MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

UK Falklands Intelligence failures.

One of the most interesting and perceptive of the British media anniversary features is a devastating attack in The Times accusing the UK Government of intelligence failures and of ignoring warnings which led to a war which it says could have been avoided.

The criticisms are contained in a five-page article headlined "A tragedy of errors", by an eminent journalist Simon Jenkins, who co-wrote one of the best books on the 1982 conflict called "The Battle for the Falklands" with Max Hastings in 1983. His new revelations derive from later research and interviews conducted in the United Kingdom and also in Argentina. He is scathing about the official report headed by Lord Franks which exonerated the Thatcher Government of negligence. Its main conclusion was: "We would not be justified in attaching any criticism or blame to the Government".

Official report "whitewash"

Simon Jenkins says the Committee was asked not whether an invasion was predictable but whether the April 2nd invasion was predictable. "With hindsight, this sophistry ranks as one of the most eccentric official whitewashes of all time". The war, he writes, was unquestionably avoidable by normal deterrent means. The invasion was not deterred by Britain because it was not accurately predicted. The Times says it can now reveal that the British Government was aware of an Argentine threat to the Falkland Islands for almost a year before they were invaded. The invasion needed copious preparation and prior intelligence. British Governments have been content to see the invasion as "a bolt from the blue". London tried afterwards to explain its laxity as some overnight brainstorm by a banana republic. It was no such thing. It emerged from blatant political shifts in Buenos Aires at the time, and no less glaring errors of response in London. Margaret Thatcher and Foreign Secretary Lord Carrington are accused of ignoring or failing to act upon increasingly concerned warnings from diplomats and Foreign office officials.

Argentines claim Britain forced invasion

The Times declares: "Argentine sources have claimed that Britain's response effectively forced them into the invasion that led to war". Warnings about the risk of war were raised by the head of the Foreign Office South American Department, Robin Fearn, in May, 1981. A Ministry of Defence operational plan produced five months later concluded that any Argentine attack would have "formidable logistical implication