Mario Menéndez
| Mario Benjamin Menéndez | |
|---|---|
Leopoldo Galtieri with General Menendez during the Falklands War.
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| Military Governor of the Falkland Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands | |
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In office 3 April 1982 – 14 June 1982 |
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| President | Leopoldo Galtieri |
| Preceded by | Sir Rex Hunt |
| Succeeded by | Jeremy Moore |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
3 April 1930 Buenos Aires, Argentina |
| Died | 18 September 2015 (aged 85) |
| Alma mater | Colegio Militar de la Nación |
| Military service | |
| Service/branch | Argentine Army |
| Rank | Brigadier general |
| Battles/wars | Falklands War |
Mario Benjamin Menéndez (3 April 1930 – 18 September 2015) was the Argentine governor of the Falklands during the 1982 Argentine occupation of the islands. He also served in the Argentine Army. Menéndez surrendered Argentine forces to Britain during the Falklands War.
Menéndez should not to be confused with his cousin, Luciano Benjamín Menéndez, another Argentine general of the Dirty War. Both are nephews of Benjamín Andrés Menéndez, an Argentine general who led an unsuccessful putsch against Perón in 1951.
Menéndez progressed from a cadet at the national military college to the top ranks of the Argentine military. As a full colonel serving in the 5th Infantry Brigade, he participated between July 1975 and January 1976 in Operativo Independencia, a counter-insurgency campaign against trotskyist ERP guerrilla operating in Tucuman province. He later commanded the 6th Mountain Brigade in Neuquén province. In March 1982, Menéndez (according to historian Max Hastings and Simon Jenkins) was a general in the Argentine Army, and the commander of the Buenos Aires first corps. According to his memoirs, Menéndez was in fact a member of the Military Committee in Buenos Aires that addressed the Argentine president on a weekly basis on a range of issues, including foreign diplomacy, military training and the military budget.
On 2 April 1982, Argentine forces invaded the Falkland Islands, which is British territory, and gained control that day. On 3 April, the British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher announced that British forces had been dispatched to recapture the islands. Menéndez arrived in Stanley (the capital of the Falkland Islands) on 7 April, with the purpose of taking over the governorship of the Falklands. One book described him as a "competent soldier". Menéndez competed with the senior representatives of the Argentine navy and air force for dominance; a competition which was formally concluded on 26 April when Menéndez appointed himself head of the Malvinas Joint Command, an action which was approved by the Argentine government. Two Argentine brigadier generals commanded forces in the Falklands. They were both senior to Menéndez, and treated his orders as suggestions. Menéndez opted for a strategy of attritional warfare, fighting tactically from fixed positions against any British Armed Forces that made a landing upon the Falklands, rather than a more technically complex war of manoeuvre. The plan was later criticized, but historian Duncan Anderson contended after the war that the plan "suited admirably the capabilities of the soldiers he had at his disposal".
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Wikipedia