Belgrano secrets
When the information commissioner ruled that cabinet minutes from the lead up to the Iraq war should be disclosed, there were those who predicted that this could make it open season on cabinet minutes on all sorts of topics.
After the Information Tribunal backed the commissioner, Jack Straw then vetoed their release. He said this was necessary in order to protect the notion of collective responsibility in cabinet government.
Those who predicted and in some cases feared this open season may be reassured by more recent judgments from the commissioner in which he has decided that cabinet minutes should stay secret.
Last month he ruled against revealing discussions about the Olympics (declaration of interest: that was my request).
Today he has issued a decision about documents relating to the controversial sinking of the Belgrano during the Falklands War - and he says that he "has concluded that the public interest narrowly favours withholding the four cabinet minutes".
The commissioner says that this is because they concern a decisive moment in an armed conflict and disclosure could have implications for future such discussions.
To many it may seem surprising that documents about military action nearly 30 years ago are thought to still require more secrecy than those about a much more recent conflict. But the commissioner is always keen to stress that under the Freedom of Information Act assessing the public interest depends on the circumstances of the individual case. Yet it is often the same factors (the prominence and currency of the issue) which may strengthen both the case for and the case against disclosure.
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Surely it is not in the public interest to divulge how the cabinet comes to its decisions when related to war issues. Would that not give a potential/future enemy the information it needs to try and manipulate the cabinet decision?
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Perhaps one was legal whilst the other was not?
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Submarine operations are sensitive, then and now.
The sub involved may have been retired, but tactics etc are not for public view then or now.
We must be about the only nation who would (or some of us would at least), beat ourselves up about this.
On 2nd May 1982 the Argentine navy were planning a pincer attack on our fleet, a fleet that was 8000 miles from home with the nearest friendly base 3000 miles away.
A fleet which, like the rest of the forces, had spent the previous 15 years switching from a more worldwide role, to one concentrating almost totally on the NATO role, in the case of the navy in the North Atlantic, against the USSR.
To the north, the Argentine carrier 25th Of May, with an air-group of Skyhawk aircraft, which unlike their land based counterparts, were trained in anti shipping attack, had more suitable bombs-that would explode on impact, which being far nearer our forces, had more endurance and could attack from a choice of directions.
To the south, the Belgrano which though old, had some modern systems and it's escorting Destroyers had Exocet missiles, the radar high up on the Belgrano allowing them to out-range the Exocets fitted to many Royal Navy ships.
In an 'Exocet shootout' they'd have an edge. Then it's much larger guns than any British ship.
The plan was to attack from the air, both from land and the 25th May, then the Belgrano group would join the fray.
The Belgrano had been tracked by the shadowing British sub, however it was as would be expected, zig zagging in and out of the Total Exclusion Zone.
But-the TEZ was only to denote when an attack would be certain, any enemy ship outside Argentine coastal waters could be attacked, this had been made public.
However, on 2nd May the Belgrano Group was on course to go into an area where large underwater mountain ranges could blunt the ability of the British sub to keep tracking them with sonar.
The enemy carrier had been tracked by another British sub nearer coastal waters, but a fog bank had caused it to lose visual track of the carrier group and the shallower waters there also caused a loss of sonar contact.
There was now a frantic search to find this carrier again.
They were not about to lose the other part of the Argentine fleet.
Admiral Woodward, commander of the Task Force wanted Belgrano sunk, he requested London for permission and got it.
Then luck turned our way, 2nd May 1982 had clear weather and no wind, meaning that to the north, the Argentine carrier could not launch it's bombers if they were loaded up with....well bombs.
But the weather could change.
We know what happened next, the main reason so many Argentine sailors would die, was that the two escorts ran and did not attempt a rescue.
We were already at war, the previous day, Argentine aircraft from land and attacked, they lost several to the Sea Harriers with no British losses.
The first Vulcan bomber, in a highly risky flight from Ascension Island took place on Port Stanley runway.
Sinking the Belgrano effectively put the Argentine Navy out of the war, a massive strategic gain.
Their ships ran for home, their subs were probably unable to penetrate the Royal Navy's anti sub screens.
Ironic since the Argentine Navy in the Junta had been the ones most for invading the Falklands, then again, their 'combat experience' was in the torture and murder of their own people at their 'Navy Technical School'.
That awful smug lady, in the 1983 Election Campaign, who 'caught out' Thatcher on TV (I bet she had no loved ones in the forces), merely showed up just how ill informed Maggie had been.
