From Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The
Falklands War
was a
war
between the
United Kingdom
and
Argentina
over the
Falkland Islands
in 1982. The Falkland Islands are 480 kilometres from Argentina in the southern
Atlantic Ocean
.
Argentina and the United Kingdom have argued over which country the Falklands Islands belongs to since the 1800s. In the 1760s and 1770s, the British set up a town at Port Egmont, which nearly led to a war with
Spain
who had a town at Port Louis. Then Argentina became a separate country from Spain in 1817 and set up a
colony
on the islands (which they call "Malvinas") in 1820. An
American
warship
later destroyed this town, and the British took the islands again in 1833.
The British kept the islands until Argentinian
Special Forces
invaded on 2 April 1982 and took control of the island.
The
United Nations Security Council
asked Argentina to withdraw, and tried to end the crisis with
diplomacy
. After seven weeks, Argentina did not withdraw, so the
British Armed Forces
traveled more than 12,000 km to attack. After a short battle in the air and at sea, the British landed on 21 May and fought on land until Argentina's army
surrendered
on 14 June.
The British captured 11,313
soldiers
, and killed about 650.
[1]
Almost half of these Argentinian deaths were when the warship ARA
General Belgrano
was sunk by the British
submarine
HMS
Conqueror
. In total there were 258 British deaths.
The
diplomatic relations between the two countries
were broken because of the war. Relations between the two countries came back in 1990.
[2]