One Hundred Days

by Sandy Woodward

  Anyway we went on to Government House where I had a long chat with Jeremy Moore, whom I had not seen since he left the Battle Group for the beaches some weeks ago. Then he and I, in company with a driver and an armed guard, set off in a captured Argentinian staff car to go to Port Stanley airfield. This area, a prime target for our bombs for weeks, was now virtually a prisoner of war camp – a fine-sounding name for a near-featureless isthmus, with absolutely no ‘facilities’, not even tents, and almost completely surrounded by Arg minefields and freezing water. About the only things it had in common with a POW camp were defeated inmates and the difficulties put in the way of their escape.

  Most of the way to the PSA we were passing groups of Argentinian POWs in their dark, drab green battle kit, coming in to be disarmed. I wound up my window and locked the door, in case a group of them suddenly changed their minds about the surrender. When, however, we arrived at the airport runway I really saw Major General Jeremy Moore in his true colours as the commander of the victorious British land forces. To my horror he jumped out of the car and, with total disregard for the thousands of Arg soldiers milling about – some of whom, I felt sure, could still be carrying personal weapons of one kind or another – strode purposefully off down the tarmac. Faced with an instant decision – shall I remain cravenly locked in the car and keep my head down until he returns, or do I go with him? – I narrowly decided I’d best follow. With not a few sidelong glances at this half-armed, ugly-looking South American rabble which flanked us, I reluctantly got out and joined him.

  As I did so, there came towards us a detachment of presumably surrendered Argentinian marines in their distinctive black-and-white camouflage uniforms, looking as smart as if they were on parade, marching briskly – left-right, left-right, left-right, in perfect time. There must have been fifty of them – seemed like a hundred! – forming a firmly disciplined body of hired, hard men.

  ‘Christ!’ I thought. ‘Would it not be the supreme irony to be literally trampled to death by this lot, after all we have done?’ I kept moving along, about two inches from Jeremy, as I remember, and the defeated marines marched on by, not ten feet from us. When they had passed, I nudged Jeremy and told him that I was not feeling too happy about this unnecessary fraternizing with the enemy. What if a couple of them decided to kill us?

  The General, however, was unperturbed. ‘Sandy, old chap,’ he said. ‘Don’t even think about it. When an army surrenders, they are completely demoralized, right down to the last man. They don’t have an ounce of fight left in ‘em.’

  Of course he was right and I was wrong. Soldiers were his business, after all. But I said again, ‘That last lot didn’t look completely demoralized.’

  ‘No,’ said the General. ‘Perhaps not. But they were. They always are.’

  I think at that very moment I realized how much of a thoroughgoing professional military officer this man was, a man who had led his troops with bravery, care and skill to victory on the ground against all the odds. He had not asked of anyone more than he was prepared to give himself. I don’t know how much he frightened the Argentinians, but he certainly did a good deal more than just impress me.

  Anyway, I came away from there a wiser man, lunched on board Fearless and then went off in a Sea King 4 to tour the places which had been, until now, just names on the chart to me. We started off by overflying the dark waters of Teal Inlet, its narrow entrance looked little wider from the air than it did on the map. Then we clattered our way west past the great bulk of Fanning Head and I tried to see the marks of the shells from Antrim on the night of the landings. Some eight hundred feet below were the waters in which Captain Kit Layman’s Argonaut had so nearly been lost.

  We flew down the length of Carlos Water which I had seen in my thoughts so often, but now saw in broad daylight for the first time. We shuddered our way out over the Sound and I looked down to the south to the slate waters where Commander West’s men had fought with such gallantry and beneath which Ardent now rested, not so far from the undersea grave of Antelope. These were the waters where John Coward had rallied his team on that dreadful opening day when they had bombed Antrim, where later Plymouth had been hit, Brilliant herself bombed and strafed. It all looked peaceful enough from up above.

