Aftermath of the Falklands War
The only civilian deaths during the war were three women who were killed when a Royal Navy shell hit the house they were sheltering in during a naval bombardment of military targets inside Stanley itself.
This, and other responses to parliamentary questions, and leaks of information to the BBC has been alleged by historian Hugh Bicheno to be a deliberate attempt to undermine the Thatcher government on the part of a variety of individuals who had a vested interest in its fall.
Mark Urban in his book UK Eyes Alpha makes reference to a "figure intimate with the workings of GCHQ" who suggested that Rowlands's comment had no noticeable effect.
[10] Ultimately, the successful conclusion of the war gave a noticeable fillip to British patriotic feeling, with the mobilisation of national identity encapsulated in the so-called "Falklands Factor".
Since the failure of the 1956 Suez campaign, the end of Empire and the economic decline of the 1970s which culminated in the Winter of Discontent, Britain had been beset by uncertainty and anxiety about its international role, status and capability.
[24] Militarily, the Falklands conflict remains the largest air-naval combat operation between modern forces since the end of the Second World War.
The French Exocet missile proved its lethality in air-to-surface operations, leading to retrofitting of most major ships with Close-in weapon systems (CIWS).
The air war in the Falklands vindicated the UK decision to maintain at least the STOVL aircraft carriers after the retirement of HMS Ark Royal.
The domination of air power in major naval engagements was demonstrated, along with the usefulness of carriers and it proved the small but manoeuvrable Sea Harrier as a true fighter.
The disparity in figures, with the Argentine fighters failing to shoot down a single Sea Harrier, can be explained by several factors, including limited fighter control that was provided by British warships in San Carlos Water, the then almost unparalleled Blue Fox radar, and the extreme manoeuvrability of the Sea Harrier.
This was hastily rectified after the war, with Sea King helicopters fitted with radomes containing a variant of the Nimrod ASW aircraft's Searchwater radar.
Task force commander Rear Admiral Sir Sandy Woodward referred to the conflict as "a lot closer run than many would care to believe", reflecting the naval and military belief that few people understood—or understand—the extent to which the logistical dimension made the war a difficult operation for the UK.
With such a high proportion of the Royal Navy's surface fleet engaged, or lost in combat, there were few units available for northbound traffic.
British special forces destroyed many Argentine aircraft (notably in the SAS raid on Pebble Island) and carried out highly informative intelligence-gathering operations.
Contrary to popular understanding, the Argentine special forces also patrolled hard, in appalling climatic conditions, against a professional enemy and showed that they could sometimes get the upper hand.
[32] Nylon was shown[citation needed] to be a poor choice for fabric in uniforms, as it is more flammable than cotton and also melts with heat.
Strained by two oil crises (1973 and 1979), the United Kingdom's government desired to cut defence spending in line with the rest of Europe.
)[33] Denis Healey, the Defence Secretary in 1966, once said that aircraft carriers were required only for operations involving 'landing or withdrawal of troops against sophisticated opposition outside range of land-based air cover'.
"Since here was a clear, imminent threat to British overseas territory that could only be reached by sea, what the hell was the point in having a Navy if it was not used for this sort of thing?".
[42] Within the defence budget itself funding for training and even basic maintenance was significantly cut, a factor contributing to the accidental loss of the Argentine submarine San Juan in 2017.
The Soviets became aware that the British relied heavily on the quality and training of their personnel to compensate for the extreme logistical difficulties the campaign presented.
The Official History describes the contorted logistical arrangements that led to the removal of the nuclear depth bombs from the frigates, following political alarm in Whitehall.
[45] In his 2002 memoirs Sir John Nott, Britain's Secretary of State for Defence during the conflict, made following disclosure regarding the activities of the UK's Secret Intelligence Service (MI6): I authorised our agents to pose as bona fide purchasers of equipment on the international market, ensuring that we outbid the Argentines, and other agents identified Exocet missiles in markets and rendered them inoperable.
[47]According to Russian journalist Sergei Brilev, whose claims were reported in The Times on 2 April 2010, Argentina may have received satellite imagery of British positions from the Soviet Union during the conflict.
Many recovered better than medical opinion of the time considered possible; subsequent theories have postulated this may have been due to a combination of the extreme cold and the good standards of physical fitness amongst the wounded.
Britain also had medical staff familiar with high velocity gunshot wounds, due to their experiences in the Northern Ireland conflict with the IRA.
[citation needed] The British Ministry of Defence was accused several times of a systematic failure to prepare service personnel for the horrors of war and to provide adequate care for them afterwards.
There are allegations that the Ministry of Defence has tried to ignore the issue of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which left many sufferers emotionally scarred and unable to work, immersed in social dislocation, alcoholism, and depression.
A comprehensive statistical study of the deaths of personnel deployed to the Falklands since the end of the conflict was published by Defence Analytical Services and Advice (DASA) on Tuesday 14 May 2013.
Lawrence was shot at close range by an FN rifle and lost a large percentage of brain matter, but recovered to a degree not thought possible.
