Page 35 - Le Operazioni Interforze e Multinazionali nella Storia Militare - ACTA Tomo II

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ActA
The Retaking of the Falklands in 1982: Successful Joint
Operations Against the Odds

John PEATY

Summary
oint and Combined Operations are by their nature very challenging operations of
J war. During the latter years of the Second World War and subsequently, the British
Armed Forces have excelled at Joint and Combined Operations.
The Falklands conflict of 1982 saw the British Armed Forces successfully mount
Joint Operations – after many years of exercising but little experience - to retake the
Falklands Islands from Argentina. These operations were mounted over great distances
and without a base in the region. Because of the Cold War focus on Europe, Operation
CORPORATE was unforeseen, planning had to be done in a hurry and equipment
was inadequate. Victory was achieved because of the superior skill, training, morale,
robustness, professionalism, leadership and intelligence of the British Armed Forces.
The paper will look in particular at how one type of intelligence - Geographic
Intelligence (GEOINT) - was provided in high quality and at short notice by Ministry
of Defence (MOD) civilians in the UK to the three services: the Royal Navy (in
particular the Royal Marines), the Army and the Royal Air Force. GEOINT provided
the British Armed Forces with excellent situational awareness (far superior to that of
the opponent) and enabled the land, sea and air forces of Britain to co-ordinate their
efforts to a remarkable degree. The demands made by CORPORATE were unexpected,
the difficulties great, the fortunes mixed and improvisation was the order of the day. Yet
despite the rough terrain, the harsh climate and the opponent (numerically superior on
land and in the air), Britain’s Armed Forces co-ordinated to achieve a victory that few
inside and even fewer outside Britain thought possible.
The paper will conclude that a first-class challenge can only be met by first-class
forces, that Joint Operations are inherently complex and difficult, and that success is
only likely if they are properly planned, rehearsed, equipped and led. These are enduring
lessons of military history, lessons which the British Armed Forces successfully put into
practice in Southern Italy seventy years ago and relearned the hard way in the South
Atlantic in 1982.

Introduction
April 1st is a risky day for the gullible in Britain, where hoaxes are a national sport. In
1977 thousands were fooled when the “Guardian” newspaper announced the existence
of Sans Serriffe, a pair of islands in the Indian Ocean, shaped like a semi colon and
named Caissa Superiore and Caissa Inferiore. The normally sober MOD has been known
to join in, with a proposal to reduce costs by replacing Regimental goats with rabbits.