Talk:HMS Brilliant (F90)

Carriage of Nuclear Weapons during Falklands War

There's a UK MoD report - here - on the carriage of nuclear weapons by elements of the Falklands task force. HMS Brilliant was one of the ships discussed. Is that worth adding as an item here? MadScot666 (talk) 04:02, 13 September 2008 (UTC)

There have been persistent rumours for a number of years about the threat of nuclear attacks during the war. As I understand it, Cordoba was the city threatened. However, I have little concrete on this, so I can't add it. Suffice to say, that if Cordoba had been bombed, it would have drawn in Latin America, and added an international element not previously present. China and the Soviet Union might have become involved, and the anti-nuclear lobby would be outraged. It never happened thankfully. --MacRusgail (talk) 16:25, 14 September 2008 (UTC)

HMS Brilliant primarily an anti submarine hunter

This article is essentially a stub and gives little emphasis to HMS Brilliant main role in the Falklands War first as a point defence goalkeeper for HMS Invincible and secondly as an a/s hunter in search of ARA San Luis. Detatched on 1 May to search in the suspected position of San Luis off Stanley and possibly aided by the fact the USN had broken Argentinian naval communications from about 12/4/ 82 , the Brilliant and Yarmouth searched for the San Luis for 20 hrs as it did again after St Luis failed strike against HMS Arrow a couple of weeks later. The Brilliants captain John Coward seems to have conducted sustained and ruthless searches, using Sea Kings from the Hermes and the HMS Yarmouth' mortar to blow up ever located whaling wreck and at least 2 whales in the area. Admiral Woodward was sure the San Luis would be hiding on the bottom . The failure to force the ARA San Luis to the surface reflects the advantage was with the submarine, who probably should have found HMS Hermes and Invincible, and their lack of bravado see's them failed even the ,Perishers standard passing course by Admiral Woodward and the failure to force San Luis to the surface probably reflects inability to precisely locate it and an insufficient inventory of depth charges in power and number to do the job, possibly also the Sea Kings could not land on the RN frigates or suck up fuel at night hovering over the RN frigates.

The impressive performance about the Brilliants goalkeeper performance was not only its Sea Wolf kills but that its radars proved the best in the fleet and contributed to as many as 8 of the planes the Sea Harriers shot down.

References