(Just after the Argentine invasion she was shocked to find out that 1) we had no large conventional aircraft carriers any more 2) The ships would take 3 weeks, not 3 days to reach the islands and 3) the RAF could not provide effective air cover for the fleet).
Just a small number of unproven Harrier aircraft from in effect, small helicopter carriers.
She was left in no doubt just how risky re-taking the Islands would be, of course if we failed, her government would fall.
Al Haig's diplomatic efforts of course had to be tried first, he found the Junta belligerent and often even drunk.
Notable too that even the Capt of the Belgrano reckons he would have just the same in Admiral Woodward's position.
Moving on........
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Excellent post SonicBoomer!
The sinking of the Belgrano was a military action justified by every rule of war ever written, even her Commanding Officer, Cpt. Hector Bonzo has admitted this publicly. He has also confirmed that their orders where to hold station for 24 hours. Another reason why the Argentine attack was postponed was that the carrier 25 de Mayo had a faulty boiler preventing her building up enough steam to overcome the lack of wind and enable her Skyhawks to take off. They had hoped to have the problem fixed the following day and they would have tried the attack again. The Belgrano and her escorts were not on a whale watching cruise but were intending to attack the RN Task Force. I deeply regret the fact that so many of her crew died but that was the fault of the military junta which ordered the invasion. As you say the only shameful act that day was the decision of the captain's of her escorts to flee the scene and leave men who had survived the sinking to die of hypothermia. They should both have been put against a wall for that!
This issue is only kept going because of bitter left wing activists who resent the fact that the Falklands provided the springboard for Thatcher's landslide the following year. Well they should consider the fact that the Falklands would probably never have happened if Denis Healey hadn't cancelled the Royal Navy's CVA-01 aircraft carrier project in February 1966. With 2 of those ships in service Argentina would probably never have felt bold enough to invade. Had the Falklands never happened, it's likely that Thatcher would have been re-elected, (primarily as Labour under Foot were catastrophically unelectable!) but it's likely that she would have had a majority similar to that won in 1979. Would she have felt strong enough to take on the miners and begin privatising the nationalized industries? Probably not! But it was Healey's decimation of the RN in 1966 which set in train the sequence of events which led to Labour spending years in the political wilderness. Apparently many former RN officers relish that fact!
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The posts above sum it up rather well.
I think the perceived threat to Buenos Aires after the Belgrano was sunk was real, prior to that it was assumed the threat was piffle.
It was explained at that time to their embassy that further actions were very likely, and this further explained perhaps why certain helicopters and/or aircraft ex Culdrose were left to fly without being shot down, as public opinion would have demanded significant retribution. None of that will be in the papers. Quite right too!
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JPSLotus79, I did not know about 25th Of May's boiler room issues - I had wondered even allowing for an old catapult, about the inability to launch though.
But I'm not sure that Healey was totally to blame for CVA-01.
It seems years of treasury pressure and dockyard limitations had produced a lemon of a design, the Chief Designer called the day of it's cancellation 'the happiest of my life'.
It had also some odd features, so limited in displacement yet with a bulky Sea Dart system which duplicated in part the fighters role, a plant that it was feared would have problems in operation and of providing enough speed - and was to be an out of date technology by the time it entered service,
The Navy also reckoned manning them would be a serious issue too,
Wilson came to power committed to 'East Of Suez' the main rationale for the big carriers, but the economy, in a serious mess despite all the 'never had it so good' talk.
The best solution was to devalue sterling, but doing that would make the UK's overseas commitments unaffordable.
We know in the end, they were forced to in 1967.
The RAF agitated against the carriers, even 'moving' Australia several hundred miles north to show how they could provide air cover in the region!
Of course, they and the RN were both being played against each other by the treasury, but the RAF lost out too.
Healey later remarked that the RN never provided senarios such as an invasion of the Falklands.
However, I think the real killer for the carriers was the shift to a more NATO centric defence policy, the main threat was the USSR's sub fleet, the best answer was more RN subs.
Also Polaris was coming too.
I think both parties have made mistakes, note the 1981 defence review, including planning to sell the brand new HMS Invincible to Australia and the scrapping of HMS Endurance which sent the wrong message to the Argentines.
If they had waited just another year or so, they would have won by default.
Five years before, the same threats and intel came from Argentina, Jim Challaghan sent a nuclear sub south and prepared some Frigates to do the same, this was leaked to the press and the Argentines got the message and backed off.
Indeed, under 'Sunny Jim' the rate of naval building increased, two of the three Invincibles plus Frigates and Destroyers.
Nuclear sub building having been stepped up since the late 60's.
