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| Falklands still home to optimists as invasion anniversary nears | Falklands still home to optimists as invasion anniversary nears |
| (about 2 hours later) | |
| At the eastern end of Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands, where the sea mists are thickest and the winds iciest, there are whole streets of optimists. Instead of the usual weatherbeaten, unshowy old cottages and bungalows, crouching behind painstakingly raised hedges, there are new two-storey houses with sun decks, conservatories and picture windows. Big enough for the Australian suburbs, they have barbecues in their exposed, barely planted gardens and glossy 4x4s in their driveways. | At the eastern end of Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands, where the sea mists are thickest and the winds iciest, there are whole streets of optimists. Instead of the usual weatherbeaten, unshowy old cottages and bungalows, crouching behind painstakingly raised hedges, there are new two-storey houses with sun decks, conservatories and picture windows. Big enough for the Australian suburbs, they have barbecues in their exposed, barely planted gardens and glossy 4x4s in their driveways. |
| In the American-style Shorty's diner, the TV shows the football scores on Sky. Across from Shorty's, one of several building firms is throwing up another house. Nearby, developers are buying land for more. | In the American-style Shorty's diner, the TV shows the football scores on Sky. Across from Shorty's, one of several building firms is throwing up another house. Nearby, developers are buying land for more. |
| Further east still stands Stanley's first supermarket, recently opened, and fenced-off compounds full of huge pipes and touchy security guards: storage facilities for newly arrived oil companies. Along the roads – expansive cul-de-sacs and closes rather than Stanley's old, tight grid – people drive slightly faster than elsewhere in the islands, as if they know they are in a boom town. | Further east still stands Stanley's first supermarket, recently opened, and fenced-off compounds full of huge pipes and touchy security guards: storage facilities for newly arrived oil companies. Along the roads – expansive cul-de-sacs and closes rather than Stanley's old, tight grid – people drive slightly faster than elsewhere in the islands, as if they know they are in a boom town. |
| But in the Falklands, the past haunts the present more than in most places. In and around Stanley lies the bleached or rusting junk of centuries: skeletons of old ships, soaked Victorian farm equipment, the blackened wrecks of Argentinian helicopters. The islands can feel like a great open-air museum, to which outsiders gain fascinating but exhausting admittance. | But in the Falklands, the past haunts the present more than in most places. In and around Stanley lies the bleached or rusting junk of centuries: skeletons of old ships, soaked Victorian farm equipment, the blackened wrecks of Argentinian helicopters. The islands can feel like a great open-air museum, to which outsiders gain fascinating but exhausting admittance. |
| The past also has a heavy psychological presence. In 1914, during the first world war, German warships made an abortive attack on Stanley. Sixty-eight years later, when invading Argentinian amphibious vehicles suddenly appeared in its narrow streets, like enormous sea monsters, one seven-year-old resident told her older brother: "The Germanys are coming!" The brother, 40 now, has put up a homemade poster beside his old, pretty Stanley cottage saying: "Piss Off Argentina!" He asks not to be named; Stanley is a gossipy place, and increasingly wary of the journalists who have converged here this year for the invasion's 30th anniversary. | |
| But his memories of 1982 are freely offered and raw. "I remember putting a union jack T-shirt on, and standing by the window as the Argentinians went past. They were horrible bastards. They shat everywhere." Across the road, he shows where their passing vehicles gouged a wall as if it had just happened. | |
| In recent months, with the 179-year-old quarrel between Britain and Argentina over the Falklands at its sharpest since the 1980s, and an erratic but tightening Argentinian economic blockade of the islands, everyday life here has taken on an even more self-consciously embattled quality than usual. Last month, the price of an orange – like almost all fruit and most vegetables, imported from South America – reached £1.39. There have been shortages of eggs in Stanley's half-dozen food shops, and no South American beer in the town's one hotel. Rumours have raced round the islands that the only weekly commercial flight to the outside world, across Argentinian airspace to Chile, is about to be shut down. | In recent months, with the 179-year-old quarrel between Britain and Argentina over the Falklands at its sharpest since the 1980s, and an erratic but tightening Argentinian economic blockade of the islands, everyday life here has taken on an even more self-consciously embattled quality than usual. Last month, the price of an orange – like almost all fruit and most vegetables, imported from South America – reached £1.39. There have been shortages of eggs in Stanley's half-dozen food shops, and no South American beer in the town's one hotel. Rumours have raced round the islands that the only weekly commercial flight to the outside world, across Argentinian airspace to Chile, is about to be shut down. |
| Falklanders respond to such hardships with a certain ingenuity and defiance. They always have done. In the original part of Stanley, established by British settlers in the 1840s on a sheltered slope facing a deepwater inlet, vegetables are grown in almost every porch and inch of garden. A sheep is tethered on one plot. The houses are thrifty improvisations of wood and corrugated iron, displaying British and Falklands flags in ever greater profusion. | Falklanders respond to such hardships with a certain ingenuity and defiance. They always have done. In the original part of Stanley, established by British settlers in the 1840s on a sheltered slope facing a deepwater inlet, vegetables are grown in almost every porch and inch of garden. A sheep is tethered on one plot. The houses are thrifty improvisations of wood and corrugated iron, displaying British and Falklands flags in ever greater profusion. |
