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How is this a war? You could fit all the participants in one room. Not every international fight is a war. This was a skirmish or two.

	Falklands War is a former featured article candidate. Please view the links under Article milestones below to see why the nomination was archived. For older candidates, please check the archive.
Article milestones Date Process Result January 19, 2004 Refreshing brilliant prose Not kept November 20, 2004 Featured article candidate Not promoted December 12, 2006 Peer review Reviewed
Current status: Former featured article candidate

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A fact from this article was featured on Misplaced Pages's Main Page in the On this day section on March 19, 2004, March 19, 2005, April 2, 2007, and June 14, 2008.

British Prisoners

It says here that there were 115 British prisoners of war taken. I find two things wrong with this. If you look at the article 1982 invasion of the Falkland Islands, you will see that 114 Britons became prisoners. Only 96 of them were actual soldiers, the remaining ones civilians temporarily detained by the Argentines. Secondly, these figures do not include the 22 British Royal Marines taken prisoner during the Invasion of South Georgia. If we combine this with the British soldier captured during the Skirmish at Many Branch Point, I would have to say that 119 British military personnel were taken prisoner during the war.

Reenem (talk)

April 2nd: 57 Royal Marines, 11 Royal Navy & 23 Falkland Islands Defence Force (FIDF), April 3rd (South Georgia): 22 RM, May 21st: 1 RAF (Flt Lt Jeffrey Glover), June 10th (West Falkland): 1 SAS. That's what the hidden text is revealing. I have no idea how the numbers at the 1982 invasion of the Falkland Islands article were tallied. No Britons were killed, so they were all PoWs. 57+11+25 to 40=93 to 108. The figure 96-114 PoWs must be explained at the "1982 invasion of…" article, not here. --Regards, Necessary Evil (talk) 07:38, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Consequences of the Falklands War

Another editor and myself have a conflict of opinion about the Falklands War#Consequences of the Falklands War section. I think it needs references, is weasely, POV, and has obtuse sentence structures; requiring copyediting. They have argued in edit comments that it doesn't need references because it links to a main article on the subject. My understanding is that all content within an article needs to be referenced, and other pages on[REDACTED] specifically cannot be used as references - see WP:CIRCULAR. While the weasel wording and POV and strangled grammar seems very apparent to me, perhaps someone else can give their opinion on that? Hohum (talk) 17:41, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I suggest you check that, its a short intro section to another linked article. You don't need to source content in an introduction when its referenced elsewhere in the linked document. Justin talk 21:09, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I suggest you check it. I've provided a wiki policy completely to the contrary, while you've not shown anything to support your opinion. WP:LEAD suggests that even the lead of an article needs to be referenced. Hohum (talk) 21:34, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

Quoting WP:CIRCULAR is an utterly fallacious argument, its not a circular reference, the linked article is not being used as a citation. Per WP:LEAD

Because the lead will usually repeat information also in the body, editors should balance the desire to avoid redundant citations in the lead with the desire to aid readers in locating sources for challengeable material. ...

Redundant citations is precisely what you're advocating. Its not as if the material is not well known or controversial. Justin talk 22:09, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

This is a textbook example of how to abuse {{fact}} to harass other editors. You have placed the templates as a bot would have done it; at the end of each subsection. The number of fact templates should never depend on whether the text is written in one section or three subsections. The general idea is that challenged material should be cited, not common knowledge or previous cited material. The WP:LEAD is irrelevant here since the introduction of the article isn't in question. The introduction of WP:CIRCULAR shows that the you haven't even bothered to look at Consequences of the Falklands War#References which is full of non-Wiki references. --Regards, Necessary Evil (talk) 00:02, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Please get a grip, I am not trying to harass other editors, I'm trying to make sure what is being said is verifiable, without referring to other pages on wikipedia. The policy quite clearly says that each wiki article needs to stand on its own, with their own references, and not hope that the other articles have them. Other articles are moving targets. The number of fact templates depend on the number of contentious, unreferenced passages. That is how I applied them. This would be immediately resolved if references were supplied. Details of the political situation in Argentina and Britain in 1982 do not fall under "common knowledge". Hohum (talk) 02:20, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

