The British had taken most of the hills overlooking Port Stanley by the morning of 14th June 1982 – and 2 Para had been ordered to halt on their position on Wireless Ridge. They were waiting for the SAS and the Royal Marines who were raiding from the north of Cortley Hill Ridge, a long narrow piece of land running from Moody Brook to the northern arm of Stanley harbour. That opeation was more of a hindrance than a help to 2 Para because the SAS run into trouble and had to be supported by the art...
Jul 24, 2022•21 min•Season 1Ep. 21
We heard how the assault of Two Sisters and Mount Harriet went last episode, both were taken within 2 and a half hours – but 3 Paras attack on Mount Longdon was a different proposition. It’s a steep sided hill about a mile long running almost west to east, it’s main ridge above 600 feet in places and overall, about 300 feet on average above the surrounding ground. This hill formed only a small part of the Argentinian 7th Regiment and its commander Lieutenant Colonel Ortiz Gimenez overlooked the ...
Jul 18, 2022•20 min•Season 1Ep. 20
We pick up after the sinking of the Galahad and the debacle at Fitzroy and Bluff Cove. The British war cabinet was plunged into an argument over information. New Brigade commander Moore had panicked and sent a message that he’d lost 900 men – we know it was 51. The Argentinians naturally believed the 900 figure and also thought that the British attack had been stunted. It hadn’t, but London ironically gained as it lost. The Ministry of Defence faced the media and responded that the casualties ha...
Jul 11, 2022•26 min•Season 1Ep. 19
It was 30th May and the rusty liner the Canberra headed back into San Carlos water. On board were reinforcements from the 5th Infantry Brigade including the Gurkhas, the Scots and Welsh Guards. They had been collected from the QE2 liner which had docked at South Georgia with the Guards and the Gurkhas, from where they were collected by the Canberra. Also on board was the new commander, Major-General Jeremy Moore who was to take over from Brigadier Jeremy Thompson. The command post at San Carlos ...
Jul 03, 2022•30 min•Season 1Ep. 18
The night of 27th May 1982 was cold and rainy, and waiting for the British on the mile-wide isthmus to the north of the settlements of Darwin and Goose Green were one hundred Argentinian conscripts making up two platoons of 12 Regiment A company, a dozen or so Argentinian reconnaissance soldiers, First Lieutenant Jorge Manresa, three officers and 14 NCOs. Manresa’s men weren’t in a good place. They were part of the extension of the defensive position ordered by their commander back in Stanley an...
Jun 27, 2022•27 min•Season 1Ep. 17
As we heard in Episode 15, the British were ascendant, but they’d paid a high price.Twenty-six Argentinian planes had been shot down since the landings at San Carlos, ten British ships had been damaged by unexploded bombs, so imagine the carnage had these been fused properly. Five ships had been sunk – HMS Sheffield, Ardent, Antelope, Coventry and the SS Atlantic Conveyor. One more would go down before the end of this short war. Back in the U.K. the cabinet was muttering about action and natural...
Jun 19, 2022•19 min•Season 1Ep. 16
The British landings at San Carlos were both a threat and an opportunity for the Argentinians. Obviously allowing the British a toehold on east Falklands was a strategic danger, but now they could concentrate their air attacks on the landing zone, and the ships providing support. In their first sorties, the Argentinian air force flew over open seas, searching for targets and burning up precious fuel. Now the landings had altered the odds – they could aim at the warships anchored in Falkland Soun...
Jun 13, 2022•22 min•Season 1Ep. 15
It’s still D-Day – 21st May 1982, and the British have landed over 3000 troops at the Bay of San Carlos Waters, now they need to shift thousands of tons of material from ship to shore, something that was going to be sorely tested by the Argentinian Air force. On the morning of 21st May, and the British had made good use of the early morning mist to land their troops virtually unposed as you heard last episode – the only major hitch for the British so far was the retreating Argentinian platoons b...
Jun 05, 2022•22 min•Season 14Ep. 1
The British were preparing to land their amphibious force on the north western tip of the East Falklands at a place called San Carlos. I won’t go into the long drawn out debate that took place between commanders over alternatives, because its moot considering what happened next. However as you’re going to hear, because they had not managed to take control of the air war, some of the landing and support vessels were going to suffer the consequences. By 15th May, civilians aboard the ships includi...
May 29, 2022•21 min•Season 13Ep. 1
The HSM Sheffield has just been sunk by an Exocet days after the General Belgrano was sent to the depths by two torpedoes. This war was turning nastier by the minute and not helped by the media on both sides – British Warship sunk by Argies – yelled the Sun Headline The Daily Star was a bit more direct – its headline was merely: SUNK! The odd thing was that the Sheffield had not actually gone down by the time these stories were published – it would take three days for the Sheffield to eventually...
