&gt; Right now there&#x27;s offshore oil exploration taking place in the Falklands - you could see tons of equipment near Stanley. If that comes back lucrative, I&#x27;d expect the dispute to heat up accordingly.<p>I don&#x27;t think it&#x27;s a co-incidence given that they think there is vast oil reserves around the Falklands that within a few years the UK will have two of the most powerful aircraft carriers in the world (outside of the US carriers) or that our Type-45 was designed to engage dozens of simultaneous air threats, the argentine military isn&#x27;t even the threat it was in the early 80&#x27;s, a British carrier battle group carrying F35&#x27;s with MBDA Meteors (which are a more advanced but similar missile to American AMRAAMS with a variant having a 200 mile range) with a support group of Type-45&#x27;s and nuclear subs would make it the most one sided naval battle since The Battle of the Nile in 1798.<p>Any in-bound Argentine planes would be dead before they got within 300 miles of the Falklands from the F35&#x27;s not to mention the Type 45&#x27;s which is acknowledged as the most advanced air defense destroyer in the world at the moment.<p>I lament that we spend so damn much on the things but within 5-10 years we&#x27;ll have the 2nd most powerful blue water navy in the World (the question then is do we need that really...)<p>Throw in that the British government has very effectively used political pressure to block all sales of modern aircraft to the Argentine government they&#x27;d be flying an obsolete 40 year old fighter against a state of the art 5th generation fighter, it wouldn&#x27;t even be a war it&#x27;d be a damn blood bath, they can&#x27;t even afford to run the planes they have now, those planes are a mix of 60&#x27;s era French Mirages and upgraded vietnam era A4 Skyhawks.