The Falklands War

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1:07It is the morning of May the 2nd, 1982, deep in the South Atlantic Ocean. The General Belgrano, a heavy Argentine cruiser carrying more than a thousand men, is heading westward. The Belgrano first took to the sea during the Second World War under a different name, the USS Phoenix. Some sailors whisper that it's bad luck to change a ship's name. On board, Captain Hector Bonzo paces the command deck, keeping an eye on the ship's instruments. A career naval officer in his mid-fifties, he is balding with a neat mustache and the calm, deliberate manner of a man who has spent many months of his life at sea.

1:52His gaze shifts now to the growing restlessness of the water. The Belgrano cuts a steady line, sailing south of what Bonzo calls Las Islas Malvinas. Known in English as the Falkland Islands, they have been under British rule since the 19th century. But they're only 300 miles from the coast of Argentina, and its new leadership seeks to claim them once and for all. The Belgrano is just outside what the British call the Total Exclusion Zone, a circle of ocean extending 200 nautical miles from the islands, inside which any Argentine ship or aircraft can be attacked without warning. For now, Bonzo keeps his crew at action stations, every man at his post ready for combat.

2:45Outside, the wind is strengthening, blowing at more than 30 knots, and heavy waves roll in from the west, drumming against the cruiser's sides. Somewhere beyond the grey horizon, the British fleet is patrolling. Airstrikes are a risk. But the greater danger lies below the surface, where nuclear-powered submarines move silently through the depths. The Belgrano shudders as another wave strikes her bows. To ease the pounding, Bonzo orders a slight turn, bringing her onto a heading of 270 degrees into the wind, the exclusion zone behind them. The helmsman repeats the order, and slowly the The cruiser adjusts, a great hull meeting the waves at a better angle.

3:39Nearby the two accompanying destroyers struggle to match her course and speed. Bonzo watches them through the bridge windows as they ease back a few knots, sparing their cruise from the worst of the sea's fury. Later that afternoon, just as the Belgrano is nearing its 1600 watch change, Captain Bonzo is leaving the communications room. But as he begins to descend a set of steps, a tremendous explosion tears through the hull. The ship jolts violently as if struck from above, but the blast from a torpedo has come from below. The lights overhead flicker, then die. The cruiser grinds to a sudden halt and begins to list sharply to port.

4:26Bonzo gropes his way back toward the command deck when a second underwater missile hits. A column of black smoke, water, and debris erupts 80 feet into the air. Water now surges through the jagged wound in the hull, and everywhere there is shouting, panicked men racing to assess the damage. Steam hisses from fractured pipes, and oil spreads across the decks. The list accelerates, creeping at nearly a degree a minute. There is only one option now. Captain Bonzo gives the orders to abandon ship.

5:08The sinking of the General Belgrana on May 2, 1982, was one of the most controversial events of the Falklands War. Despite being around 40 nautical miles outside the exclusion zone imposed by the British forces, it was sunk after being struck with torpedoes from the British submarine HMS Conqueror. The strike resulted in the deaths of 323 Argentine sailors, nearly half of Argentina's total casualties during the conflict. But though the escalation over the preceding months was swift, in some ways, the Falklands War had been simmering for centuries. Argentina, the closest mainland nation to the islands, saw them as a part of its territory and national identity, while Britain defended its historical claim, citing the wishes of the islanders.

6:06In April 1982, decades of tension exploded into war, leaving nearly 1 ,000 dead. But how did the islands fall under British control in the first place? Why did the war break out after so many years of diplomacy? And how did the political situations in both countries contribute to one of the strangest conflicts in modern British history? I'm John Hopkins from the Noiser Podcast Network. This is a short history of the Falklands War.

6:46In 1690, John Strong, the English captain of HMS Welfare, is on his way to Chile. But a violent storm drives him east, until he finds a scattered chain of 740 islands in the South Atlantic Ocean, about 300 miles east of what is now Argentina. He has heard of these islands before, but as far as he knows, no one has ever set foot on their uninhabited shores. Stopping here a while, Captain Strong notes that the islands offer good harbors and discovers fresh water and an abundance of geese and ducks. easy prey for a hungry crew. Before sailing on his way, Strong names the sea between the two largest islands after the first lord of the admiralty, Lord Falkland.

