Falkland Islands: Girding for the Big One

After a sharp setback, the British attack "with all we've got

At last, the climactic battle for the Falklands was on. Just ten weeks after Argentina seized the desolate South Atlantic islands, the 9,000 British troops encamped on the hills above Port Stanley launched an all-out assault on the 7,500 Argentines dug in around the capital. The intention was, as an official in London put it, to hit the Argentine garrison "with all we've got."

In what British Defense Minister John Nott described as a "brilliant surprise attack," Royal Marine commandos and paratroopers overran...