If you look at Dentren's use of the fact template he's wondering if "the air combat training of the British pilots was indisputably superior" is correct. Your carpet bombing of the text with fact templates makes it impossible to know what it is you want to see sources for. Is it whether Margaret Thatcher was Prime Minister in the UK or the Royal Navy participated in the Falklands War or that Argentina became a democracy because of the war? Secondly it is not just a hyperlink, it's a {{Main|Consequences of the Falklands War}} --Regards, Necessary Evil (talk) 22:52, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

Three fact tags isn't "carpet bombing". It's selective for each of the passages tagged. It's obviously for the contentious points raised, not the "sky is blue" ones. I note that one of the phrases has since been completely removed by another editor because it is totally unjustified.

Your assertion that using a "Main" template excuses a section from being referenced is completely unsupported, and completely contradicted by[REDACTED] policy, as I have shown. References are required. You haven't shown otherwise. Hohum (talk) 23:24, 5 October 2009 (UTC)

Except that it has, the citations you are demanding are redundant as demonstrated above. References are supplied, they're on the linked article. Justin talk 23:56, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

What part of the policy that says a wiki article can't rely on another wiki article for references, is confusing you? Hohum (talk) 23:16, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

Which part of another wiki article is NOT being used as a reference don't you understand? You demanded redundant citations, your use of {{fact}} tags was entirely inappropriate. Further it was disruptive as you didn't actually identify what supposedly not common knowledge or challengable as being controversial. You're saying that we haven't demonstrated appropriate areas of policy, we have, now it appears you're resorting to little more than naked abuse. Justin talk 07:43, 9 October 2009 (UTC)

Most importantly, see WP:SUMMARY#References, citations and external links. David Underdown (talk) 13:10, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

Invasion photos

Hi guys, would you mind commenting here regarding the photographers the Argentines used on the invasion day, cheers. Ryan4314 (talk) 09:02, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

My talk page is not an appropriate venue; the discussion is here. Эlcobbola _talk 13:47, 10 October 2009 (UTC)

Battle Maps

I found these two PD maps. The article is already image heavy, but maybe we can use them somewhere.The Illusional Ministry (talk) 23:40, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Out of curiousity, where did you find them, they're from Battle Atlas of the Falklands War, which is not PD. Justin talk 23:45, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

Sorry my bad, they're not, though similar in style. Second one is inaccurate as Coventry was sunk off Pebble Island. Justin talk 23:49, 22 November 2009 (UTC)

I think the first one should be nice addition to British naval forces in the Falklands War --Jor70 (talk) 11:26, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Commanders

I just removed Pablo Carballo from the list but Im now in doubt. Is this supposed to list top commanders at the time of the conflict isnt it ? Because some AR people are listed there with their final ranks and not what they have at that moment. --Jor70 (talk) 11:22, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I think you were right to do that, its purely for top commanders. Justin talk 12:38, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

I just removed Margaret Thatcher. MT in her role as Prime Minister was a political leader, she appointed military leaders to command the operation, she had no military command authority. In Britain the Prime Minister exercises political control over the military only by means of the Royal Prerogative, in other words on behalf of the Queen. It is the Queen that is "commander in chief" not the Prime Minister and military appointments are made by The Queen on the advice of the Prime Minister. Marlarkey (talk) 22:31, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

As this is a global issue see also Misplaced Pages:Village pump (policy)#Commanders in War articles --Regards, Necessary Evil (talk) 23:16, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks, but if you'd looked you'd have seen that I'm already aware of that - not that is sheds any light on the topic as yet. Marlarkey (talk) 11:05, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, the link was addressed to anyone else but you in order to avoid repeating this discussion. I actually found the link by looking at your contributions at Talk:Iraq War#Commanders. --Regards, Necessary Evil (talk) 14:12, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

