The Argentine Occupation

[Firefly]

What was life like for the Islanders after the Invasion.

For the people of the Falklands, occupation was at best demeaning, at worst terrifying.

[Man_of_Stoat]

@www.falklands.info

Communique No.3
Instructions for the Population

As a consequence of all the necessary actions taken, and in order to ensure the safety of the population, all people are to remain at their homes until further notice. New instructions will be issued. The population must bear in mind that, in order to ensure the fulfilment of these instructions, military troops shall arrest all people found outside their homes.

To avoid inconvenience and personal misfortunes, people are to abide by the following:-

1. Should some serious problem arise and people wish to make it known to the Military Authorities, a white piece of cloth is to be placed outside the door. Military patrols will visit the house so as to be informed and provide a solution.

2. All schools, shops, stores, banks, pubs and Clubs are to remain closed until further notice.

3. All infringements shall be treated according to what is stated in Communique (Edict) No.1.

4. All further instructions shall be released through the local broadcasting station which shall remain in permanent operation.

Islas Malvinas 02 Abril 1982
OSVALDO JORGE GARCIA
General de Division
Comandante del Teatro de Operaciones
MALVINAS

[Man_of_Stoat]

@http://www.falklands.info/history/dc82memories.html

One day I was interrogated by an Argentine officer. He was Canadian, with Argentine grandparents, and thus spoke perfect English. What knocked me to the floor was that he had amazingly detailed dossiers on nearly everyone, including myself. He knew where my dad worked, where he and my mum were born, what schools I went to - everything. Pointless info. really, but where did he get it from?

The flat I lived in overlooked the school. The Argentines had turned the playground into a compound. I used to watch as soldiers would come in to get their meagre ration of soup with a few spuds in it. I also used to watch, spellbound, as erring soldiers were put through punishments of wriggling across the ground like snakes, on their bellies, arms either side, with the odd swift kick up the khyber from an irate NCO. They noticed me watching one day when they had no food. They were angry, pointed their guns up at me, and waited while an officer came and told me I had to keep the curtains closed 24 hours a day from now on; though not before I saw three corpses being slid into large plastic wrappings, not the sophisticated ‘body bags’ used today.

Everywhere we went we had to ‘wave something white’ when encountering the military. Luckily, I had a handkerchief that had come up semi-grey courtesy of ‘Square deal Surf’, so I was okay.

It was time for me to broadcast a record round-up. It was almost 8pm, cold and dark, as I made my way up to the studio. After numerous hanky-waving rituals, made even more of a pain in the backside as I was lugging 12 or so slippery LPs under my arm, I was stopped by a group of soldiers who insisted they ‘check’ my LPs. One made them burst out laughing. It was Queen’s first LP, simply called Queen. One pointed to a picture of the then long-haired Roger Taylor and said ‘Maricon’ (poof) and tossed the album into the grass. They let me retrieve it and I broadcast my programme. I even managed to make the quip ‘Record round-up makes the day go (Dago) quicker’…hmmmmmm…well, I thought it was good at the time.

Gradually, I (as did nearly the whole population) ceased work. After a couple of rushed editions of the Times, the military used my office as their second-in-command HQ. Everything I had there was smashed, torn - completely destroyed by them. We were even told to bury components of our CB radios two miles apart! I don’t think anybody did.

Myself and Peter King busied ourselves painting giant red crosses on the roof of the nurses’ home so it wouldn’t get flattened in the event of an air attack. Band rehearsals were over, the Town Hall was being used as a barracks. The Post Office was turned into a giant latrine. Soldiers even defecated in the drawers of the Postmaster’s desk. Argentine pesos were replacing Falkland Islands pounds. Even our stamps were over-franked with an Islas Malvinas postcode.

At first, we didn’t bother talking to the soldiers, but as the days went by people spoke to the many who could speak English. A lot I spoke to were actually amazed we could speak English. The younger conscripts had been told they were going to fight their bitter enemies, the Chileans. Another trio of ‘semi-schoolboys’ manning a machine gun nest outside Church Flats told me they had no choice but to join the Argentine army. Leave college and have no job or join up. This fuelled the rife speculation that Argentina had invaded partly to steer the nation’s anger away from the junta’s miserable handling of the plummeting economy. I didn’t hate the conscript soldiers. I genuinely felt sorry for them. The regulars were another matter. Hard-bitten, resolute - an attitude that made the whole situation all the more surreal. They were an unknown quantity. Argentina had never been to war before but were itching for a fight. Just ask the idiot who let the Task Force ships anchor in San Carlos.

