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Weapons of the Falklands War. These are some of the key weapons of the Falklands War used by both sides. Aircraft and weapons. Argentina. Two Argentine Naval Aviation Dassault Super Étendard strike fighters, the primary platform for the Aérospatiale AM.39 Exocet anti-ship missile. Argentine Air Force English Electric Canberra B.62 Bomber.
Sep 17, 2010 · While Mirage and Harrier jets streaked across the sky above, British and Argentine troops struggled against one another with rifles and machine guns on the ground. During the pre-dawn hours of ...
- Overview
- Early claims to the islands
- Britain takes control
- War begins
- Legacy of the war
Few could locate the remote South Atlantic archipelago on a map. But tensions brewed for 150 years over who owned it—and still simmer now, 40 years after the war
Over the course of 10 weeks in 1982, British and Argentine forces battled for control over the tiny Falkland Islands—or, as they're known in Argentina, Islas Malvinas. Although Britain ultimately won the war, Argentina still claims sovereignty over the islands.
Shortly after midnight on the morning of April 2, 1982, a detachment of Argentine commandos landed on the Falkland Islands, a South Atlantic archipelago a few hundred miles off the country’s southern coast, and moved overland toward the settlement’s capital, Port Stanley. A few hours later, a larger landing force began unloading troops in Stanley harbor. By 8.30 a.m., with 800 Argentine troops ashore and 2,000 more about to join them, the islands’ British-appointed governor recognized the futility of resistance by the small garrison of Royal Marines at his disposal and agreed to surrender.
Not until 4 p.m. local time did confirmation reach London, more than 8,000 miles away. For much of the British public, the news was both shocking and confusing, not least because few had heard of the islands or could locate them on a map. In Argentina, however, the fate of what is known there as the Islas Malvinas had been a cause célèbre for generations. Their reclamation prompted wild celebrations in Buenos Aires.
Left: Argentine soldiers line up to hand in their weapons to Royal Marines outside Port Stanley on East Falkland on June 17, 1982. Argentine forces had surrendered to the United Kingdom three days earlier, ending the conflict.
Martin Cleaver,AP
Right: Royal Marines from the 40 Commando unit wait on the deck of the HMS Hermes for helicopters to transport them to the Falklands Islands. The unit was among the first British forces to arrive after the Argentine invasion.
Hulton-Deutsch Collection/CORBIS/ Getty Images
There is no certainty who saw the Falkland Islands first. It may have been Esteban Gómez, a member of Ferdinand Magellan’s 1519-22 circumnavigation of the globe; it may have been the English navigator John Davis on board the Desire in 1592. The first undisputed sighting belongs to the Dutchman Sebald de Weerdt, sometime around 1600, and the first known landing was by English captain John Strong in 1690. Strong seemed unimpressed, noting that there was an “abundance of geese and ducks” but that, “as for wood, there is none.” He charted the sound between the two islands, named it after the First Lord of the Admiralty, Viscount Falkland, and sailed away.
Indeed, despite the jostling for possession that would unfold over the ensuing centuries, few of the French, British, or Spanish settlers who took turns colonizing the islands seemed particularly enamored by them. “I tarry on this miserable desert, suffering everything for the love of God,” lamented the Reverend Sebastian Villeneuva, the first priest at what was then the Spanish colony of Puerto Soledad, in 1767. Four years later, the British government was so anxious it would have to reinforce the country’s claim to the islands that it commissioned Samuel Johnson to belittle them as “thrown aside from human use, stormy in winter, barren in summer … which not even the southern savages have dignified with habitation.”
In 1816, the forerunner of the modern Argentine republic formally declared independence from Spain and four years later claimed the islands. Without a Spanish presence, the islands descended into an anarchic refuge for sealers. So in 1829, Argentina appointed a governor, Louis Vernet, who attempted to impose order by arresting three U.S. sealing vessels. In response, Silas Duncan, the captain of the U.S.S. Lexington steamed to the archipelago, destroyed all military installations, razed all the buildings, and then sailed away, declaring the islands free of government.
Left: An Argentine soldier on his way to occupy the captured Royal Marines base in Puerto Argentino/Port Stanley on April 13, 1982, a few days after the Argentine military dictatorship seized the islands.
Photo by DANIEL GARCIA , AFP via Getty Images
Right: A young Argentinian prisoner glances at the camera as he waits aboard a ship in San Carlos water for transit out of the area. He was captured along with more than 1,200 others after a British attack on Goose Green and Darwin in late May 1982.
Getty Images
Left: Argentine soldiers march near Port Stanley, the capital of the Falkland Islands.
Despite its quick early victory, Argentina had underestimated Britain’s resolve, motivated by a determination to hang onto its dwindling Great Power status and by the belief articulated by Sir Henry Leach, the head of the Royal Navy, that if they failed to respond to the invasion, “in a very few months’ time we shall be living in a different country whose word will count for little.” Even as U.S. Secretary of State Alexander Haig engaged in shuttle diplomacy to find a resolution, a British task force of 127 ships—including Naval vessels and commandeered merchant ships such as the luxury cruise liner Queen Elizabeth 2—steamed south toward the islands.
For all the history building up to it, when war finally erupted it was relatively brief. Argentina had not expected a forceful attempt to retake the islands. When it became clear that such an attempt would take place, the defenders expected it to come through Port Stanley and were caught by surprise when the British landed to the west and worked their way inland. Additionally, the Argentine forces “were riven by conflicts between officers and men, regulars and conscripts,” whereas the all-volunteer British force “demonstrated the virtues of military professionalism.”
Argentine forces on South Georgia surrendered almost as soon as British soldiers stepped ashore on April 25, 1982; and the main battle for the Falklands lasted 72 days, culminating in the capture of Port Stanley, on June 14.
But despite its brevity, the conflict was brutal: Argentine fighter planes sunk several British ships, and altogether about 900 people were killed—255 British and 649 Argentine, as well as three islanders. Defeat proved disastrous for Galtieri, who was deposed almost immediately—ushering in a new period of Argentine democracy. The previously unpopular government of Britain’s Margaret Thatcher, however, was reelected in 1983 and again in 1987.
Forty years later, Argentina continues to assert its sovereignty over the islands, and a 2021 survey found that 81 percent of the country believes it should continue to do so. A Malvinas Museum, established in 2014, presents Argentina’s claims to the archipelago. Conversely, in a 2013 referendum, 99.8 percent of Falkland Islanders—whose numbers have doubled and wealth has increased in the years following the war—opted to remain British. Of approximately 1,500 votes cast, only three were ‘no.’
But in the immediate aftermath of the war, wrote Hastings and Jenkins, a kind of silence descended on the islands anew: “Just as many of the islanders made clear their impatience to be alone once more, so the British did not conceal their burning anxiety to be gone from the islands … They had done what they came to do. By the end of June, most of the men who fought were gone.”
The Falklands War (Spanish: Guerra de Malvinas) was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982 over two British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and its territorial dependency, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands.
These are some of the key weapons of the Falklands War used by both sides. The Exocet is probably the most famous weapon of the war, sinking two British ships and damaging a third. Operated by both sides the missile was used by the Argentine Navy either air launched from Dassault Super Étendard...
Nov 23, 2020 · Meilan Solly. Associate Editor, History. November 23, 2020. The 74-day clash found Argentina and the United Kingdom battling for control of the Falkland Islands, an archipelago in the South...
Jun 15, 2020 · The British Army and the Falklands War. In April 1982, British soldiers joined a naval task force sent to re-take the Falkland Islands after their surprise capture by the Argentine military. They went on to play a key part in the land campaign that helped secure victory in the war. 33 min read.
