They certainly did. Colonel Martin Balza of the artillery requested ten 155mm CITEFA long range guns from General Jofre, who replied “Let's talk seriously, it isn't going to come to that” but Balza thought differently and managed to request two of them without Jofre's knowledge. Jofre was not very pleased about that.
The 155mm guns did a good job of keeping British warships on the alert and there were a few close shaves (Argentine propaganda is full of suggestions that British ships constantly turned tail and ran from them, but this is somewhat hyperbolic) and later, the guns were turned to the west to engage the British on Mount Kent and in the staging areas prior to the battles of Mount Longdon, Two Sisters and Mount Harriet.
After this, the British 105mm guns were at close enough range to engage them and, of course, they could fire faster and were more mobile, but the Argentine 105mm Pack howitzers were still at a major disadvantage and Balza managed to have another two 155mm units delivered, although one came into action on the night of June 13th (replacing one which had been blown up by a Harrier) and the other never got out of the airport because there was nothing to tow it. Even then, they were basically out of ammunition. They now adorn several museums in the UK.
As to land based missile batteries, Argentine forces did famously make the ITB (Instalacion de Tiro Beretta) Exocet launcher using an aiming system made out of old cathode ray equipment and a technically ancient Siemens generator and fired on a plugboard system which was an old telephone switchboard, to provide the right signals. It was technically basic but also ingenious.
The story given about this device is, however, one I do not fully subscribe to, as it has too many anomalies (as with so much of the Argentine history on this period, it was shaped by the junta and later apologists) and although it did engage and seriously damage HMS Glamorgan, yet the full story of it isn't properly known.
It is believed in certain circles (the type who know what they're talking about) that the Argentine forces actually had an earlier model made, which has been described as “a sort of simple rail" amongst other things, although details are very scarce. It was believed to have been on Pebble Island, but this was rumour and not one I particularly believe. Certainly, however, the Royal Navy were aware of it, at least conceptually, before the ITB landed in the Falklands, so there's an intelligence question there.
What doesn't fit is when you count how many missiles the Argentine forces actually had and how many they launched… then the available history doesn't work. Either way, they scored one hit with it and Glamorgan was very nearly sunk.
No comments:
Post a Comment