And the chap’s treatment when he travelled through Argentina after being deported for “printing ‘anti-Argentine propaganda’ over the years”:

I went to the desk where the flights to Uruguay departed. There were no flights for another six hours or so. In those days, all foreigners in Argentina had to carry a little white photo-ID card. They asked for mine. When I showed them, they shouted something like: ‘He’s from Malvinas’. I was quickly surrounded by people. One old woman punched me repeatedly in the back. An old man spat all over me. One woman, who could speak good English, was ranting on about how Thatcher was going to nuke Buenos Aires (a bloody good idea I thought) and how Britain had forced her son to go to war. I couldn’t argue. They left me alone after a while. I’d had a good kicking. I felt pleased I hadn’t cried although I desperately wanted to.

[Man_of_Stoat]

@http://www.falklands.info/history/hist82article19.html

Imprisoned at Goose Green and Fox Bay

After air raids on Goose Green and Stanley, the Argentines forcibly imprisoned all Goose Green residents in the community hall - 115 people including 43 children and two people over eighty, at first with no food or bedding, and only two toilets. In breach of the Geneva Convention, they were kept in a building not marked as for civilian detainees and not provided with shelters against air and artillery bombardment. The prisoners lifted the floorboards to dig dank uncomfortable bunkers for safety as bombs and shells exploded.

They were not held as hostages but because the Argentines were paranoid about spies and fifth columnists. Convinced the prisoners were transmitting radio messages, the Argentines frequently carried out searches which no one escaped, not even four-month old Matthew McMullen. “They would look in his nappy while the watching adults hoped Matthew had a special surprise for them!” They got a message to the Catholic priest Monsignor Daniel Spraggon, who remonstrated with the Argentines to relieve their plight.

A group of Stanley citizens were suddenly rounded up to be incarcerated together at Fox Bay. These included Brian and Owen Summers, Gerald Cheek, Stuart Wallace, and George and Velma Malcolm, who describes her arrest with characteristic bluntness: "A big burly bumptious bugger said: “You’re going to camp… He had drawn his pistol and was standing over me. I said: ‘You don’t need that gun. I’m not likely to do anything silly.’” The book describes their experiences as “demeaning and terrifying”.

Curfews, deportation and community spirit

“Shared dangers and self-help brought the community together. People who had bickered for years became firm friends.” Compassion also extended to Argentine conscripts who were given food by Islanders.

There is a dramatic account of how three civilians - Sue Whitley, Doreen Bonner and Mary Goodwin - were killed and others injured in John Fowler’s house by a misdirected British Naval shell from HMS Avenger.

Curfews were imposed and Bill Luxton - “the famous vitriolic critic of the Argentines” - and his family from Chartres were forcibly deported to Britain. A positive side effect was that Bill gave the British forces useful intelligence information and launched a worldwide information campaigned condemning the Argentines.

‘Nice Argies, Nasty Argies’

The Argentine who caused most fear was the “sinister and dangerous” head of military police intelligence, Major Patricio Dowling, who personified “the Argentine terror machine”. He had detailed personal dossiers on Islanders and carried out arbitrary house searches and arrests. In one incident at Neil and Glenda Watson’s Long Island Farm, Dowling pointed a weapon at their young daughter Lisa and repeatedly ordered her to stand up. Lisa repeatedly said no and continued sucking her thumb, until Dowling gave up.

Dowling was ordered home part way through the occupation by two “decent” senior Argentine officers. Comodoro Carlos Bloomer Reeve, described as “the acceptable face of Argentina”, a man of “humanity and bravery” who did a great deal to protect Islanders from the excesses of their compatriots in what he regarded as a misguided adventure. He was amiable, always smiling, not politically driven, having previously lived with his family and made friends with Islanders in 1975/1976 when he ran the Argentine Air Force passenger service to the Falklands. His 1982 task was to organise an interim military administration, helped by naval Captain Barry Melbourne Hussey, “a man of humane principles” who worked to help Islanders.

Orders were that Islanders were to be regarded as Argentine citizens and treated well. In these two officers, Graham Bound writes, “Islanders had gained powerful friends who, though Argentines, proved that fundamental decency could survive when all other strands of civilised behaviour were unravelling.”

Benign Whitehall warrior: Foreign Office deceit

[1000ydstare]

I don’t think the Argies won any friends when they landed, something that may hinder their chances if the Islanders are ever polled on who they want to be part of!!!

Of course the other things they did was attempted to get all Islanders to drive on the wrong side of the road - which led to games of chicken apparently. And tried to impose Spanish on the Islanders as their “new” language.

Starving, beating and in some cases killing their conscripts, even before the Brits landed, probably didn’t win the Islanders “Hearts and Minds” either!!!

[1000ydstare]

Were there any British casualties during the invasion?

