Wary partners in the South Atlantic

IN ALMOST every respect, Argentina and Britain get along swimmingly, as they have for most of the past two centuries. British Airways does a roaring trade between the two countries, and is talked of as a possible buyer of Aerolineas Argentinas, a local airline. This month HSBC, a British banking group, bought Banco Roberts, which (despite its English name) is Argentine. And Argentina recently displaced Mexico as Britain's most important Latin American market after Brazil.