  We flew on over West Falkland, stopping off at Pebble Island to examine the eleven dead aircraft, seemingly untouched until we got close. I looked out to the north to the choppy grey Atlantic waves which now flowed over the wreck of the Coventry. Here too was where they had so nearly sent Bill Canning’s Broadsword to join her. I felt, reasonably enough, anything but elated. We went down and looked at Port Howard, Darwin, Goose Green and finally to Fitzroy, the little bay of such distressful memory. Far to the south I could just make out Sea Lion Islands, upon which one day would be erected a memorial to the men who went down in the Sheffield. And so, back to Fearless.

  That night, I tried to write down my impressions of the place, thinking perhaps I might find some poetry in my soul to describe it. But, curiously, my emotions recorded in my diary were flat.

  Very north of Scotland. Dark, cold, windy, but patches in the weather. Wood smoke and clear air, but crystal visibility and mist. Many sheep and few cattle. Fewer people – square miles of rough turf, granite rock fields, tussock grass, nearly all of it soaking.

  Twenty degrees warmer and it would be the yachting centre of the world. As it is, bloody awful…definitely not a jewel in the Queen’s crown.

  I remember just as vividly the journey in the helicopter back to Hermes. We had just taken off when I happened to glance back towards the rear seating area, from which we were almost cut off by a large sonar set in this anti-submarine Sea King, and I spotted three or four strangers, all dressed in ‘Talking Tree’ outfits. All with rather tanned faces. All with sizeable and slightly droopy dark moustaches. All armed to the teeth. None of them speaking.

  This, I surmised, is definitely odd. Unannounced ‘passengers’ do not usually travel with the Admiral – and no one asked me if they could hitch a lift. Also these people looked uncomfortably like Argentinian Special Forces would. Was Jeremy’s belief in the demoralizing effect of surrender so totally reliable?

  I sat very still, and very quiet, and scribbled a note to my Marine colonel sitting beside me, to the effect of, ‘Don’t on any account look aft, but just check with the pilot who his friends in the back are, will you?’

  He read it and went forward to the cockpit. I could see the pilot shrug in answer and a minute later a scribbled note came back: ‘Fearless has absolutely no record of anyone on this aircraft except yourselves.’

  I immediately instructed: ‘Check with Hermes also.’

  Back came a signal from the carrier’s Ops Room: ‘Absolutely no record of any visitors expected on your aircraft.’

  Sod it, I thought. What a way to go. I scribbled a new note instructing the pilot to inform Hermes, ‘I have four unwanted guests on board. Prepare reception for possible Arg SAS on landing.’

  Down through the dusk we came, hovering over the flight deck of Hermes. We flopped down very fast. My two staff officers and I broke cover, piling out of the door forward on the port side. The helicopter was surrounded by our own SAS, each man with an automatic rifle levelled at the rear doors. We headed for shelter, confident that no enemy was getting out of that SK5 alive. But these four did. No bullets flew – only words. I was ‘reliably’ informed the conversation went roughly as follows:

  ‘’Allo, Charlie. Fancy seeing you!’

  ‘Wotcha, Sid. Just sneaked a ride ‘ome with the brass. Had a lovely day on the beach. ‘Bout time we had a look round after all this bloody hangin’ about. And tell you the truth, it ain’t really worth a carrot, full of f***ing sheep, innit? What’re you all doing up ‘ere on the flight deck then? Havin’ a tea party?’

  There was, I expect, plenty of laughter, most of it at my expense. I muttered something about ‘Silly buggers – they should at least have told someone.’ But that’s the trouble wit
h the SAS: they never tell anyone any more than they feel they absolutely have to. That tends to be very little, and it doesn’t include a run-ashore in the Admiral’s helicopter, it seems. But then I suppose it all goes with the job, along with their ability to merge into the background, to go anywhere in the utmost secrecy. I did just wish they had chosen someone else’s transport, I’d had enough frights for one day, thank you.

  As a result of that little incident, we always required incoming helos to show who they had in the back before landing on Hermes’s flight deck. It was a sobering thought how much damage half a dozen Special Forces men could have done on a carrier’s flight deck, where the main concern is the safe handling of aircraft, not defence against a well-trained team of hard-men. You could almost hear the stable door slamming!