Of course, the Cold War meant that major revisions elsewhere, such as seriously slashing the Rhine army and RAF Germany, was politically impossible as was as militarily.
For the first time in British peacetime history, we were trying to have a worldwide fleet (plus a major North Atlantic commitment), including several classes of capital ships (Carriers, nuclear subs, nuclear missile subs) AND maintaining a larger than usual army, due to continental commitments. As well as a large tactical airforce, much of which was also deployed in Germany.
It does seem so ironic that just when the Fleet Arm got fully world class aircraft, Phantoms and Buccaneers, the end for conventional carriers was in sight.
Then not long after the last one went, such a vessel was needed.
Call it a mismatch in defence and foreign policy.
I agree that if a successful CVA-01 class ship was available, Argentina would not have invaded.
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Do You Want to Know Another Well Kept Secret? Well GPs and other health workers are carying out a campaign to develop and extend Balint Groups.Never heard of them? Neither have most people. The Balint Society was set up initially at UCH London and this is where much activity stems from still. Their purpose is supposedly to improve health workers', mainly GPs, empathy with those who consult them and, who are encouraged, some would say manipulated, as a level of deception is involved, to confide sensitive, personal information in a supposedly trusting confidential consultation. The Balint Society is allied with the Association of Psychoanalytical Psychotherapists - a private group which also practices in the NHS. This group has been the subject of successful complaints to the Information Commissioner/GMC and NHS Trusts yet still does not inform the public or people registered at practices that members belong either to a Balint Group or the APP or that their personal, often very sensitive information is used for group discussions. The APP is particularly concerned with setting up Balint Groups in Primary Care (usually GP practices)- see article on web site of APP by Andrew Elder GP/Balint Group member/member of APP. yet are resisting the right of people to be fully informed of their practice by claiming that the relationship between practitioner and client/patient would be compromised! The Balint Society claims that advising members that material should be anonymised conforms to GMC guidelines as material is being used for training purposes. It also advises that no information divulged in meetings shoud 'go outside the room'. Obviously as they meet behind closed doors with no outside monitoring this is a nonsense but, more than anything it breaches the rights of people to give or withhold consent to use of their information for purposes other than that for which informed consent was freely given. These Balint Groups are engaged in research and some at least has not received Ethics Approval (see Chris Mace Prospective Study of Balint Groups, entry on Trials Register). GPs, psychologists, nurses, theerapists and other health workers are obliged to conform to their own organisations' regulations regarding Rights to Consent to Use of Personal Information - albeit for traing, publication, research. these practitioners are obliged to conform to Human Rights Laws re Right to Privacy/Common Law Rights to Privacy/Data Protection Act/GMC Guidelines which incorpporate these laws and guidelines. However in any decent relationship, especially a professional one built on concepts of trust, transparency, honesty, respect for dignity and autonomy it is surely simply just courteous, moral and ethical to inform, consult and request consent to use of personal information. The public showed how much these concepts mean when the scandals around using information as well as body parts for research and training was exposed in recent years.
References:
Balint Society / Journal / lists some GP and other members of Balint Groups
Human Rights Law re Privacy; Data Protection Laws; GMC and other professional bodies' guidelines; Common Law Rights to Privacy; individual practice leaflets which omit to declare membership of Balint Group or of the APP; NHS Guidelines re Rights to Consent or not to Use of Information
Annual Meeting of GPs June 2009 - keynote speech given by Dame Iona Heath GP Caversham Group Practice, Chair of Ethics - on promoting Balint Groups. Organised by David Watts GP Secretary of Balint Socciety
Trial Register ISRCTN31260533 Chris Mace Study of Balint Groups
Association of Psychoanalytic Psychotherapists / APP Journal/ Article by Andrew Elder GP re campaign to develop work of AAP in Primary Care settings. Article describing 'patient led policies' as threatening the practice of the APP in the NHS.
A List of at least some members of Balint Groups is on Balint website - your GP or other healthworker may be one of them.
Ethics Committees
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Sonic, I take it you've read Richard Beedall's article on CVA-01 on navy-matters.com then?!
Yes it was a pig of a design but that was largely a result of politicians wanting to have it done on the cheap, a problem that has bedeviled many big defence projects since the end of the war.
As for Healey saying that the RN never provided a Falklands scenario in 1966. Back then Britain and Argentina were allies, especially the navies. The 25 de Mayo was a former Royal Navy light fleet carrier, in 1982 the Argentine Navy also included 2 Type 42 destroyers, exactly the same kind used by the RN, Argentina also had large amounts of British weapon systems In 1966 the idea that Britain and Argentina would go to war was totally inconceivable, especially as the prevailing view over the Falklands was that with a policy of benign neglect the islanders would eventually come to the view that their interests were best served by integrating with Argentina. No one could have foreseen that within 10 years Argentina would be ruled by a brutal and nationalistic military junta. Had they not invaded then it's possible that today the islands would be under a joint soverignty arrangement.
