentina
I recommend you attempt an exercise in multi-culturalism. Try typing “America del Sur” in the same google window, and see what you will find. After all, “America del Sur” is what the vast majorities of the people in South America call it (Ámérica do Sul in Portuguese) Virtually all say what I posted earlier, and some even go so far as to not even mention the term “Falkland”. Since the only English speaking populations in South America are Guyana and the Malvinas, I think ‘America del Sur’ is a reasonable research term.
Our land, your people is relative to the reader. Not true in your case, true in my case. Your premise is predicated on your belief that Argentina does not have a valid claim, while mine asserts the opposite.
Unfortunately your ‘facts and documents’ omit the damning information found in the British Foreign Office archives. Lord North renounced all claims to the islands in the 1700’s. The British head of the American office commissioned a study which found that there was no formal British claim to East Falkland until 1829, shortly before the invasion. These are my facts and documents, and my sources are two British authored books about the Malvinas – one by Simon Jenkins and Max Hastings “The Battle for the Falklands”, and the other by the Sunday Times of London “War in the Falklands”. While you casually mention ‘facts and documents’, you provide no bibliographical sources. Did you ever go to college? Your paper would be returned to you with a stern admonition.
