Cultural impact of the Falklands War

The cultural impact of the Falklands War spanned several media in both Britain and Argentina. A number of films and television productions emerged from the conflict. The first Argentine film about the war was Los chicos de la guerra (The Boys of the War) in 1984. The BBC drama Tumbledown (1988) told the story of a British officer who got paralysed due to a bullet wound. The computer game Harrier Attack (1983) and the naval strategy game Strike Fleet (1987) are two examples of Falklands-related games. A number of fictional works were set during the Falklands War, including in Stephen King's novella The Langoliers (1990), in which the character Nick Hopewell is a Falklands veteran. The war provided a wealth of material for non-fiction writers; in the United Kingdom (UK) an important account became Max Hastings and Simon Jenkins' The Battle for the Falklands.

The Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges wrote a short poem, called Juan López y John Ward (1985), about two fictional soldiers (one from each side), who died in the Falklands, in which he refers to "islands that were too famous". Another Argentine example is "Elegy for the Argentine Dead Boys, in the South Atlantic" by Salvador Oria.^[1] Music referencing the war includes songs by Captain Sensible, the Argentine punk-rock band Los Violadores' song "Comunicado #166", and British heavy metal band Iron Maiden's song called "Como Estais Amigos".^[2]

Arts, entertainment, and electronic media

Films and television

Simon Weston, British war veteran.

A number of films and television productions emerged from the conflict. Notable examples include:

• Simon Weston, a Welsh Guardsman who had suffered serious burns during the bombing of Sir Galahad, became a popular figure due to British media coverage. A series of television documentaries followed the progress of rehabilitation and eventual recovery from his injuries, the first being Simon's War (6 April 1983) in BBC One's QED series.
• The first Argentine film about the war was Los chicos de la guerra (The Boys of the War), directed by Bebe Kamin in 1984.
• The film version of Whoops Apocalypse (1986) features a conflict very similar to the Falklands War between the United Kingdom and the fictional Caribbean country of Maguadora over the equally fictional Santa Maya.
• The BBC drama Tumbledown (31 May 1988) told the story of Robert Lawrence MC, a junior officer in the Scots Guards (Colin Firth) left paralysed down his left side by a gunshot wound to the head inflicted by an Argentine soldier on Mount Tumbledown, during the final push for Stanley, and his adjustment to disabled life after the war.
• Harley Cokeliss' horror film Dream Demon (1988) depicts a planned marriage between the main character and a Falklands War veteran.
• The 1989 British film Resurrected, directed by Paul Greengrass, had David Thewlis as a British soldier previously presumed dead in the war reappearing alive weeks after the end of the conflict.
• In the American/British film For Queen and Country (1989) starring Denzel Washington, Reuben is a St. Lucia-born British ex-para finding it difficult to adjust to civilian life some years after the war. The film deals with the poverty and crime that Reuben encounters back home and how he is ignored by both society and government despite his service.
• The BBC film An Ungentlemanly Act (13 June 1992) depicts the events leading up to and during the initial occupation of the Islands by the Argentine Army. Based on true events, the film was produced to mark the 10th anniversary of the conflict and starred actors Ian Richardson as Governor Rex Hunt and Bob Peck as Major Mike Norman.
• The Cracker episode "Brotherly Love" (1995) features a psychologically damaged veteran from the Falklands War, Barney (Ron Donachie), who gets into a brief argument with DS Jimmy Beck (Lorcan Cranitch) and flies into an insane rage, when Beck shows no interest in Barney's exploits in the war.
• Although the drama by Ian Curteis that became known simply as The Falklands Play was originally commissioned by the BBC in 1983, it was then temporarily set aside until 1985. The Corporation subsequently gave a number of reasons why it could not be made, including that it would have been broadcast too close to the 1987 General Election. Curteis maintained that the generally sympathetic portrayal of Margaret Thatcher and his refusal to include material that was contrary to both the official record and what his interviews with the major protagonists had revealed, went against a perceived BBC anti-government bias, citing the fact that Tumbledown - which he and others claimed was more "anti-establishment" - was made and broadcast. Curteis' play was eventually recorded in a truncated form and screened by the digital satellite channel BBC Four in 2002.
• The 2005 Argentine film Iluminados por el fuego ("Enlightened by Fire"), directed by Tristán Bauer and starring Gastón Pauls, is a docudrama based on the autobiographical novel of the same name by Argentine Falklands veteran Edgardo Esteban, who fought in the conflict as an 18-year-old conscript. It received a San Sebastián Festival special award. The film tells about a veteran's memories, re-awakened after he learns of the suicide of a former soldier comrade. The movie gave a realistic portrait of the extreme weather and psychologically stressful conditions the Argentine soldiers faced in the field, the brutality and indifference to the suffering of the soldiers by their leaders, and the horrors of modern conflict. The movie won several awards, including a Goya.
• The 2006 British film This Is England, directed by Shane Meadows, is set in July 1983 in a small town in England and includes documentary footage and extracts from radio broadcasts about the Falklands War. The main character of the film is 12-year-old Shaun, whose father was killed fighting in the war.
• The British science fiction series Ashes to Ashes uses the Falklands War as a backdrop during its second series.
• BBC motoring show Top Gear visited Argentina in 2014 for filming a Christmas Special. However, the presenters' cars' number plates were seen as references to Falklands War. Presenter Jeremy Clarkson's Porsche 928's original number plate "H982 FKL" was seen as a direct reference to the conflict. Upon reaching Ushuaia, from where the General Belgrano departed on its final voyage, an angry mob confronted them. The three presenters were forced to abandon their cars, which were pelted with rocks from demonstrators, and catch the last plane to Buenos Aires and flee to Chile. A filming crew of 30, who was left behind, was escorted to the Chilean border by local police overland.
• The Falklands War is a significant episode of the 2011 biographical film The Iron Lady, depicting the life and career of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
• In the 2015 TV show Blunt Talk the protagonist, Walter Blunt (Played by Patrick Stewart) is a former Royal Marines major and veteran of the Falklands War along with his valet Harry Chandler (Played by Adrian Scarborough), a former Royal Marines lance corporal.

