Winding Down

Britain returns the last P.O. W.s

No bands played, and no crowds cheered, as 593 Argentine soldiers returned home under tight security last week aboard the British ferryboat St. Edmund. The diesel-powered vessel discharged its human cargo, the last of some 11,000 prisoners taken by Britain in the Falkland Islands war, on a windswept dock in out-of-the-way Puerto Madryn, 650 miles south of Buenos Aires. One of the first down the gangplank was General Mario Benjamin Menendez, army commander in the Falklands, who saddened many of his countrymen when he surrendered to Britain's Major General John Jeremy Moore. Military authorities refused to allow the returning soldiers to be interviewed or photographed, but Menendez did offer a few words to a local journalist who approached him while he was drinking coffee in a Puerto Madryn hotel. "The war was very important for the country, because we can use it as experience," he said. "We may have lost a military battle over the Malvinas, but we must be prepared to fight another one--the diplomatic one."

The Conservative government of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher had vowed to retain custody of the final batch of P.O.W.s until Buenos Aires formally admitted defeat in the 74-day war. Argentina refused, insisting instead that Britain had restored colonial rule over the Falklands. But in a message sent to Whitehall through the Swiss embassy in Buenos Aires, and relayed to London through the Swiss Foreign Ministry in Bern, Argentine Foreign Minister Juan Ramon Aguirre Lanari admitted that .here was a "de facto cessation of hostilities." The Thatcher government, faced with having to move the prisoners 8,000 miles to proper facilities in Britain, decided that Lanari's statement was concession :nough, especially when it was coupled with private assurances given to third parties that Argentina was done with fighting. Said a Thatcher aide: "One has to face up to the fact that a dictatorship, after that kind of defeat, finds itself in certain difficulties."

In Washington, President Ronald Reagan took another step toward restoring normal relations with Argentina. He announced an end to economic sanctions imposed on that country by the U.S. on April 30. The sanctions had blocked U.S. Government loans and credit guarantees for exports to Argentina, but had little impact on the Argentine economy. Said Reagan: "It is important now for all parties involved in the recent conflict to put the past behind us and to work for friendship and cooperation."

Still, Reagan did not seek an end to a U.S. arms embargo imposed by Congress in 1978 in response to Argentina's poor human rights record. The Administration had been considering a resumption of arms shipments to Argentina before its soldiers occupied the Falklands on April 2. Now, though, Washington believes that an early resumption of military aid to the enemy of a major U.S. ally like Britain would be unseemly. U.S. officials also fear that weapons shipments to Argentina could destabilize the southern portion of Latin America, where Argentina is embroiled in a longstanding territorial dispute with Chile, another country under a U.S. arms embargo. Argentina hopes the U.S. will pressure Britain to negotiate the question of Falklands sovereignty. But the U.S. is standing pat, unwilling to ask Margaret Thatcher to make a politically difficult concession.

Unlike the U.S., which has a great stake in maintaining neighborly relations with Latin American nations, Britain is keeping economic sanctions against Argentina. The Royal Navy plans to continue denying Argentine ships and aircraft access to a 200-mile zone around the Falklands. The exclusionary zone may be maintained at least until the end of August, when British military engineers expect to complete expansion of the runway at Port Stanley for use by a squadron of Phantom jet fighters and Nimrod reconnaissance planes. Britain intends to establish a permanent garrison of some 2,500 troops in the Falklands, as well as a naval force that will include two submarines and three frigates. As a Thatcher aide put it, "We shall be keeping our guard up for some considerable time to come."

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