Customer Reviews

Argentine Forces in the Falklands (Men-at-Arms)

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The author served along the British general in command of the Royal Marines Brigade in the Malvinas and later wrote Nine Battles to Stanley (published in 1999) that studied the ground war in much greater detail. Nicholas van der Bijl establishes that the 601st and 602nd Commando Units of the Argentine Army gave the British patrols a lot of trouble prior to the final battles. He sheds new light on the battle for Goose Green by proving that an Argentine company there was made up of tough hand-picked conscripts that had undergone Commando-training. I believe that this was the reason the Paras went through such a horrible time at Goose Green. I enjoyed this book for its colour plates and pictures of the elite RI 25. It is a good companion to his latest book Nine Battles to Stanley (click "Book Search" to find it or otherwise you will make no progress)in which he describes in great detail the ground war from the Argentine side, naming practically all the Argentine platoon commanders that saw action on Mount Harriet and Two Sisters, describing in detail the numerous Argentine platoon-sized nocturnal counterattacks that took place and which involved roughly 600 Argentine conscripts and regulars. The British commanders as his second books establishes, severely underestimated the Argentines, which resulted in higher (that could have otherwise been avoided)casualties among the British patrols and platoons that took the hills.