May 22, 2022•25 min•Season 1Ep. 12
A catastrophe had befallen the Argentinians with the sinking of the Belgrano on May 2nd 1982, all in all 368 sailors died after it was torpedoed by the nuclear submarine HMS Conqueror. While Argentina’s warships never ventured out to sea again, the diplomatic fallout from the sinking caused Britain to lose a great deal of good faith that she’d built up over the preceding few weeks. But it was only two days later that Admiral Anaya was going to take his revenge. Before then, a few bits of action ...
May 15, 2022•24 min•Season 1Ep. 11
The Vulcan has just bombed Port Stanley airfield, causing significant damage and the Argentinians on the Falklands were about to experience a wave of attacks by Sea Harriers. While this was happening, Argentina’s most powerful warship the General Belgrano was steaming into the Atlantic for the last time as it turn out. To the north east, Vice-Admiral Woodward’s battle group of thirteen ships had entered the exclusion zone in the early hours of the 1st May and the flight-deck crews on board the c...
May 08, 2022•26 min•Season 1Ep. 10
It’s late April 1982 and the British have retaken the island of South Georgia after a sharp fight against the Argentinians who’d seized the frozen outcrop the day after the Falklands were invaded. The Argentine fleet had returned to its base after the initial landing on 2nd April, its welcome as the force which had regained the islands muted by the United Nations resolution calling for a withdrawal and the news that the British had dispatched a task force. It would be at least two weeks before t...
May 01, 2022•20 min•Season 1Ep. 9
When we ended last episode, the Argentinians had just seized Gryviken in South Georgia on 3rd April 1982 and had begun to move new units into the Falklands replacing the commandos who landed on the 2nd. The British cabinet had met and the Task Force was at sea within 5 days. Elements of the force converged on the Ascension Islands at the end of the second week of April 1982 and were under orders to prepare a number of options for the cabinet’s decision. Commodore Clapp and Brigadier Thompson abo...
Apr 24, 2022•26 min•Season 1Ep. 8
The Argentinians invaded the Falklands on 2nd April 1982 and as you heard last episode, the main force took the islands after a short firefight at Government House which left one Argentinian dead and two wounded and one Royal Marine wounded in the arm there. The Army’s 25th Regiment was already flying in from the mainland airfield of Comodoro Rivadavia to replace the marine landing force. It would be followed by the 9th Engineer Company, and these two units would constitute the first Argentine G...
Apr 17, 2022•24 min•Season 1Ep. 7
The Argentinians have just landed commandos and attacked the Marine Barracks at Moody Brook, but missed their target as the 40 specialist brit soldiers have been on the move for more than a day already. As your heard last episode, the British finally managed to get a warning to their Falklands Governor, Rex Hunt, a few hours before the Argentinian fleet anchored off Port Stanley. Argentinian Rear-Admiral Büsser had been studying the problems of landing at the Falklands since January 1982 and the...
Apr 10, 2022•21 min•Season 1Ep. 6
As we heard last episode, Argentinian businessman Senor Davidoff had chartered a boat to take 41 of his men to South Georgia to salvage metal and other materials from abandoned whaling stations. The had not reported to the British head of a scientific mission at the port of Grytviken despite being told to. It was March 1982 and the Bahia Buen Suceso had dropped off the scrapmen on the island who were breaking down the abandoned buildings. They’d also been joined by a French film crew who were fo...
Apr 03, 2022•25 min•Season 1Ep. 5
As you heard last episode, Admiral Jorge Anaya had begun to plan an invasion of the Falklands by 1979, shortly after Argentina won the Soccer World Cup of 1978. Anaya had been commander-in-chief of the Argentine Navy and a member of the military junta that controlled the country since 1976. But by far the most important player in this saga was General Leopoldo Galtieri who became president shortly before Anaya was installed as navy chief. Incumbent president Roberto Viola’s health had been deter...
Mar 27, 2022•27 min•Season 1Ep. 4
This is episode three and we’re dealing with the period up to the invasion of the islands by the Argentinians on 2nd April 1982. Had it been a day earlier, most people across the world would have thought that the news was a horrendous April Food Joke – but it wasn’t. As we heard last episode, by 1971 negotiations between the British and the Argentinians had vascillated between good intentions and terrible breakdowns. Throughout the 1960s, the British were trying to figure out how to offload the ...
Mar 21, 2022•22 min•Season 1Ep. 3
Those who fought in their twenties would be in their mid-sixties now – and there are quite a few thousand vets on both sides commemorating fallen comrades. As you heard last episode, the ownership of the Falklands has been disputed for centuries although the islanders themselves are very clear who they are – they’re British. Through today’s podcast you’ll hear that at times, London was not so sure about that. What some forget is that the British government in the 1960s were close to doing a deal...
Mar 12, 2022•24 min•Season 1Ep. 2
It was an odd war, fought with the same weapons, NATO weapons. But bullets don’t recognize nationalities, neither do torpedoes and missiles and both sides were going to brutalise each other with western arms. That was only one of many unusual facts about this short sharp war that has left the veterans on both side wondering what it was all for. As we watch Russia invade Ukraine claiming ownership, this is surely a moment to reflect on the Falklands where 255 British military personnel died, alon...
Mar 08, 2022•21 min•Ep. 1