| The founding of Stanley followed almost a century of shortlived attempts by Britain, France, Spain and Argentina to establish settlements elsewhere in the islands, which were defeated by remoteness, poor soil and weather, and a chaos of rival sovereignty claims and military initiatives. | |
| At first, Stanley's main value was as a storm refuge and supply base for ships rounding nearby Cape Horn. Then, in the 1870s, sheep were introduced to the land beyond. | |
| The emptiness of the treeless plains and hills can make this archipelago half the size of Wales feel more like Texas: an immense sour landscape of yellow grass and rocks the colour of tombstones. Sometimes there are no passing cars for hours on the gritty, juddering roads, arrow-straight and lined with telegraph poles. | |
| Dust clouds billow out behind every vehicle. There are no villages, just a thin scatter of farms and hamlets – "settlements" in the 3,000 islanders' sometimes sepia language – visible for miles when the usual grey cloud sheet overhead tears and a low, golden light rakes the valleys. | |
| The farmers called this territory Camp, from the Spanish campo, for countryside, one of many local terms derived from Spanish. They compensated for the meagre grazing by setting up vast, self-contained farms. | The farmers called this territory Camp, from the Spanish campo, for countryside, one of many local terms derived from Spanish. They compensated for the meagre grazing by setting up vast, self-contained farms. |
| An enduring culture of communal living, hard graft and hard drinking grew up, recorded in loving detail in the local history books with which every Falklands guesthouse and gift shop abounds. "It was a bit like the wild west," says a Scotsman who emigrated to the coastal settlement of Fitzroy in 1970. | |
| Until the early 90s, there were no proper roads: "To ride to Stanley from here, which is about 25 miles, took four and a half hours. Through the winter you couldn't travel at all." | |
| Remnants of this culture live on. A centrepiece example is Sports Week, a round of horse races and socialising to mark the end of sheep shearing. Last month, the racing was on a rudimentary old course above the settlement of Goose Green. | |
| The area also has grimmer associations: in 1982, the Argentinians imprisoned the local population for a month in the community hall, and then fought the British nearby in the fiercest land battle of the war. You can still find the Argentinian hilltop trenches, and the fatally exposed slopes below where Colonel H Jones and 2 Para were pinned down. | |
| Yet at Sports Week the war, for once, seemed far from people's minds. Instead, next to a parked line of 4x4s and a tiny, draughty grandstand, heavy-set men in boilersuits, deeply tanned from the neck up, held cans of Budweiser – the islands' beer of choice – and considered the islands' virtues in old-fashioned Falklands accents, part west of England burr, part New Zealand twang. | Yet at Sports Week the war, for once, seemed far from people's minds. Instead, next to a parked line of 4x4s and a tiny, draughty grandstand, heavy-set men in boilersuits, deeply tanned from the neck up, held cans of Budweiser – the islands' beer of choice – and considered the islands' virtues in old-fashioned Falklands accents, part west of England burr, part New Zealand twang. |
| "There's no natural disasters, no bugs, no pests for sheep," said Steven Dickson, a young farmer from an old islands family. "I get my meat for free. There's no such thing as unemployment. I hear there's three million unemployed back in Britain." Could there be another Falklands war? He looked dismissive. "Argentina couldn't invade. Being realistic, of course they couldn't." The 1,300-strong British garrison, almost 20 times the force overwhelmed by the 1982 invasion, made it impossible, he said. "The day I saw a Phantom [fighter jet] fly out of Stanley airport was the best day of my life." | |
| For most of the 20th century, the Falklands were much less prosperous and secure. The opening of the Panama canal in 1914 almost killed off the Cape Horn shipping route, and with it Stanley's importance as an anchorage. The volatile price of wool made an economy dominated by sheep farming vulnerable. | |
| From a peak of 2,400 in 1931, the population of the islands dwindled, to barely 1,800 in 1980. So many Falklanders returned to Britain, either permanently or to find temporary work, that Southampton became known in the islands as "Stanley north". | |
| From the mid-60s onwards, successive British governments increasingly felt that the solution to the Falklands' decline was closer ties with Argentina, only an hour's flying time to the west. Argentina, whose interest in regaining the islands was undergoing one of its periodic revivals, saw closer economic ties with them as leading, ultimately, to an acceptance of rule by Buenos Aires. During the 70s Argentina built Stanley its first airport. | |
| Many islanders were suspicious of such co-operative gestures: "Two yachts presented by the Argentinian navy to local youth remain unused," a 1976 British government survey of the islands noted. But Falklanders began to fly to Argentina for secondary education and hospital treatment not available in the islands. | |
| The archipelago had long been a hairshirt place, usually generating more money for Whitehall and for its sheep farms' absentee landlords in Britain than was invested in return. Yet in an era of British military and imperial retreat, holding on to the Falklands against Argentina's wishes seemed increasingly impractical. Despite the islanders' opposition, and the emergence of a fierce pro-Falklander lobby in Fleet Street and the Commons, the British government edged towards a handover. "We were being given away, bit by bit," says John Fowler, deputy editor of the Falklands weekly, the Penguin News. | |
