Eagle, I don't want to form an alliance anymore.

"Agreed, partially agreed. We will provide full intelligence support, and weapons will be distributed through third-party channels without leaving a trace."

What do you think?

Slava looked at her. His rose-red eyes were quiet in the dim light, waiting for him to speak.

"I'm thinking... how many people have died in this decades-long Cold War between the two superpowers, and how many more will have to sacrifice themselves for it in the future."

Director Nian peeled the orange clean, broke off a segment, put it in his mouth, and chewed it.

"You want to quit?"

“No,” Slava shook his head. “I just wanted to make sure I was clear-headed. I was clear-headed when I made this decision—I know very well that I’m not excited at all right now, I don’t hate the British, and I don’t think they deserved it. It’s because I judged that doing this was worthwhile for the strategic interests of the Alliance, and that value justified the price.”

"Revolution is not a dinner party."

“Only when you treat someone to a meal does it count as a meal,” Slava stood up, picked up his coat, and draped it over his shoulders. “Let’s go, it’s time to get to work.”

...

On April 2, Argentine troops landed on the Falkland Islands, and the British garrison surrendered after a token resistance. The news reached London in the early hours of the morning, and Thatcher was awakened at 10 Downing Street.

At that moment, the whole world was watching her.

A prime minister whose approval ratings have plummeted, a country with the highest unemployment rate since the war, and a navy whose budget is being cut—now they are embarking on an expedition of 8,000 miles to fight a South American country for an archipelago that most British people can't even find on a map.

If Britain doesn't fight, it will be the death knell for the last vestige of dignity of the British Empire. Argentina, a military dictatorship, seized British territory by force. If Britain doesn't even dare to respond to such a thing, it will never be able to hold its head high in the international community again. There will be a rebellion within the Conservative Party, and Thatcher will be ousted from power within days.

If war were to break out—the risks would be equally enormous. The British Navy would be launching an amphibious expedition across 8,000 miles of ocean, its supply lines stretched to the limit, and its air force severely understrength. The Royal Navy had only two aircraft carriers—the thirty-year-old HMS Hermes and the newly commissioned HMS Invincible—capable of carrying fewer than forty Sea Harrier fighters combined. In contrast, the Argentine Air Force had over two hundred combat aircraft, including French-made Super Étendard attack aircraft and Exocet anti-ship missiles.

On April 3, the House of Commons convened its first Saturday emergency session since the 1956 Suez Canal Crisis. The atmosphere in the chamber was like a grenade about to explode—Labour, Conservatives, and Liberal Democrats all demanded government action. Foreign Secretary Lord Carrington resigned because the Foreign Office under his leadership had failed to anticipate the Argentine invasion.

Thatcher made the biggest gamble of her life.

On April 5th, a task force led by HMS Hermes and HMS Invincible set sail from Portsmouth Harbour, heading south for the South Atlantic. The docks were packed with people seeing them off; some waved British flags, others wept. Television cameras captured several sailors' wives standing on the shore watching the warships depart, their expressions a mixture of pride and fear.

If she won, she would be the Iron Lady who led Britain out of its decline; if she lost, she would be the eternal sinner who sent British soldiers to feed the fish in the South Atlantic.

On a deeper level, she was betting on the future of the entire United Kingdom. If the expedition succeeded, it would not only be a victory in reclaiming territory but also a victory for her reform agenda—the whole nation would unite around her because of the war victory, the voices of the opposition would be drowned out, and her economic reforms would gain the political capital to continue.

But if it fails—

If the once invincible British Empire were to fall in the South Atlantic, and this small island controlled by Argentina were to still stand proudly in the world, it would be far more than just Thatcher's embarrassing moment.

Well, a country undergoing painful reforms coupled with a military defeat resulted in political collapse. Thatcher stepped down, the Conservative Party split, a snap election was held, and the Labour Party came to power—and a Britain struck by both war defeat and economic crisis would be busy healing itself for the next few years, with no energy to cooperate with the United States in pressuring the Soviet Union within the NATO framework.

This was exactly what Slava was planning.

On the night the task force set sail from Portsmouth, Slava watched the images on television in his Moscow apartment—the grey warships slowly sailing through the mist of the English Channel toward the South Pacific, and a serious-looking British man reading a statement that said things like "the resolve of the British Empire" and "never to bow to aggression."

He turned off the TV.

The room fell silent, save for the distant clanging of the tram passing by outside the window.

Major historical events are being rewritten, and he is the one writing them.

Chapter 19 The Americans did it too!

Before the full-scale outbreak of war, Argentina had no idea how powerful it could be, and Britain had no idea whether it could actually achieve its goals.

Britain has almost mobilized its entire force this time.

Due to the long distance, all military operations had to rely on the Royal Navy to deploy task forces, with Admiral John Federhouse as the supreme commander of Task Force 317.

This fleet includes two aircraft carriers, HMS Hermes and the newly commissioned HMS Invincible, whose more than 20 Sea Harrier vertical takeoff and landing aircraft constitute the air force that the entire task force can use to counter the Argentine military.

However, HMS Invincible would not get too close to the battlefield because Queen Elizabeth's second son, Prince Andrew, served on HMS Invincible as a helicopter pilot. In addition to performing anti-submarine and anti-ship missions, the helicopters he piloted also served as temporary airborne early warning platforms to assist in emergency evacuation, transportation, and search and rescue operations.

While Prince Andrew's joining the fleet signifies the Royal Navy's emphasis on this operation, it would be highly incompetent for a commander to actually send the young prince to the front lines. Therefore, HMS Hermes is the core of the Royal Navy.