I dont know UK, but Galtieri must stay because was his idea to create a garrison of 12000 troops under protest of the other generals. --Jor70 (talk) 23:34, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Support, keep Galtieri in, but MT out. Ryan4314 (talk) 23:39, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Galtieri was a commissioned officer and head of the military as well political leader of the country. He combined both roles. He was in de facto command of the forces and therefore it is valid that he is included. Marlarkey (talk) 11:02, 10 February 2010 (UTC)

Skirmish at Many Branch Point

I've removed this from the article, it was a minor unit skirmish that does not warrant mention in an overview article. Please don't add it again. Justin talk 21:32, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

Agreed, to newcomers, we've been trying to bring the Falklands War article down in size, for ease of reading. The Skirmish at Many Branch Point is covered in it's own article. Ryan4314 (talk) 22:58, 30 January 2010 (UTC)

The Sun and its headlines

I have looked at the discussions in the archives and they don't seem to have resulted in a consensus. The issue I have is that the Greenslade article, whilst stating that the headlines were (in his opinion) xenophobic and jingoistic, does not explain WHY they were xenophobic and jingoistic. I do not have the Harris book so I'm unable to check what it says (perhaps some page numbers could be added, to help others with checking the reference). I suggest a compromise where the Harris and Greenslade references are retained but the paragraph dealing will the Sun headlines is re-worded somewhat. We could perhaps use the Douglas reference to mention that the Gotcha headline was later considered by Kelvin Mackenzie himself to be going too far.

My suggestion -

The Sun became controversial for its headlines during the war. The headlines 'Gotcha' and 'Stick this up your junta' in particular were considered by Harris and Roy Greenslade, former employee of the Sun, to be 'xenophobic' and 'jingoistic'. The 'Gotcha' headline, was recognised by Kelvin Mackenzie, the editor of The Sun at the time, to be inappropriate and he had it changed for later editions of the paper.

I've tried for a compromise of sorts, so that the interpretations of xenophobia and jingoism are not implied to be a universal truth (which is how I read it), but still have support from fairly reliable sources. What does everyone think?Rtdixon86 (talk) 18:59, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

From time to time people are trying to whitewash The Sun, I don't know why. It wasn't only the "Gotcha" headline that was 'xenophobic' and 'jingoistic'. If you are able to look at The Sun during the Falklands War you'll see that it was 'xenophobic' and 'jingoistic'. 'Stick this up your junta' was another headline. Other British media were far from The Sun so it's not just because the times were different like in World War Two where the whole press was pro-war. --Regards, Necessary Evil (talk) 05:59, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

It hasn't been proven that being in favour of defending one's country's territory in a localised war is xenophobic or jingoistic. If they'd argued in favour of invading Argentina preemptively or "just to see the look on those dirty Argies' faces", you'd have a case. Maybe "Kill an Argie and win a Metro"? But they didn't publish either of those.

That's broadly why very few (if any) news pieces refer to the Sun as 'jinogistic' and 'xenophobic'. Citing 'Harris' isn't good enough (whilst Robert Harris is notable, it does not give a page, which would actually make it verifiable), and citing an opinion piece (Greenslade) as fact is incorrect. It ought to be attributed, as in the suggested paragraph above. Bastin 08:58, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Necessary Evil - I was not trying to 'whitewash' the Sun. I was only suggesting a way of settling an editorial issue which does not seem to be resolved to everyone's satisfaction yet.

Could you please tell me if my suggested change to the article would in any way make it worse (i.e. is any information being removed)?

Also is it unreasonable to interpret 'Stick this up your junta' as a simple display of contempt for a belligerent military dictatorship? Is this unambiguosly xenophobic? If so, how so? Rtdixon86 (talk) 17:25, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

There is a significant difference between being in favour of defending ones sovereign territories and how the Stun tend to express that. Their editorial position does tend towards the xenophobic on a wide range of issues, I have to say that I don't entirely get why there is a move to tone down the description.

Personally I find the wording above to be quite weaselly, but that's to be expected, I don't imagine that there are any credible sources to suggest that it wasn't particularly xenophobic, so we have to twist the language to excuse their editorial line.

FWIW they do tend to express a nationalistic position quite a distance from how the military would generally position their understanding of the OPFOR. There is little value in de-humanising the opposition to the extent that they do, as it gets in the way of effective military action.