Games

• The computer games Harrier Attack (1983) and Yomp presented unofficial portraits of the fighting.
• The naval strategy game Strike Fleet (1987) includes a scenario set in the Falklands, where the player takes control of British destroyers under attack from Argentine submarines.
• The naval strategy game Janes Fleet Command includes a scenario set in the Falklands, where the player controls the entire naval force, from Carriers to Destroyers and Aircraft.
• The naval tactical game Harpoon 4 has an extension book named "South Atlantic War: Battle for the Falklands" which comprises numerous scenarios and historical details about the conflict. The second edition was published in 2002 by Clash of Arms Games.
• Malvinas 2032, developed by Sabarasa, is a real-time strategy game, in which the player has to command the Argentine forces and re-take the Falkland Islands for Argentina.^[3]
• The Falklands War - 1982 scenario collection, created with the Harpoon3 naval warfare simulator, is intended to accurately recreate the real-life war from 1982.^[4]
• The Falklands War 1982 was published by Shrapnel games.^[5]
• Port Stanley: Battle for the Falklands (1984), a battalion level board war game of the land campaign, was published by 3W.
• John Tiller's Squad Battles Falklands is a turn-based, realistic videogame based on the Falklands land war.^[6]
• Falklands '82 (1986) by Personal Software Services.
• Project Reality v1.4 includes multiple maps based on the Falkland conflict^[7]

