The Chilean Falklands Factor

Abstract

Throughout the Falklands conflict, Chile played the role of a mysterious third participant whose presence was more felt than seen. During the war, the Chilean Falklands factor weighed more heavily in Argentine military strategy than is generally known. Conversely, within the British government, the Chilean connection was considered ‘the most sensitive subject of the war’.1 For these reasons, a good deal of speculation still remains about Chile’s role in the Falklands War. However, the latter was only one expression of Argentina’s territorial expansionism. Argentinian frustration over the failure to seize the Chilean Beagle Channel Islands was an important element in the decision to invade the British Falkland Islands and their Dependencies. Like the Beagle Channel dispute, this aggression was part of a premeditated plan to secure foreign strategic outposts in the South Atlantic and South Pacific areas. Territorial claims were disguised under a game theory of sovereignty whereby any claimed territory would become an imaginary ‘Argentinian sovereign territory’. The Falklands adventure led the Argentine dictatorship to develop a two-front military strategy out of fear of a Chilean military attack — despite Chile’s hasty and unnecessary proclamation of neutrality in the conflict.