ALR (talk) 15:18, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

What views of the Sun's are nationalistic? Read the introduction to the article on nationalism, and please explain how the Sun's editorial positions reflect that. Bastin 16:39, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

ALR - Could you please elaborate on what you mean by "Personally I find the wording above to be quite weaselly". I accept there may possibly be some shortcomings with how I have worded my suggested paragraph, so could you tell me which forms of weasel words found at] I have included, so I can make any necessary revisions.

Everyone - I'm only trying to make the best of the sources. I have mentioned and cited for the controversy which was generated by the editorial stance in the first sentence, this can be elaborated on with further sources, would be anyone be willing to help find some?

The Greenslade article is an opinion piece, so I think it should be directly attributed to him in the text. Does anyone think this is completely wrong as an approach? Could anyone direct me to information on how to work with opinion pieces? Again, the Greenslade piece could be reinforced by other sources, if anyone would like to help. I'm happy to keep the Harris reference. However, I think a page number might be required, to help other editors verify the claim.

One final thing, please bear in mind that I'm not trying to take sides with The Sun, I just want to make a genuine effort to improve what I think is a section which has some problems. Rtdixon86 (talk) 19:14, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

As an analyst when I read a passage that makes several attributions in that way it serves to obfuscate something. It lacks elegance and sounds contrived, hence a bit weasely. Quite happy to acknowledge that is a, subjective view rather than making reference to the wikifantasy rules. There are a number of systemic failures in Misplaced Pages that tend to encourage such clumsiness, so it's an observation

ALR (talk) 21:06, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Two things..

Why is there a need for '(UK)' after 'United Kingdom'?

And why is there a need to show the Argentine president as a commander when QEII or Margaret Thatchter are not shown? Flosssock1 (talk) 21:40, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I think the use of (UK) after United Kingdom at the start is to clarify what the abbreviation UK means later in the article, however this could possibly be removed, and the first following instance of the abbreviation UK in the main body could be wikilinked instead.

The Argentine President did hold military rank, so it is definitely appropriate to include him. If we look at Korean War and World War II, we will see that Attlee and Churchill are included as commanders even though they held the same position in military terms as Margaret Thatcher. So I would suggest either we include Thatcher as per the WWII and Korean War articles, or clarify how the commander section of conflict infoboxes should be completed on the relevant project page before changing the article again. Rtdixon86 (talk) 22:19, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Argentina was a military junta, Galtieri was both the leader of the junta and also still an active member of the Argentinian army, which is obviously quite different to the situation in the UK. David Underdown (talk) 11:35, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Was already expain at Talk:Falklands_War#Commanders --Jor70 (talk) 11:49, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

This links to many disputes over commanders in war articles. Did he have considerable millitary command? Because QEII did, and still does ofcourse, hold a military rank. Flosssock1 (talk) 13:27, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

Galtieri was a career miltiary officer, and the Argentinian aarmed forces also held the political power in Argentina. While QEII does hold rank, apart from her WWII ATS service, it's essentially honorary. David Underdown (talk) 14:17, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

HM holds a largely ceremonial rank and doesn't participate in military command. There are a number of reasons for that, although the most basic is that she's not a military professional, we're well past the era where the monarch rode out at the head of a fighting force.

Not all states organise their military force commands in the same way. In the UK the MOD directs the implementation of support to HM Foreign and Security policy. No military officer would accept an order per se from a politician, the political direction is managed by the MoD and then cascaded down. In that sense politicians are not part of the command strucuture and are not bound by the same legislation.

ALR (talk) 15:04, 15 February 2010 (UTC)

1. "War". British-library.uk. 1982-05-04. Retrieved 2010-02-07.
2. Cite error: The named reference Harris was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
3. ^ Close. "The Sun newspaper on the Falklands | Media". The Guardian. Retrieved 2010-02-07.
4. Douglas, Torin (2004-09-14). "UK | Magazine | Forty years of The Sun". BBC News. Retrieved 2010-02-07.

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