I'm coming in late and probably saying things repeated but.
HOW THE FUCKING HELL CAN YOU NOT KNOW ABOUT ONE OF THE MAJOR CONFLICTS OF THE SECOND HALF OF THE 20TH CENTURY!
the american education system is officially shit.
Now. since its probably been explained about the technical side, i will represent the idealistic and patriotic side. Frankly, from a tactical point of view, Falklands war was pointless. Sending an armada of the relatively small British fleet including 2 aircraft carriers, the
Hermes being absolutely frigging ancient and only in use because she was much larger than the
Invincible (i think that was the other carrier
). It was a tiny rock of a few hundred colonists. Tactically, Falklands meant nothing.
Idealistically it meant two things.
1) Britains empire had been and still is crumbling to dust. We've handed back alot of our crown states and suchlike. But when a force actively invaded our territory, it was an act of war. Many countries expected, because of the crumbling empire mentality, that we would relinquish the Falklands, it would remain in Argentina's hands and be renamed the Malvinas islands, their Argentinian name. We did not.
When Margaret thatcher declared that the Royal navy, one of the most prestigious yet weakening forces in the world, was going to respond and defend our sovereign territory, it shocked the world. The Argentinian government wasnt expecting us to respond, Weren't expecting us to attack the garrison, werent expecting the HMS
Conqueror to sink the ARA
General Belgrano, the pride of the Argentinian fleet. The war showed that Britain still had strength. And it damn well had the will to use it.
2) Margeret thatcher was under alot of pressure, with trade unionist stuff and lots of riots and that kind of thing. By her showing that, inappropriately, she had some balls, she showed the people of Britain, who were in outrage at the invasion of our territory, that She was not a weak woman, not a woman that would succumb to demand, not a woman who was out to get at the people of England. It showed her true colours.
The Falklands/Malvinas war was not just a tactical battle. It was a political battle too. And in both counts....we won.
It cost us. We lost the type 42 destroyer HMS
Sheffield two days after the
Conqueror sent the
Belgrano to the deep, plus i found out we lost another destroyer and two frigates. But we payed a price for cheaper than the Argentinians did.