By Daniel Guzmán | Director of Agenda Malvinas

Forty-four years after the Malvinas War, Argentina displays an administrative wound that is nothing less than a geopolitical capitulation: the refusal to recognize as War Veterans the soldiers who defended the Patagonian coast in the South Atlantic Theater of Operations (TOAS). This recognition is not a concession; it is an act of strict military and sovereign justice that, at this point, is non-negotiable.

The arbitrariness of the Forces: The abandonment of the Army

The biggest shortcoming lies in the lack of a unified state policy. While the Argentine Navy , in an institutional decision in the mid-1990s, incorporated 6,200 personnel (officers, non-commissioned officers, and conscripts) who did not see direct combat but served in the Fleet, the Argentine Army has maintained a wall of denial toward its own troops.

The soldiers who guarded the air bases in Patagonia, who operated radar, who loaded ammunition for the aircraft that attacked the British fleet, who patrolled the coasts, who endured the same harsh weather as on the islands, and who were on high alert for incursions confirmed by the enemy itself (such as Operations Mikado and Plum Duff ), are treated by their own force as mere "deployed personnel." This distinction lacks tactical justification: a military objective under risk of attack is a war zone, period. The government's responsibility has been to look the other way, allowing each branch of the armed forces to manage its own "honor roll" according to budgetary or political considerations, or simply to devalue the most vulnerable.

Lessons in sovereignty: How does the world solve it?

While Argentina debates whether a soldier 600 km from the islands was a veteran or not, nations with a true military tradition have resolved this dilemma by prioritizing service to the nation over the geography of the firing location or the range of bombs or missiles. These international military regulations are apparently unknown to the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the Argentine Armed Forces. This reflects a failure to fulfill the political responsibilities that have plagued these 43 years of democratic restoration.

1. United Kingdom: Logistics is War

The enemy of 1982 has no doubts. London awards the South Atlantic Medal to those who served on Ascension Island (6,300 km from the Malvinas) and at support bases on British territory itself, such as RAF Brize Norton (12,700 km away) .

2. United States: Honor Categories

In conflicts such as Vietnam or World War II, the U.S. uses the concepts of Wartime Veteran and Combat Veteran .

3. France and Russia: Risk as a criterion

France awards the Combatant Card based on risk and deployment in overseas operations (OPEX), regardless of distance. Russia (formerly the USSR) recognized thousands of advisors in Vietnam as veterans, even though they never carried a rifle but provided technical support for the conflict. For these countries, logistics under threat are considered combat .

A void in favor of the true enemy

The lack of this recognition in Argentina has created a vacuum that will be exploited by British diplomacy, which specializes in dividing nations. Africa and India are global witnesses to the British Empire's expertise in this area. By not giving them the place they deserve, the Argentine State is allowing a British non-commissioned officer to come this Monday, the 30th, to "validate" our own soldiers, who are being rejected by their own nation.

Recognition of the TOAS and its soldiers is non-negotiable:

1.   It validates the real map of the war: The war was not just on two islands; it was throughout the South Atlantic and the Patagonian coast.

2.   It repairs institutional injustice: There cannot be veterans "by force" (Navy and Air Force yes, Army no).

3.   Strengthens Sovereignty: Recognizing that the continent was a conflict zone is to reaffirm that British aggression was against the entire national territory.

4.   Restore fighting unity: Unite the soldiers who fought in the Islands with those who served on the mainland to sustain the true fight, which is none other than with the British enemy.

The distinction between the battlefront and the strategic rearguard must exist in honor and decoration, but the status of War Veteran must be the same for all those who put their lives at the service of the Fatherland in 1982. Any other position is to continue de-Malvinizing.