Literature

Fiction

• Jack Higgins' thriller Exocet (1983) deals with one of the war's most famous "buzz-words"; for many years afterwards, "Exocet" became synonymous with "missile" in the UK. ("Yomp" and "Task Force" also entered the language.)
• Pierre Boulle's novel La Baleine des Malouines (1983), translated in the UK as The Falklands Whale and in the US as The Whale of the Victoria Cross, is about a blue whale which befriends the British task force.
• The comic strip Bloom County featured several story lines taking place during the Falklands War.
• Raymond Briggs' picture book The Tin-Pot Foreign General and the Old Iron Woman (1984) is a satire of the Falklands War.
• On Foreign Ground (1986) by Eduardo Quiroga, a novel in diary/letter form, tells of the war from the viewpoint of a young Argentine soldier.
• In Stephen King's novella The Langoliers (1990), the character Nick Hopewell is a Falklands veteran.
• Falklands 2: Argentina's Back and This Time It's Different (1997) by Jim Thorn is a technothriller about a fictional second invasion of the Falkland Islands.
• The first chapters of Chris Ryan's novel Land of Fire (2002) are set in the Falklands War, while the latter part involves a plot by a new military junta to re-invade the islands.
• The novel Ghost Force (2006) by Patrick Robinson depicts the Argentines reinvading the Falklands.
• David Mitchell's bildungsroman Black Swan Green (2006) is set in Worcestershire, England, in 1982, and contains many references to the Falklands War.
• Daniel E. Arias' novel That Forgotten Little War (2012) is about the intertwined lives of 14 participants in the Falkland War.
• The Captain's Story (2012) by Ray J. Cowling is a Falklands War novel about fictional Commander Mike Mansfield of the fictional Type 42 destroyer HMS Devonport.
• A Stone's Throw (2015) by Lee Watts is set mainly in Belfast during the troubles but has several chapters concerning the Falklands conflict and Mount Longdon.

Non-fiction

The war provided a wealth of material for writers, and many dozens of books came from it; in the United Kingdom (UK) the definitive account became Max Hastings and Simon Jenkins' The Battle for the Falklands. Other titles focused on the Sea Harrier (Sharkey Ward's Sea Harrier over the Falklands), the land battles leading up to the Argentine surrender (Christian Jennings and Adrian Weale's Green Eyed Boys), and the general experience of battle and life in the surrounding area (Ken Lukowiak's A Soldier's Song and Marijuana Time). Vincent Bramley's "Forward into Hell" offers a less apologetic account of the War. In Argentina, one of the best-known is Commodore Pablo Carballo's Halcones de Malvinas, a collection of personal experiences of fighter pilots and many others^[8] and mandatory reading for admission to the FAA' Escuela de Aviación Militar.^[9]

Poetry

The Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges, himself partly of British descent and bilingual in Spanish and English, wrote a short poem, called Juan López y John Ward (1985), about two fictional soldiers (one from each side), who died in the Falklands, in which he refers to "islands that were too famous". He also said about the war: "The Falklands thing was a fight between two bald men over a comb."^[10]

A large amount of poetry has been written on both sides, regarding the war. An Argentine example is "Elegy for the Argentine Dead Boys, in the South Atlantic" by Salvador Oria.^[11]

Comics

• The comic book Hellblazer, which is unique in that unlike other comics, it takes place in real time and shows present day crisis and social commentary about Britain. The Falklands War is one of those themes that were portrayed and mentioned upon in various issues and story arcs.^[12]

Music

Music referencing the war includes:

