BELGRANO AND THE CONDUCT OF THE HON MEMBER FOR LINLITHGOW

That this House notes that the book the Falklands War by Denys Blakeway, serialised in the Daily Express, concludes that the 'Belgrano' with its Exocet-armed escorts was a worrying threat to the British task force which was caught in a pincer between the 'Belgrano' and the aircraft carrier '25 de Mayo'; also notes that the 'Belgrano' commander Captain Hector Bonzo has said that he was not ordered to return towards the mainland or to port but to a waiting station within the South Atlantic; regrets the loss of 323 Argentine lives but believes the sinking may well have averted the loss of several thousand British lives in the Task Force and may have prevented the failure of the entire mission to liberate the Falkland Islands; and concludes that the allegations of the honourable Member for Linlithgow that the 'Belgrano' was sunk to torpedo the peace talks has been exposed as utter nonsense.