The figures were glossed as a measure of British military prowess, for being so low. It was even seen as agreeably ‘light’, given the intensity of the combat. footnote 1 This casualty list was found acceptable. Argentina suffered at least 1,800 dead, missing and injured. Yet 256 were killed on the British side, along with three Falklanders, and 777 wounded. Initially a clear majority wanted to see no loss of life and, for some weeks after the task force had sailed, held that the Falklands were not worth a single British death. Nonetheless, the manipulation of opinion was at least as masterful (and as important) as the military operation. It was helped, of course, by a quick and, in part, fortuitous victory. Will reality and spectacle eventually collide? It was remarkable how well the British public relations side of the Falklands affair stood up. If the first time is tragedy and the second farce, the third is spectacle: the media event that was launched when the British fleet set sail for the South Atlantic. We are witnesses to the repeat of a repeat, and as befits the late modern world it was played out on television and in the press. Today, therefore, British history has entered a new stage. Indeed, when the British Parliament gathered on 3 April 1982 for a special Saturday debate on Argentina’s invasion, readers of that morning’s Times were told: ‘The emergency sitting of the Commons will be the first on a Saturday since 3 November 1956, over Suez.’ Yet the 1956 Anglo-French invasion of Egypt was itself a clownish attempt by the two European powers to recreate their colonial domination over the Suez Canal. The most apt and widely drawn comparison, however, has been with the Suez crisis of 1956. It reminded some of the original eviction of Argentina by an English fleet in 1833, while Trevor-Roper compared it to the even earlier confrontation with Spain over the islands in 1770. The British recapture of the Falkland Islands was obviously a repeat performance, although there is argument over precisely what was taking place again. Perhaps that alone is good reason to abandon the idea. Despite its Marxist origin, the aphorism is now a received wisdom. W hen history repeats itself, the first time is tragedy, the second farce.
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