• The song "Glad its all over" by Captain Sensible, is about the Falklands War.^[13]
• The song "Brothers in Arms" is supposed to be about the Falklands War of 1982.^[14]
• The Argentine punk-rock band Los Violadores wrote the song "Comunicado #166" at their album Y ahora qué pasa ¿eh?. The song is critical of the military Junta, and the role of the United States. Pil Trafa, the lead singer, commented in 2001 that Argentina should not try to annex the islands, but rather improve as a country, so that the Falklanders themselves would emigrate to Argentina.^[15]
• The Falklands War provided much of the subject matter for Pink Floyd's album The Final Cut (1983), written by Roger Waters. The lyrics are highly critical of perceived British jingoism and of the Thatcher government's actions. A specific lyric protesting the sinking of ARA General Belgrano reads: "...Galtieri took the Union Jack. And Maggie, over lunch one day, took a cruiser with all hands... apparently to make him give it back."
• Pop musician Elvis Costello wrote the song "Shipbuilding" (1983) with Clive Langer in response to the Falklands War. Written from the point of view of workers in a depressed shipbuilding town, it points out that their jobs only come at the expense of the lives lost in the war.
• Argentine rock musician Charly García recorded the song "No Bombardeen Buenos Aires" during the war and released it in his album Yendo De La Cama Al Living. The song is about the socio-political climate in Argentina during the war.
• Much material produced around this time by the anarchist punk band Crass was extremely critical of the war and its aftermath, in particular the album Yes Sir, I Will (1983) and the singles "Sheep Farming in the Falklands" and "How Does it Feel to be the Mother of 1,000 Dead?" The latter, intended as a statement directed at Mrs. Thatcher, led to questions in Parliament and a request for prosecution for obscenity from Conservative MP for Enfield North, Timothy Eggar.^[16] Crass were also responsible for Thatchergate, a hoax tape, originally attributed to the Soviet KGB, on which the spliced voice of Margaret Thatcher appears to imply that the destroyer HMS Sheffield was deliberately sacrificed in order to escalate the conflict.
• The folk rock band The Levellers wrote and produced the song "Another Man's Cause" featuring the lyrics "Your daddy well he died in the Falklands."
• Manchester group The Fall released the single "Marquis Cha-Cha" (1983), which tells the story of a Lord Haw-Haw type figure who broadcasts from Argentina but meets a sticky end.
• British heavy metal band Iron Maiden recorded for their album Virtual XI (1998) a song called "Como Estais Amigos", about the Falklands War.^[17]
• Macclesfield-based punk band The Macc Lads penned a typically un-PC song called "Buenos Aires (1982, Falklands War Mix)" which included lyrics such as "Costa Mendez lives in fear / Of real men who can hold their beer!" and "hey hey hey / The lads are on their way / With their bayonets and tommy guns / and their bellies full of Boddingtons."
• Joe Jackson's song "Tango Atlantico" (from the 1986 album Big World) represents a look back at the Falklands War.
• The title track of The Exploited's album Let's Start a War (1983) directly addresses the Falklands War, implying Margaret Thatcher started it almost on a whim, for her own benefit and to take the focus away from other problems Britain was facing at the time, such as unemployment.
• On their album From Here to Eternity: Live (1999), The Clash substitute a line in the song "Career Opportunities" for "I don't wanna die, fighting in the Falkland Strait" which was a common ad-lib during their set at the time.
• Some people in Britain took the song "Six Months in a Leaky Boat" by the New Zealand pop group Split Enz to be a criticism of the war, and the song was banned by the BBC. The group denied that this was the song's intent^[18] particularly because the song was recorded earlier in 1982.
• Relating to the sinking of the Belgrano, British garage band Thee Milkshakes recorded the instrumental song "General Belgrano" on their fourth album The Men with the Golden Guitars (1983). The song begins with the sound of a submarine's sonar.
• Punk band New Model Army's "Spirit of the Falklands" took a highly critical stance of the war and its "selling" to the public by the British Government.
• Swedish power metal band Sabaton's album Attero Dominatus (2006) features a song entitled "Back in Control", whose subject is the Falklands War. It features lyrics along the lines of "Back in control, push them further out to sea / Falklands in our hands, back under British reign".
• Political singer / songwriter Billy Bragg's album Brewing Up with Billy Bragg (1983) features a song "Island of no Return", in which a soldier details his experiences "fighting fascists in the southern sea". Bragg joined the British Army in 1981, but bought his way out a few months later.
• "The Falklands Hymn" is a song by Iain Dale.
• The song "Uninvited Guest" by British group The Christians mentions the Falkland Wars briefly in its lyrics.
• American Midwestern DJ/musician Steve Dahl parodied the war using his own lyrics but the music of The J. Geils Band song "Freeze-Frame".
• The Finnish rock band Eppu Normaali published a song "Argentiina" on their LP Tie Vie, comparing the war to a bad football game with cheating, an incompetent referee (who only understands baseball) and "the choir of the disappeared" as the cheerleaders.
• The Clash make reference to the war in the song "This is England" (1985).
• New wave band Spear of Destiny addressed the war in a song "Mickey", a fictional story about a young soldier losing his sight in the explosion of a landmine.
• New York indie rock band, Vampire Weekend, references the war in the song "Mansard Roof", saying "The Argentines collapse in defeat; The Admiralty surveys the remnants of the fleet".
• British New Wave band The Fixx's single "Stand or Fall" was given little radio play due to its anti-war lyrics, which coincided with the Falklands conflict.
• British progressive rock band Jethro Tull references the war in "Mountain Men" by saying "died in the Falklands on TV".
• The war is mentioned briefly in the song "Cráneo Candente" (Spanish: Blazing skull) of the Argentine band Hermética, from the eponymous 1989 LP.
• Irish folk band Wolfe Tones wrote a song about Admiral William Brown, the Argentine Navy founder, in which they state their support for Argentina on the Falklands' issue.
• Danish rock music composer and singer C.V. Jørgensen included the song "Postkort fra Port Stanley" (Postcard from Port Stanley) on his album Lediggang a go go (1982). The acerbic lyrics^[19] are unusually harsh, even for Jørgensen.
• The American punk rock band NOFX criticizes both Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher for their involvement in the Falklands War in the song "Ronnie & Mags" off their Self Entitled (2012) album.
• Fields of Fire (song) by Big Country, is about the Falklands War.^[20]
• The song "Memorias de la guerra" by Argentine punk rock band Embajada Boliviana, is about the sequels of a Falklands War soldier.

