Mario Benjamín Menéndez facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Mario Benjamin Menéndez
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General Menendez during Operation Independence
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| Military Governor of the Malvinas Islands, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands | |
| 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) |
| Spouse | Susana Arguello (m. 1955) |
| Children | 3 (2 daughters, 1 son) |
| Alma mater | Colegio Militar de la Nación |
| Military service | |
| Branch/service | 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.
Early life
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 the People's Revolutionary Army 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.
Falklands War
On 2 April 1982, Argentine forces invaded the British territory of the Falkland Islands, 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 criticised, but historian Duncan Anderson contended after the war that the plan "suited admirably the capabilities of the soldiers he had at his disposal".
British troops landed on the islands in May and inflicted a number of defeats upon the Argentine defenders during the course of the month. When British forces won at the Battle of Goose Green on May 29, "the gloom and despondency that gripped Menéndez and his headquarters soon infected many Argentine officers". However, in a bold move, Menéndez in late May assembled all his army, national gendarmerie and airforce special forces with a "plan to plant a north-south screen to strike at the British logistics line of communication and capture British soldiers." They were ambushed by the Special Air Service and Mountain and Arctic Warfare Cadre patrolling Mounts Kent and Simon and had a Puma helicopter shot down. Ten Argentine commandos were killed and 23 were injured or taken prisoner in the heli-borne offensive.
In the first week of June, as British forces prepared to assault a number of hills near Stanley, Menéndez was pressured to try to attack the Falklands settlement of Fitzroy, which had recently come under British control, but he decided to stay on the defensive. After the hills were captured by the British, Menéndez considered withdrawing his forces from Stanley, and holding the main airfield, Port Stanley Airport, located on a peninsula east of the town.
On 14 June, Menéndez spoke with Lieutenant-General Leopoldo Galtieri-the President of Argentina-by radio regarding the situation. Galtieri said that Menéndez should counter-attack against the British forces with all of his soldiers, and told him that the Argentine military code stipulated that a commander should fight until he has lost 50% of his men and used 75% of his ammunition. Menéndez's morale finally broke. He started communicating almost gratefully with a Spanish-speaking British officer who had got in touch with him by radio. Menéndez agreed to meet with representatives of the commander of British land forces on the islands that afternoon, and Menéndez surrendered his forces in the evening.
Later life and death
Within a month after the surrender, Menéndez had been removed from his positions of power. According to Menéndez's mother, Hilda Villarino de Menéndez, her son was arrested in October 1983 by the Argentine Army, and sent to a base for 60 days of disciplinary detention. She said that the arrest had "apparently something to do" with a book her son had published, which covered his experiences during the war.
On 18 October 2012 he was again arrested, along with another 16 persons, indicted for his role in human rights violations during Operativo Independencia in 1975. Menendez served as second-in-command of the 5th Infantry Brigade, first under Brigadier-General Acdel Vilas and latter under Brigadier-General Antonio Domingo Bussi, who commanded the various units sent to fight the ERP guerrillas in Tucumán province with orders to also to detain their active collaborators hidden among the civilian population.
Menéndez died in Buenos Aires on 18 September 2015, two weeks after having been admitted to hospital. In 2019 it was reported that Menéndez's ashes had been secretly scattered on the Falkland Islands in December 2015 without the consent of the Falkland Islands government.
See also
In Spanish: Mario Benjamín Menéndez para niños