  The following two weeks were busy but not really worthy of note. I had to write my personal report to the Task Force Commander, the Commander-in-Chief, Fleet, Admiral Fieldhouse, most of the contents of which I have related a great deal more fully in this book. I was, however, struck some years later, re-reading the report, by the way the gentler habits and attitudes of peace had had to be ditched as the harsher realities of war pressed upon us. On the Belgrano sinking, I had drafted: ‘…the destroyers accompanying Belgrano had been deliberately spared – albeit against my strictly military judgement.’ I had added that a hardening of attitudes is a natural process of war and, in referring to our discovery that the Argentinians intended to sink any ship coming to the aid of Sheffield, I went on: ‘…certainly it stripped away the last vestiges of any real determination on our part to let chivalry stand in the way of success…’

  I also let loose on matters of Government policy; even I realized this was not strictly my business, but I proceeded anyway, with the following:

  I cannot resist a review of this whole affair. Were I Galtieri I would have observed the Malvinas negotiations of the last few decades and found little hope of early satisfaction. I would also have observed that, over the same long period, there had been a progressive withdrawal of, and reduction in, British overseas military capability. In the General’s boots, I would have concluded that, at some time in the not-so-distant future, British policy on the Falklands issue would become all shadow and no substance.

  When the cuts in the Royal Navy were announced recently, the way ahead must have seemed clear to Galtieri, and he only needed a half-reasonable excuse. Señor Davidoff’s scrap-dealers and our indignant reaction to them provided that excuse. Galtieri attacked. His reasoning was as impeccable as his timing was previous. All he had to do was wait another six months, when Hermes, Invincible, Fearless and Intrepid would all have gone…

  If the Argentinian government, or others similarly minded elsewhere, are to be deterred from this kind of military adventurism, we shall need to provide not only the mark of our resolution on the spot [a flag, a ship, a platoon]. But also the obvious wherewithal to reinforce it [mobile forces, at short readiness].

  We would not again wish to repair our mistakes the hard way. But it was the last Defence Review that was the problem. After the needs of the strategic nuclear deterrent and the defence of the home base had been met, they decided in favour of the short-term, politically expedient, continental European commitment. This was to the detriment of Britain’s long-term, long-established, worldwide, national interest. This was plainly evident to Galtieri, and I doubt he was alone.

  Whatever I may have thought before, the Falklands experience has given me a new insight into the capacity of non-democratic governments for immorality and dishonesty. That capacity is apt to be too common in this turbulent world. What, if any, should be Britain’s role in all of this? It is clear enough that our traditional global policy has long suited our geographic and political interests. That is a matter of history. And this war has once again demonstrated that it also suits our professional military capability – air, land and sea.

  Our Defence budget, of course, can only buy a certain amount. But I am convinced that it ought to be spent where it can influence both European and world affairs. It must be a mistake to place it where it can affect – and in a very limited way at that – the policies of our European neighbours only.

  I do not find that my views of 1982 have changed significantly almost twenty years years later, only that national defence policy now seems to have turned in the same direction. But at the time of writing that piece, I was essentially preparing to leave. I had been at sea now for three months since sailing from the UK, Ascension being the only other land I had seen, back in mid-April. How the time had run away. And now I had to prepare to meet a new challenge, the popular Press of England, who, I was sure, were just longing to make a fool of me, if I didn’t manage to do it for them. I was well aware that the only time during the whole of this campaign my superiors had been deeply upset with me was because of what they had read the Press said I had said. Again I resolved not to drop my guard.

  I set about rehearsing myself to deal with the opening Press conference I was certain I would face upon arrival. Quite frankly I dreaded the entire thing, because I am simply not trained to tackle it professionally. My diary assessed what their first question would be and listed my possible responses:

  ‘Whose fault was the Bluff Cove disaster?’

  A1 Mine, if anyone’s.

  A2 It was no disaster.

  A3 The Argentinians’.

  A4 CLFFI’s? COMAW’s?

  A5 Don’t know.

  A6 No comment, on the grounds that if it was a culpable disaster I should not prejudice it; if it wasn’t, then the question of fault does not arise.