The Argies mortared Moody Brook barracks, which lays lie their reported desire to take the place with no casualties and I know they had at least three of their own killed during the hostilities on the Falklands.

Were there any more or any Brits?

I don’t think there were any losses on either side at Georgia, although a frigate and a heli were shot up by the Marines on the Island.

The full story being that when they finally ran out of ammo, after using rifles, machine guns and a Carl Gustav to see off a heli, a frigate/corvette and a landing party, they surrendered. The Argentines couldn’t believe that there were so few!!!

[Cuts]

No Brit cas during the invason, not through want of trying mind.

Moody Brook bore the marks of WP and HE grens inside, as it would have been marked in a house clearance.
It must have surprised the 601 boys to find that Royal had already deployed !

At least two 601 troops were slotted trying to get into Government House, I’m unsure of any cas in the Amtrak that was stopped.

[1000ydstare]

Didn’t the Argies try to get the islander birds to chat and have fun with them?

Saw some pics that had been taken but the girls wouldn’t even look at the blokes.

They were taken back, because the Junta told them they were conquering heros retaking the islands and freeing the population. They thought they would be treated like heros instead they were treated like a bad smell.

[Eagle]

@1000ydstare

Were there any British casualties during the invasion?

No. The only british soldier who was wounded was at Georgias islands, reached on a leg by argentine machine gun fire.

The Argies mortared Moody Brook barracks, which lays lie their reported desire to take the place with no casualties and I know they had at least three of their own killed during the hostilities on the Falklands.

No. In the Operation “Rosario” Argentina suffered only one death. He was the Captain Giachino, from the navy special forces, who was killed trying to cope the Governor’s house. In the same place a medic was reached with rifles fire.
The other two soldiers that you are talking about died in the Operation “Azul”. They were argentine marines, into the Puma Helicopter which was shoot down in the Georgias on April the 3rd.

I don’t think there were any losses on either side at Georgia, although a frigate and a heli were shot up by the Marines on the Island.
The full story being that when they finally ran out of ammo, after using rifles, machine guns and a Carl Gustav to see off a heli, a frigate/corvette and a landing party, they surrendered. The Argentines couldn’t believe that there were so few!!!

Talking about the Operation “Azul” (blue), on April the 3rd two helicopters (a cargo helicopter, Puma; and an attack helicopter Alouette III) and two ships (a corvette “Guerrico” and a polar ship “Bahia Paraiso”) were moved to take the Georgias islands.
At first the Allouette made a patrol, and found millitary movements on Grytviken, the same place where the Puma was trying to land and disembark it second wave of marines (the first wave of 15 soldiers had had landed minutes before). There it was reached by at least 80 bullets. The pilot lost the controls and it crashed at the outsides from Pt Grytviken.

When the argentine helicopter was shoot down, the 15 marines that were landed before, the crew of the Puma and the unharmed marines on the Puma started an attack against the british Royal Marines, supported by another landing from the corvette.
Besides, the corvette Guerrico opened fire from the cost with its cannons and machine guns, and receiveng fire too.

The Allouette left his works as an assault helicopter and played a role of CSAR (Combat Safe and Rescue), taking away the Puma’s victims.

Five minutes later, a section of mortars were landed. At the same time the first white flags started to flame. The casualties: Two argentine marines deads, four argentine marines harmed, one british Royal Marine harmed.

Some pics:

Argentine Navy Corvette, ARA “Guerrico”, nowadays in service.

Argentine Navy Polar Ship ARA “Bahia Paraiso”, lost and sunk in an accident.

Port Grytviken, Georgias islands, in summer

Port Grytviken, Georgias islands, in winter

The polar ship Bahia Paraiso and the Corvette Guerrico, prepared to launch the attack. This picture was taken by the Allouette crew, in the Georgias islands, on April the 3rd 1982.

I’m sorry but I didn’t find any photograph from the british soldiers that April the 3rd…

[1000ydstare]

Eagle didn’t the Argentine Navy Polar Ship ARA Bahia Paraiso sink after the Falklands war? She was also repainted and used as a Hospital ship during the war too. See my thread on “hosptial ships and search lights” or whatever I called it. She was the ship involved.

[Eagle]

Yeah mate… The Bahia Paraiso was used, after the Georgias recovering, as a hospital ship. The same happened with the icebraker Almirante Irizar, that was used as a cargo ship in the recovering of the Malvinas islands, and then used as a hospital.

I said that the Bahía Paraíso was lost and sunk in an accident, but I didn’t say when that accident happened.

In 1989 the polar ship was supplying some Argentine Antarctic Bases, when crashed with a rock, in the coast of the Anver Island, not far from the Antarctic peninsula. Until today there are a lot of denunciations that near the ship, the gas-oil is still flowing.

Greetings! Saludos!