In the Jan. 3 article, Argentina’s leader tells UK to give up Falklands, two things you can unequivocally say about those islands in the part of the Atlantic dubbed the “Southern Ocean,” there’s a pub in Port Stanley that serves the best fish and chips west of London and the ongoing and long standing give and take between Britain and Argentina is about the prospect of oil at reasonable depth under the shale banks separating the coast of Argentina and the controverted ownership islands.

As to the current population, it stemmed from migrants from the British Isles after the then islanders of Spanish derivation were forcibly emigrated back to the mainland, without compensation, about 200 years ago. The past is exactly that and if Argentina can, under the present regime, get its economic act together, a joint effort to exploit nature’s potential might satisfy everybody. It is doubtful at this juncture, or in the foreseeable future, that many Argentineans would entertain a move back as a natural consequence without any other inducement except oil platforms.

Bill Stern, Deerfield Beach