  Beneath this I wrote: ‘Obviously, I prefer A1, true or not. A2 – A5 are either wet or criminal. A6 is patently a neat evasion.’

  Next question, I guessed, would be a reference to the veiled accusation in the Press that I had kept Hermes out of bombing range through personal cowardice rather than strategic necessity:

  ‘It has been said frequently that you commanded the South African Task Group (or should be awarded the South Africa Star). What have you to say to that?’

  A1 Not a lot.

  A2 South Atlantic would be more correct.

  A3 Who said it, how often, and for what reason?

  A4 You should not believe all you hear.

  A5 Next question.

  I then prepared myself to field the inevitable:

  ‘What have you to say to Mr Nott about his cuts in the Navy?’

  A1 Nothing. He has not invited me to give my views.

  A2 I am a Naval Officer. I would regret them.

  A3 That would be between Mr Nott and myself, since I am a public servant.

  Then might come:

  ‘What was your first thought on getting back?’

  A1 Shit, it’s still raining.

  A2 Oh, Gawd, I’ve got to face the Press again.

  A3 England, my England…

  And so on, and so on…The days dragged by until 1 July when my old friend Admiral Sir Derek Reffell arrived to take over the continued defence of the islands. To this day, I remain mildly astonished that he was not given the job in the first place, since he was very much better qualified than I, in just about every respect. We spent a pleasant couple of days together until on the morning of 4 July 1982 I prepared to go home. I wrote my last signal and had it transmitted to all the front-line authorities in the South Atlantic under the command of General Moore and myself – to all of the thirty-one warships, the twenty Royal Fleet Auxiliaries, the five minesweepers, the forty-three merchant ships and thirteen air squadrons directly involved. It read:

  As I haul my South Atlantic flag down, I reflect sadly on the brave lives lost, and the good ships gone, in the short time of our trial. I thank wholeheartedly each and every one of you for your gallant support, tough determination and fierce perseverance under bloody conditions. Let us all be grateful that Argentina doesn’t breed bulldogs and, as we return severally to enjoy the blessings of our land, resolve that those left behi
nd for ever shall not be forgotten.

  They arranged a superb fly-past of some eighty aircraft, the Harriers and the Sea Kings forming a magnificent aerial Victory Parade. I stood alone in the pale sunlight, in my working rig, my Navy blue sweater and beret, up on the Gun Direction Platform right at the top of Hermes’s bridge. It was very impressive and served also as a reminder to anyone else that we still had serious air power here should the Args consider changing their minds about that surrender.

  Then I ordered my flag to be hauled down and a helicopter flew me, Commander Jeremy Sanders and several of my personal staff to Port Stanley airfield – my two GWOs Captains Andy Buchanan and Peter Woodhead had left some time before. My war had lasted exactly one hundred days – one hundred days since I had said goodbye to Commodore Sam Dunlop, captain of Fort Austin in Gibraltar harbour on the evening of 26 March. A lifetime in one hundred days.

  We took off in a Hercules CI30 transport, with its long-range fuel tanks taking up a large part of the hold where we sat, bound for Ascension. From there we made a very quick turn-round into an RAF VC10 up the coast of Africa towards the Royal Air Force station at Brize Norton in Oxfordshire. We banked along the southern edge of the Cotswolds in pretty poor visibility and touched down at Brize in the middle of a dull, grey English summer day. The weather was not much different from that in the Falklands, except it was not quite so cold. The media’s welcome, however, made up for that.

  I was met by Char and the children, Admiral Fieldhouse, and a good few others. It should have been a very emotional meeting, but a part of my mind was picking away at the next event. I was about to be taken into a hall to face thirty or forty of Fleet Street’s finest.

  ‘Welcome home, Admiral,’ said the first of them. ‘Right, then. How do you account for the disaster at Bluff Cove?’

  Pusillanimously, I presented them with answer A6 – the skilfully worded evasion and I remember wondering to myself: ‘Christ! I suppose it’s a good thing we didn’t lose the war, if it’s like this when you win it.’