7:34Accordingly, the two main islands become, in British parlance at least, East and West Falkland. After Strong's departure, the islands remain uninhabited, but in 1713, the Treaty of Utrecht, made between several European States confirms Spain's control over its American territories, including the Falklands. Half a century later, in 1764, a French explorer claims the islands in the name of Louis XV, and establishes a settlement he calls Port Louis on East Falkland. He names the archipelago Les Isles Malouines, after Saint Malo, which later becomes the route of Argentina's Las Islas Malvinas. This occupation will lie at the root of all subsequent Argentine claims to the islands.

8:27The next year, British Commodore John Byron, nicknamed Foul Weather Jack, lands on West Falkland. Hoisting the Union flag, he officially claims the islands for Britain, plants a vegetable patch, and sails away. In short order, another British captain sails out to consolidate Foul where the Jack's landing and to build a fort. But in doing so, he encounters, for the first time, the French at Port Louis. Neither party is happy to see the other, and most furious of all are the Spanish, who consider the claims of both nations to be in breach of the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht. France, at that time an ally of Spain, cedes its claim to the islands in exchange for handsome compensation for the French noblemen who claimed them.

9:17A new Spanish governor is appointed and the French vacate the islands. But though the British do not give up so easily, they withdraw their garrison in 1774 for economic reasons, leaving behind a plaque that asserts their claim. Professor Sir Lawrence Friedman is the official historian of the Falklands campaign. Various countries made various claims to the island. They were basically part of the Spanish-Latin American empire. When that started to collapse and what became Argentina was independent from Spain, they believed that this was theirs and semi-occupied it. It was very unclear exactly who was there for how long.

10:05And then in January 1833, in an incident which also involved the Americans, Basically, the Royal Navy expelled the Argentine garrison, such as it was, and occupied it, and stayed there ever since. From 1833, Britain takes control of the islands, and a small, permanent colony begins to take shape. The islanders make their living as whalers, sealers, and sheep farmers, while the capital, Port Stanley, serves as a vital stopover for ships preparing to navigate the treacherous Cape Horn at the southern tip of the Americas. The islanders see themselves as British, though Argentina never fully surrenders its claim.

10:50Nothing much changes in the Falklands, the lives of the villagers adhering to the natural rhythms of the seasons. But even here, hundreds of miles from the nearest neighbour, the devastation left behind by the Second World War changes everything. The conflict redraws the map of the world, leaving old colonial empires diminished. As the tide of decolonization sweeps through the world, Argentina seizes the moment, bringing the Falklands dispute back out of obscurity and onto the world stage. Because for Argentina, the Falkland Islands are more than just territory. They are a symbol of national pride.

11:32At the United Nations in New York, Argentina's diplomats argue before the General Assembly that the Islas Malvinas are a colonial leftover that must be decolonized by returning them to Argentine hands. In 1965, the UN's Resolution 2065 recognizes that a sovereignty dispute exists and urges negotiation. Diplomacy begins, but matters are not helped in September 1966 when a group of armed youths called the New Argentina Movement hijack a plane and land it on the islands. There, the rebels wave their flag in a brief, symbolic act of defiance. In the 1960s, when decolonization was the rage, the British were quite keen to find a way of transferring sovereignty to the Argentinians who clearly wanted it.

12:27And they thought they'd reached an agreement in the late 1960s, 68. But there was a rebellion against this in the House of Commons on the grounds that the people who were living there didn't want to be part of Argentina, they wanted to be part of the United Kingdom. And at that point, a promise was made to the islanders that sovereignty would not be transferred, or changes to their status would not be agreed against their wishes. Now, if they'd said against their interests, that would have allowed all sorts of possibilities about how you construct their interests. But once you said wishes, it effectively gave them a veto over whether they should have their sovereignty transferred or not.

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15:07Everything is designed to last and may getting dressed easy. So this spring, refresh your wardrobe with Quince. Go to quince.com slash short history for free shipping and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. Go to quince.com slash short history for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash short history. The decade ends and the talks are still getting nowhere. Even any ideas for power sharing plans are met with strong resistance from the islanders who refused to consider any deal that would make them Argentine. The islands are now home to around fewer than 2 ,000 residents, living mostly in small settlements, with the largest concentration in the capital, Stanley.