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JP, yes Bedell's site, as well as, pre-internet, Leo Marriot's 'Royal Navy Aircraft Carriers 1945-90 and Eric Grove's 'Vanguard To Trident'.
There were, it seems, unofficial Argentine 'expeditions' to South Atlantic Islands, as you say, things changed when the Junta came to power.
But one good source of getting a picture behind the mid 60's defence policy changes, is not a work in that sphere at all.
'White Heat' by Dominic Sandbrook, which does not even hardly mention stuff like aircraft carriers, but it does provide a lively and highly detailed picture of life in Britain from 1963-70.
Including the eye watering financial crisis throughout the period, starting with Douglas-Home's chancellor Reggie Maudling telling his successor after the 1964 election, 'sorry old cock, left a bit of a mess'.
For 20 years, the UK had been spending twice as much as a % of GDP on defence than our main European competitors, much of which was unavoidable given the many commitments.
From the conscription from 1947-60 to the need to modernise kit, it was all a massive strain on resources.
'Supermac' had engineered short term booms for short term politics, he was a 'spinner' who makes todays ones look very amateurish.
Then the in fighting after 1964, driven largely by Wilson's twin vices of his 'Walter Mitty' nature and paranoia.
Back to Maulding, by early 1964, the Treasury saw, in a best case senario, just one CVA, the modernised HMS Eagle and HMS Hermes (unable to carry F-4 Phantoms) as the RN carrier force through to 1980.
My own view is that Ark Royal should have been modernised to Eagle's standards in terms of sensors and machinery, then Eagle to be refitted to operate F-4's.
Ark to run to when it actually did, Eagle until late 1980/early 1981.
However, the 'Invincibles' would have been around the size and displacement of HMS Hermes.
Throughout the 1970's, Hawkers produced a range of proposals for improved Harriers, usually with larger wings, including ones in concert with the US, such as the AV-16, which was cancelled in 1973 but later re-emerged as the AV-8B.
Some of these versions would have combined the nose/radar of what became the Sea Harrier, with the improved second generation Harriers we are familiar with.
The story of how, after the attack on HMS Sheffield, the AEW Sea King was hastily developed is well known, in fact this was based on a proposal by Westlands of some two years before.
In a fleet largely dedicated to NATO, such vessels/aircraft would have provided not a direct replacement for the big carriers, but an affordable way to have fixed wing Naval airpower, that could be paid for without huge cuts elsewhere, could be manned, that could get past the Treasury as a largely NATO assigned asset, as the Invincibles did.
Since this original discussion was about what a RN nuclear sub did, which changed the strategic game, post East Of Suez, these were always going to be the main capital ships.
France of course, did maintain fixed wing conventional carriers, though the F-8's and Etendards did not compare to F-4's and Buccaneers so well.
But they had a much smaller forces of SSN's, indeed their first SSN's arrived a long time after the RN, their own SSBN's of course being a priority.
Thoughout the Cold War, their fleet of escorts also were far fewer.
I cite them since they are more comparable as a nation to the US as far as we are concerned.
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Yes the original plan was to modernise Ark Royal and Eagle to operate the Phantom, which required major modification to the ship and thats where the conspiracy theories start. Eagle had received some of the necessary mods in a refit in 1964-66, she needed comparatively little extra work to fully "Phantomise" her and she was good enough to remain in service until the mid 1980's when, according to the RN's plan, the third and final CVA-01 ship would replace her. Ark Royal was only good to last until the late 1970's, needed much more work done on her and she had such a poor reliability record that she was cynically known as "The Park Royal." If one carrier was to be kept then logic says it should have been Eagle. The conspiracy theorists say that Ark Royal was chosen because Healy and Wilson knew that her poor condition meant that the RN would be out of the big carrier game more quickly and a future Tory government wouldn't be able to revive the capability. When she retired in 1978, Ark Royal by all accounts couldn't have physically lasted much longer. Even if CVA-01 had gone ahead, the second 2 ships of the class probably wouldn't have survived the cuts in public spending caused by the IMF crisis in the mid 70's so perhaps it's all academic!
I read in the Times last week the obituary of the chief designer who worked on CVA-01 and designed the RN's first nuclear subs and who's name escapes me at the minute!
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