Sea Gate Under Siege SHOWDOWN IN SOUTH ATLANTIC - Gene H Hogberg - June-July 1982

Gene H Hogberg

With stunning swiftness, Argentine military forces overran the British-held Falkland Islands. As Britain fights back, concerns mount over the worldwide impact of this curious struggle. As we go to press, a powerful British naval task force continues to "tighten the noose" around the Falkland Islands, 8,000 miles from London in the distant South Atlantic. This remote British possession was seized and occupied by Argentine troops in a lightning raid in the predawn hours of April 2. In the most dramatic developments to date, Argentina's second largest warship and only cruiser, the 13,645 ton General Belgrano, sank in the early morning hours of May 2 in a storm after being struck by two torpedoes fired from a British submarine. The majority of the crew members of the General Belgrano were rescued from the frigid waters of the South Atlantic. Two days later, the British destroyer H.M.S. Sheffield was attacked and destroyed by an Argentine aircraft missile. The loss of the ship and about twenty crewmen was a stunning blow to British confidence. - Information Supplied By: Herbert W Armstrong Library