15:49Life is almost entirely rural, dominated by farming, with hundreds of thousands of sheep and five species of penguins, who vastly outnumber their human neighbours. Another idea mooted during negotiations is that of paying each islander to move to New Zealand. But again, this one doesn't get off the ground. The islanders call instead for full British citizenship, which London hesitates to grant. By the 1970s, Britain is growing weary of its remaining colonies and the costs of keeping them, especially in a recession. And so it quietly begins looking for ways to lessen its overseas commitments. In 1971, the British persuaded the Argentinians that maybe the best way to handle this was just to improve communications between the mainland and the island, so establish an air bridge and a sea bridge, so get access to hospitals to get easier food supplies and medicines or whatever.

16:51And this was agreed. The communications agreement was agreed. but it didn't particularly turn into greater enthusiasm to be part of the mainland.

17:04By the mid-1970s, Argentina has other things on its plate. After the death of her husband, Juan Perón, in July 1974, Isabel Perón assumes the presidency, a role she struggles to fill. Inflation soars, strikes grip the cities, and political violence rages between left-wing guerrillas and right-wing death squads. The military, firmly on the right, sees itself as the guardian of national order and grows impatient. Then, on March 24, 1976, the armed forces move in. Isabel Perón is removed from office and taken into custody. The coup installs a far-right three-man junta, or military group, headed by General Jorge Rafael Videla.

17:57The junta launches what it calls the National Reorganization Process, promising to restore stability and eliminate left-wing subversion. In reality, they create one of the darkest dictatorships in Latin American history, the era of the Dirty War, in which the regime wages a brutal campaign against its own people.

18:23The same year, Argentina establishes an unauthorized, though unopposed, presence in the South Sandwich Islands, around 800 miles southeast of the Falklands. Thousands of miles away, in Britain, 1979 sees Margaret Thatcher, the daughter of a grocer, become the nation's first female prime minister. With her blue suits, pearls and resolute poise, she has already won a reputation for steely conviction, promising tough economic reforms and a firm hand against strikes and public unrest. When the Thatcher government came in in 1979, the Foreign Office managed to persuade them that it was probably unwise to leave this too long and should try and do a deal.

19:10And they did agree a sort of deal with the Hunter. which involved leaseback, that is, the British would transfer sovereignty but then sort of lease the islands back so that the population could carry on as they were. And this seems sensible enough, but there were obvious problems. First, how long would the leaseback be? Secondly, could Argentina put its own people on the islands as the freeholder? And third, what about the wishes of the islanders? Going back to the 1968 commitment. So what happened was that the minister in charge in the Foreign Office, Nicholas Ridley, went to the Falklands in late 1980 and was somehow trying to convince the Islanders that it would be their idea to go for leaseback and they weren't at all convinced.

19:57And even less so was the Commons convinced when Ridley came back and tried to explain what he was up to. So effectively negotiations ended at this point, at the end of 1918. By the early 1980s, Argentina's ruling junta is faltering, and the economy is in freefall. Public trust in the leadership has also collapsed, not least thanks to years of so-called disappearances, in which anyone considered subversive is at risk of abduction and murder at the hands of the government. Into this turmoil steps General Leopoldo Galtieri. Energetic and impulsive, he is convinced that bold action can restore Argentina's prestige.

20:43And a new hunter was formed in late 81 with General Galtieri, the army chief in charge. But one of the key figures was Admiral Anaya, who was a navy chief who'd spent some time in the UK as a naval attache. And that hadn't unfortunately made him an Anglophile. and he made it a condition of joining the Hunter that they had a go to retrieve the Falklands. And the date they had in mind, and this is why the relevance of 1833 was January 1983, the 150th anniversary of what they thought was the illegal British seizure.

21:21Meanwhile in Britain, Margaret Thatcher's government faces its own troubles with recession and unrest. Galtieri and Anaya believe that in the current circumstances their plan to retrieve the Falklands could be achievable So they developed a plan once in government which involved testing the British to see if they would agree a process to transfer sovereignty peacefully and if this wasn't forthcoming they would go back to the General Assembly in late 1982 and if still nothing was going on then they would invade So that was the plan with which they entered 1982. So what then happened was negotiations did in fact take place in New York between a British and Argentinian delegation.