| The culmination was a 1980 Whitehall proposal that sovereignty should be handed to Argentina and the islands then "leased back" to Britain for a limited period, as had been agreed with the Chinese over Hong Kong. That November, Margaret Thatcher sent a Foreign Office minister, Nicholas Ridley, to the Falklands to sell the deal. | |
| Falklanders have long memories, especially for perceived betrayals, but Ridley's visit is remembered with particular bitterness. Ridley was a self-confident, not particulary empathetic minister, the kind of Whitehall figure some older Falklanders do mocking impressions of to this day. | |
| Fowler attended a public meeting with him in Stanley: "It was fairly late in the evening. He was being heckled. He got cross. And he said, 'If you continue with this intransigence [against leaseback], on your own heads be it. We will not be sending a gunboat.' " | |
| Less than 18 months later, Argentina invaded. For this reason, the Thatcher government is less fondly recalled in the Falklands than British conventional wisdom would have you expect. "It was her mismanagement of the situation that caused the invasion," says Mike Summers, one of the islands' eight elected politicians. In Stanley, there is a street called Thatcher Drive, but it is short; H Jones Road is longer. | Less than 18 months later, Argentina invaded. For this reason, the Thatcher government is less fondly recalled in the Falklands than British conventional wisdom would have you expect. "It was her mismanagement of the situation that caused the invasion," says Mike Summers, one of the islands' eight elected politicians. In Stanley, there is a street called Thatcher Drive, but it is short; H Jones Road is longer. |
| In the 1982 war, 255 British servicemen were killed, and a greater number of Falklands veterans have since taken their own lives: taken together, almost one serviceman for every three islanders at the time. | |
| In Stanley, a near-constant flow of veterans are customarily bought taxi rides and beers. In the guesthouse near Goose Green, the minuscule bar is a shrine to the British military effort in the Falklands in 1982 and since, almost claustrophobic with heroic photographs and paintings. | |
| Sometimes, especially away from Stanley, it feels as if the war is the only human presence in the landscape. Red skull-and-crossbones signs mark off more than 80 Argentinian minefields, still lethal and largely uncleared. There are understated British and Argentinian military cemeteries, and a dozen war memorials, from the bombastic to the heartbreakingly ramshackle. | |
| On the cold summit of Mount Tumbledown, where the last, brutal battle of the war was fought in a maze of rocky clefts and blind corners, faded bits of old poppy wreaths blow around in the squalls. | |
| There are few serving soldiers in Stanley. The garrison is an hour away, down the islands' best rural road, at the Mount Pleasant airbase: a moon colony of khaki sheds and bunkers, bars and bungalows, on a brown plateau where even the British services can barely get trees to grow. The garrison has four Eurofighter jets, an infantry company and an offshore frigate or destroyer, but it is two-thirds smaller than in the aftermath of the war. "It's the minimum credible deterrence posture we have down there," says a Ministry of Defence spokesman. "Defending the airhead is what it's all about." Were Argentina to invade again – highly unlikely, according to the MoD and most serious analysts – the plan would be to hold Mount Pleasant and use it to receive reinforcements. | |
| The base is also the islands' international airport. Thirty years after the war, the military and civilian remain intimately intertwined. Perforated metal planks used in 1982 to make airstrips for Harrier ground-attack aircraft, possibly the most feared British weapon of the conflict, have been recycled for Stanley driveways and Camp animal pens. In the Falklands, even the plant life seems to send a political message, leaning perpetually eastward, away from the prevailing wind and Argentina. | The base is also the islands' international airport. Thirty years after the war, the military and civilian remain intimately intertwined. Perforated metal planks used in 1982 to make airstrips for Harrier ground-attack aircraft, possibly the most feared British weapon of the conflict, have been recycled for Stanley driveways and Camp animal pens. In the Falklands, even the plant life seems to send a political message, leaning perpetually eastward, away from the prevailing wind and Argentina. |
| And yet, the Falklands and Argentina have a shared geography. Especially after 1982, they have a shared history. Even in recent months, as the governments and media of Britain and Argentina have exchanged insults, and Stanley has prickled with dirty looks, pointedly patriotic car stickers and obscene gestures directed at suspicious-looking visitors, Argentinians have kept visiting. | And yet, the Falklands and Argentina have a shared geography. Especially after 1982, they have a shared history. Even in recent months, as the governments and media of Britain and Argentina have exchanged insults, and Stanley has prickled with dirty looks, pointedly patriotic car stickers and obscene gestures directed at suspicious-looking visitors, Argentinians have kept visiting. |
| At the guesthouse near Goose Green, the visitors' book has been signed by some. They have resisted any temptation to scrawl "Las Malvinas son Argentinas!" in the comments section. But their presence says something, unsettling or reassuring, about the islands' future. | At the guesthouse near Goose Green, the visitors' book has been signed by some. They have resisted any temptation to scrawl "Las Malvinas son Argentinas!" in the comments section. But their presence says something, unsettling or reassuring, about the islands' future. |