Prior to the Falklands war, the Argentine military had considered its "rockeros" (rock and roll music enthusiasts and artists) as internal enemies of the state. For a time during the war, popular music in English was prohibited on radio stations. Subsequent to the war and the defeat of the military junta, popular music in Argentina reacted strongly to its prior oppression as well as the impact of the war. A number of pop songs grew out of the aftermath of the conflict, including "Para la Vida" by León Gieco.

Theatre

• British playwright Steven Berkoff wrote the highly critical satirical play Sink the Belgrano! (1986) about the British decision to go to war and the sinking of the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano.

Visual arts

Linda Kitson was the official war artist accompanying British troops during the Falklands Conflict. She created over 400 drawings of the troops' daily life, many of which are now part of the Imperial War Museum’s art collection and were exhibited to the general public in November 1982. They were featured again in the Museum's exhibition Women War Artists, in 2011-2012.^[21] All of Kitson's drawings which were not retained by the Museum were sold.

Sport

Tottenham Hotspur's popular Argentine midfielder Ossie Ardiles had helped beat Leicester City one day after the invasion, to no ill effect, although he subsequently left the UK for a year, of his own volition. His cousin José Ardiles, a fighter pilot, was killed during the early stages of the air campaign. The war also created heightened passions between Argentina and England in the 1986, 1998, and 2002 FIFA World Cups, featuring play by Diego Maradona, Peter Shilton, and David Beckham. (See Argentina–England football rivalry.)

State recognition

Monument to the Fallen Soldiers, Buenos Aires.

Liberation Monument, Stanley.

Holidays

The war is commemorated as Día del Veterano de Guerra y los Caídos en Malvinas (Veterans and Fallen Soldiers of the Falklands Day), a public holiday in Argentina, on 2 April. It is sometimes referred to as Malvinas Day.

In Britain, those who lost their lives are remembered as part of Remembrance Sunday.

In the Falkland Islands themselves, two holidays commemorate the war: Margaret Thatcher Day on 10 January and Liberation Day on 14 June (or the first Monday afterward, if it falls on a weekend).

Memorials

In the United Kingdom, there is a national memorial at Pangbourne College, a small co-educational public school in Berkshire; it is titled the Falkland Islands Memorial Chapel.

