It’s time to bring the Falklands into the United Kingdom

Today marks 40 years since Operation Rosario, when Leopoldo Galtieri’s commandos landed on the Falkland Islands and began an invasion that prompted the Falklands War. The Guardian has commemorated the occasion with an unapologetic op-ed by the Argentinian government swearing itself to reasserting control over the islands. Foreign minister Santiago Cafiero, author of the op-ed, declares that ‘the recovery of sovereignty is an inalienable objective of the Argentine people’ and says ‘no Argentine government will cease in its pursuit of our sovereign claim’. 

Cafiero’s op-ed is full of self-pity but utterly lacking in self-reflection. There is no acknowledgement that his country, then a military dictatorship, overran a tiny, peaceable island population who chiefly spent their days fishing and farming. No apology for an act of aggression that resulted in a conflict killing more than 900 Britons and Argentines. No recognition that 99.8 per cent of islanders voted to remain British in a 2013 referendum with a 92 per cent turnout.