22:10And they were actually quite amicable. The Argentinians pushed a bit and the British pushed back. But the Hunter was pretty cross with what their foreign ministry had done. So they sort of disavowed the communique which came out of that. And that started ringing alarm bells in London that maybe something was up. and meetings were called and studies commissioned and so on. But before all that could happen, there was an incident in South Georgia. A remote British-administered territory, South Georgia is located about 800 miles southeast of the Falkland Islands. Though it has no permanent residence, it has a temporary population who work at research stations, such as those run by the British Antarctic Survey.

22:54In March 1982, a scrap metal merchant hired to clear an old whaling station arrives with help from Argentinian marines, who erect the country's flag on the island. When the British researchers discover them, London demands their withdrawal. Although the Argentines lower the flag, they don't leave, creating a tense diplomatic standoff. A small detachment of Royal Marines is sent to maintain a British presence But the matter remains unresolved Amid reports from London suggesting Britain may soon reinforce its South Atlantic defences The Argentine Junta sees a window of opportunity And at this point, the Junta decided to bring forward their plan So the plan that they were going to implement later in the year, they were going to implement now And they did so because of various leaks and news reports and so on from London, which persuaded them that those who wanted to hold on to the islands were going to press the British to strengthen their military position in the South Atlantic.

24:02So it would become much harder later in the year to take the islands back. So they were reinforced in this by an assumption the British just wouldn't bother. I mean, as soon as they landed and clearly were in position, the British would accept the position. But in this belief, the Junta is gravely mistaken. As Argentina moves its forces into position, British intelligence picks up warnings of an imminent invasion of the Falklands. In London, Thatcher convenes her ministers and officials to confront the unfolding crisis But the meeting is interrupted by the arrival of Sir Henry Leach, First Sea Lord He walked into this meeting because he'd seen the intelligence and realised what they might be discussing And he explained that it would be possible to send a task force Now this is not at all what the Argentinians expected and they'd made error here in that if they'd stuck with their original plan, it would have been far harder to assemble the task force later in the year because the previous year, 1981, a British Defence Review had recommended all sorts of cuts in the Royal Navy.

25:11But as it happened, a lot of the Navy was at sea, some exercises in Gibraltar, it was Easter, a lot of the Marines and parachutes that were going to be sent were easily available. Even so, any plans they make in London now would be too late to prevent the invasion from happening 8 ,000 miles away.

25:34On the morning of the 2nd of April, Argentine ships carrying several thousand troops close in on the islands. Landing at key points across East Falkland, they begin to disembark. In Stanley, a small British garrison of just 68 Royal Marines prepares to defend the seat of colonial administration, Government House, home of the island's governor, Rex Hunt. But they know the odds are against them. At around 6.30, Lieutenant Commander Pedro Edgardo Giacchino leads an Argentine assault on Government House. Gunfire erupts as the defenders fire from windows and sandbag positions. Giacchino is hit at the entrance and later dies of his wounds.

26:22For over two hours, the outnumbered Marines hold their ground. But at 9.30 in the morning, the British garrison surrenders. In total, four Argentinians die in the battle, with one British non-commissioned officer badly wounded. The Union Jack is lowered, and Argentine forces take control of Stanley.

26:48Dressed in full uniform, Rex Hunt departs for the airport, stopping briefly at the local radio station to record a farewell message to the islanders. The short, defiant stand is over, but the conflict for the Falklands has only just begun. President Galtieri appoints General Mario Menendez as the new governor of the islands and commander of the Argentinian force deployed to defend them. Meanwhile, the Falkland Islanders adapt to the new situation. They weren't brutalized. We were talking about a very small population at the time, barely 1 ,800 people. It wasn't a big urban conurbation. One major town capital, Port Stanley, and then settlements around the islands.

27:37So a lot of them moved out of Stanley. some moved out of the Falklands if they could and they learned to cope. They listened to their radios and worked out what was going on. So as well as they could they got on with their lives. The next day South Georgia also falls after a brief fierce clash. News of the victory reaches Buenos Aires where crowds flood the streets waving blue and white flags, singing and cheering. To many Argentines, it feels like a moment of national redemption. The Malvinas are finally theirs.

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