When the war started a Buenos Aires street, "Calle Inglaterra" (England Street), was renamed "Calle 2 de Abril" (April 2 Street), after the start date of the war. In November 2013, the street briefly reverted to its original name "Calle Inglaterra".^[22] But due to the resulting denunciations and fierce protests caused by this name, the same street was finally renamed in March 2014 as the "Pasaje 2 de Abril" by the Buenos Aires government, also because another street named "Calle 2 de Abril" already exists in Buenos Aires.^[23]

In 1982, after the Falklands War ended, the clock tower "Torre de los Ingleses" (Tower of the English), which was a gift from the local British community to the city of Buenos Aires in commemoration of the centennial of the May Revolution of 1810, was renamed as the "Torre Monumental" (Monumental Tower). At the same time, the "Plaza Británica" (British Square), where the tower is situated, was renamed as the "Plaza Fuerza Aérea Argentina" (Argentine Air Force Square). The Monument to the Fallen Soldiers was built in this square.

Terminology

This war is occasionally written as The Falklands/Malvinas War,^[24][25][26] recognising the international split over the Islands' name. Other constructs such as Falklands Conflict and Falklands Crisis have also been used. The term Guerra de las Malvinas or Malvinas War is the one normally used in Spanish-speaking countries and has also been used by some socialist groups in English-speaking countries.^[27][28]

The name "Guerra del Atlántico Sur", meaning "War of the South Atlantic" is also used in Spanish.^[29][30] Unlike the term "Falklands/Malvinas War", this reflects the fact that some of the conflict occurred in South Georgia, and the deep ocean.

References

1. Oria, Salvador. "Elegy for the Argentine Dead Boys, in the South Atlantic". Falklands.info.
2. Paterson, Lawrence (2009). Blaze Bayley: At the End of the Day. Blaze Bayley Recordings Ltd. p. 70.
3. "Malvinas 2032 game demo". jdejuegos.com.
4. "Falklands War - 1982". HarpoonHQ.
5. "The Falklands War 1982". Shrapnel Games.
6. "John Tiller's Squad Battles Falklands". John Tiller Software.
7. "PR 1.4 Release Announcement". Project Reality official Forums.
8. "Book Review". Air & Space Power Journal. Winter 2006.
9. Escuela de Aviación Militar, FAA. "Bibliografía de consulta obligatoria". Ediciones Argentinidad.
10. Rees, Nigel (2006). Brewer's Famous Quotations: 5,000 Quotations and the Stories Behind Them. London: Orion Publishing Group. p. 98. ISBN 0-304-36799-0. The quote apparently came from an interview published in Le Monde on 27 June 1982.
11. Oria, Salvador. "Elegy for the Argentine Dead Boys, in the South Atlantic". Falklands.info.
12. Sifting Through the Ashes: Analyzing Hellblazer, Part 11
13. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7bobUGEliic
14. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_SKx4m_7vQ The song is about the Malvinas/ Falklands War of 1982, which ended in infamously brutal hand-to-hand combat between infantrymen using practically the same equipment.
15. "Comunicado #166". antiwarsongs.org (in Spanish).
16. "Label". Southern.com.
17. Paterson, Lawrence (2009). Blaze Bayley: At the End of the Day. Blaze Bayley Recordings Ltd. p. 70.
18. "000809". dummocrats.
19. "Postkort fra Port Stanley". Lyrics59.
20. "Big Country". Rolling Stone. Retrieved 2016-02-07.
21. "Press Desk: Women War Artists". Imperial War Museum. 7 April 2011.
22. La calle "2 de Abril" volvió a llamarse "Inglaterra" y se desató la polémica
23. http://www.parlamentario.com/noticia-70606.html La calle “Inglaterra” se llamará “Pasaje 2 de abril”
24. "The Falklands/Malvinas War". SocialistParty.org.
25. "Warrior Nation - Images of War in British Popular Culture 1850–2000". History.ac.uk.
26. "Justice and the Genesis of War". Cambridge.org.
27. "The Malvinas War Revisited". LRP-cofi.org.
28. "The Malvinas War". World Socialist Web Site. June 2007.
29. Veteranos de Guerra del Atlántico Sur Archived 23 February 2009 at the Wayback Machine.
30. Roberto Russell, America Latina Y La Guerra Del Atlantico Sur

External links

• "Poetry of the 1982 conflict in English". Falklands.info.
• "Poetry in Spanish". PuertoMalvinas.com.ar.