The 'Second' Battle of the Falklands

[Pelican]

USS Salish WWII to the Falklands

During the 1982 Falklands War, Argentina’s ARA Alférez Sobral, formerly the WWII US Navy’s USS Salish (ATA-187), made a remarkable voyage of determined sailors surviving at sea.

See - https://wwiiafterwwii.wordpress.com/202 ... falklands/

[Pelican]

Why the EU mentioning ‘Islas Malvinas’ is a big deal

At a recent summit of European leaders and their counterparts from the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (Celac), the European Union published a declaration in which it referred to the “Islas Malvinas/Falkland Islands”.
Continues at - https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/why-the ... -big-deal/

[Pelican]

It is 100 years to the day that one of the key figures in the modern history of the Royal Navy was born.

Without the intervention of Sir Henry Conyers Leach on the early evening of March 31 1982, today’s Navy, indeed today’s nation, would be a very different.

It was Leach, as First Sea Lord, who dismissed naysayers in the Corridors of Power who were advising then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher that Argentina was about to invade the Falklands, there was nothing Britain could do to stop it and, worse, nothing she might do to reverse it.

Henry Leach thought otherwise.

But he was no tubthumper, no warmonger. He knew what he was asking men to do, for he had been there himself.

Sir Henry was the son of one of the that magnificent band of brothers who served the Royal Navy so well between 1939 and 1945, men tempered in WW1 who rose to prominent positions a generation later and steered the Service through its hardest hours.

Continues at - https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-l ... sUYJnibFLE

[Pelican]

Rob Steele - [On Facebook]

Back out the Falklands and Happy to be in the company of some of the lads, widows and family from the Shiny Sheffield.
My first time back since 82 and what a welcome.

[Pelican]

Search to find the artist of mysterious Falklands painting

The Defence Infrastructure Organisation has launched a search to find the artist of mysterious Falklands painting.
The picture was found in a former classroom at HMS Raleigh by a staff member who works for the Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO).

According to the DIO: ~~~ See - https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/search- ... -painting/

Also see - https://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/news-and-l ... s-painting

[Pelican]

Alan Blakeman

HMS Cardiff Comms Dept 1982.
We all went down, we all returned.
Sadly, others didn't.
RIP

[Pelican]

HMS Illustrious (R06) relieves HMS Invincible (R05) off the Falkland Islands on August 28, 1982. Sea Harriers of 809 Naval Air Squadron and Sea King helicopters of 814 Naval Air Squadron are embarked on Illustrious. Note the crews of the two ships saluting each other as the ships come perilously close.

Plus some photos taken by one of the crews who says "Yes we were that close and threw spuds at one another."

[timlewin]

"There and back with JJ Black", so sad these people are no longer with us to give their side of events, i will look through his autobiography to see if he mentions this.

[Pelican]

Guilherme Wiltgen
The last mission former BNS Garcia D'Avila (RFA Sir Galahad).
The hull will be sunk in an exercise using Penguin missiles fired from a Seahawk Helicopters and Mk48 torpedoes fired from a submarine.
The ship was towed this Sunday.

[Pelican]

The Cross of Nails - from HMS Coventry to HMS Diamond

It was a cloudless night and close enough to a full moon on the evening of 14 November 1940, with the code name of Operation Moonlight Sonata (Unternehmen Mondscheinsonate) the Luftwaffe, the aerial-warfare branch of the WehrmachtIt sent a wave of 515 German bombers with the intension of destroying Coventry’s factories and industrial infrastructure. The bombing destroyed two-thirds of the city, with a loss of 568 people and some 4,000 homes destroyed.
Coventry Cathedral suffered extensive damage, with only the external stone walls defiantly standing in an otherwise pile of smouldering ruins. The morning after the bombing, Rev Arthur Philip Wales walked through the ruins; he found several large hand-forged medieval carpenters' nails, each about 18 inches long. He used some wire to bind together three nails into the shape of a Latin cross, the original “Cross of Nails.” A symbol of love, sacrifice, hope, and redemption arose out of the ashes of destruction. Provost Howard, the leader of the Cathedral community, stepped into the devastated cathedral and wrote two words on the smoke-blackened wall behind the altar – 'Father, forgive'.
The cross is the most widely recognised Christian symbol in the world. The original “Cross of Nails” fashioned by Reverand Arthur Philip Wales has come to symbolise the suffering of war, the hope of survival, and the desire for peace and reconciliation. After the war, the remaining medieval nails or roof spikes that fixed the massive 500-year-old roof structure in place were collected and manufactured into the “Crosses of Nails" The roof spikes welded together and silver plated and despatched to German cities that were extensively bombed by the allies, Dresden, Berlin, and Kiel in a gesture of reconciliation.
HMS Coventry (D118) was a Type 42 (Sheffield-class) destroyer of the Royal Navy. She was launched on 21 June 1974 and accepted into service on 20 October 1978 at a cost of £37,900,000. As she carried the city’s name, the Coventry, it became a tradition onboard the “Cross of Nails” was used as a focal point for Sunday service onboard. On 25 May 1982, HMS Coventry was engaged in a life-and-death battle with the Argentine Airforce. A battle she would unfortunately lose. Hit with three 250 kg bombs to her port side, two bombs detonating deep inside the ship in the proximity of the Computer room and Operations room. Within 23 minutes, the ship had been abandoned and capsized, eventually sinking 330ft to the seabed, taking 19 of the ship’s company with her. HMS Coventry became and is a war grave.
Operation Blackleg was the code name for recovering NATO-sensitive cryptographic material and Top-Secret documents from within the wreck by Naval Party 2200, a Royal Navy Clearance Divers team. By no means a priority or a consideration by the Ministry of Defence, the "Cross of Nails" was destined to be recovered by the divers and returned to the Coventry Cathedral by HMS Coventry's ship’s Captain David Hart-Dyke. The cross was then in the keeping of the next HMS Coventry (F98), a type 22 class frigate until she was decommissioned in 2002 and sold to the Romanian Navy.
This “Cross of Nails” is now with HMS Diamond (D34), which is affiliated with Coventry City. She is was recently on active service in the Red Sea.
The history of this significant religious relic to the Royal Navy, HMS Coventry (D118) and the city of Coventry cannot be understated. With that in mind, I commissioned award-winning South African artist Dave Coburn to capture the moment the cross was seen for the first time being carried out of the sacred war grave 42 years ago. In the brief to Dave, I wanted him to capture the light and the dark of the diving conditions the team worked in, but symbolically and spiritually to represent the, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.” (John 1:5) The “Cross of Nails" had to be central and prominent to represent shared victory and triumph. I acknowledge there are more religious meanings, such as eternal life and resurrection.
The painting is dedicated first and foremost to the 19 Royal Navy sailors who paid the ultimate sacrifice and died in the Falklands War in 1982 for the high ideas of freedom and democracy. HMS Coventry is their sacred war grave.
Secondly, to the divers who, in the most physically and psychologically demanding of circumstances, performed their duty and carried out all items on the MoD manifest. The divers could only have completed the tasks with the Royal Navy and civilian support crew.
https://www.navylookout.com/protecting- ... 5cvEtVrX_4
To this day, Operation Blackleg has been the Royal Navy's finest achievement in deep saturation diving recovery from inside a warship. Without a doubt, on the same page, as the gold recovered from HMS Edinburgh, both are worthy of merit. While one was for the security of NATO, the other was about treasure.
I hope the families of those sailors who remain forever on watch in the South Atlantic and the 20th crewman who died from injuries sustained much later find some comfort in the painting.
By Ray Sinclair