Prior to this, the British had already reduced the number of ships in their various colonies by more than half. In the 1981 Defence White Paper, British Defence Secretary John Nott planned to drastically cut the number of surface ships in the Royal Navy, and even the only patrol ship deployed in the South Atlantic, the icebreaker HMS Endurance, was included in the list of ships to be decommissioned!

What was the configuration of the Endurance? Two 20mm Oerlikon cannons, plus two Wasp helicopters, that was it.

If even these small boats are being decommissioned, it's no wonder Argentina dared to take action against the Falklands in the first place.

On the eve of the war, Captain Nicolas Barker, captain of the HMS Endurance, commented on the decision to withdraw troops: "When we withdrew our only military presence in the South Atlantic, it was tantamount to sending an invitation to Argentina—'Come, we will not and can no longer protect our overseas territories.'"

The Argentinians did indeed receive the invitation.

...

The situation in South America is equally chaotic.

When Lieutenant General Leopoldo Galtieri became President of Argentina in December 1981 through a power transition within the military, he inherited a country whose economy had completely collapsed—inflation exceeded 400% in 1981, GDP fell by 10%, manufacturing output plummeted by 22%, and workers' real wages saw meager growth.

Moreover, since the military government came to power in 1976, it has implemented a reign of terror under the pretext of opposing national security, and tens of thousands of people have been secretly arrested, imprisoned, tortured and killed. By the early 1980s, these things were becoming increasingly difficult to cover up. At the same time, international human rights pressure and domestic protests increased, and increasingly popular labor unions began to plan large-scale strikes.

This was one of the reasons why the Soviet Union was historically unwilling to help Argentina. However, Slava was clearly more "pragmatic." After persuading Andropov, Andropov also submitted the proposal to Brezhnev. After discussing it with the Minister of Defense for a long time, Khunjerabkhov agreed to the plan, and the coalition began to contact Argentina.

Galtieri was clearly not impressed by the Soviet Union's actions, after all, it was the socialist bloc's big brother offering him support. He knew all too well how many people he had killed in his anti-communist campaigns over the past few years, so he was hesitant to use the intelligence provided by the big brother, though he didn't refuse the weapons.

After all, weapons themselves have no ideology.

On March 26, a batch of additional AM39 anti-ship missiles began their long and clandestine journey through a roundabout supply chain via Libya and Peru—"rediscovered" from the grey stockpiles of French arms dealers, changing hands several times and forging documents, before finally appearing in the ammunition depot of the Argentine Naval Air Force at Rio Grande Air Base.

---

In the early morning of April 2, 1982, Argentine Navy Lieutenant Commander Guillermo Sánchez-Sabaroz led his troops to land at Cape Rec on the eastern tip of the Falkland Islands and advanced toward Port Stanley under the cover of darkness.

British Governor Sir Rex Hunt ordered a surrender after a token resistance—only one Argentine soldier was killed and one British soldier was wounded in the entire battle. Hours later, the Argentine flag was raised over the government building in Port Stanley, and Galtieri appointed General Menéndez as the military governor of the archipelago.

When the news reached Buenos Aires that morning, a cheering crowd quickly gathered in Plaza de Mayo, Argentine flags fluttering everywhere in the sunlight. Galtieri stood on the balcony of the presidential palace, receiving the cheers of the people; at that moment, he looked like a true national hero—a patriotic general who had reclaimed lost territory. Inflation, unemployment, and photos held up by the families of the missing in a corner of the square—all of this was temporarily obscured by a blue and white flag.

The British counterattack came quickly.

In mid-April, the Royal Air Force began its deployment to Ascension Island in the mid-Atlantic, with Vulcan bombers, Ghost fighter-bombers, and Victory aerial refueling tankers arriving at RAF Widjawk. The task force completed its final assembly and resupply in the waters near Ascension Island, and a small advance force was sent to South Georgia Island.

On April 25, the British raid on South Georgia Island, codenamed "Operation Parrot," was finally completed despite repeated disruptions from severe weather. An SAS airdrop was forced to halt due to a blizzard with winds exceeding 50 kilometers per hour, and a helicopter crashed on a glacier. However, British Marine Corps Major Sheridan managed to muster 76 men for a forced assault, and under the cover of gunfire from the destroyers HMS Anchor and HMS Plymouth, forced the Argentine defenders on the island to surrender without a fight.

The Argentine Navy's Santa Fe submarine was damaged by British helicopters using depth charges and anti-ship missiles during the operation. After running aground, the crew abandoned ship and surrendered.

Major Sheridan sent a telegram after recapturing South Georgia Island:

"Your Majesty, the military flag is now flying alongside the national flag over South Georgia. God bless the Queen."

Upon receiving the telegram, Thatcher immediately stepped out of 10 Downing Street and announced the news to the waiting reporters, uttering a phrase that later became one of her signature quotes—"Celebrate with the world!"

But South Georgia is just an appetizer; the real battle awaits on the Falklands, 1,300 kilometers away.

...

Slava wasn't the only one watching all of this from Moscow.

Defense Minister Ustinov made a decision on April 1 that Slava only learned of afterward: to secretly dispatch two nuclear submarines to the South Atlantic, the area where the conflict was taking place.

The orders given to the two submarines were very brief: "Observe, do not expose yourselves. Under no circumstances should you make contact with any ships of either side of the conflict. If discovered, evacuate immediately."

The hull numbers and names of these two submarines will not appear in any public records. They departed from Murmansk and Vladivostok respectively, each taking nearly two weeks to cross most of the globe to reach the South Atlantic. One was deployed south of the Falklands to monitor the movements of the Argentine Navy's southern task force, which included the cruiser General Belgrano; the other remained far behind the British task force, tracking the HMS Hermes carrier strike group.

May 2, South Atlantic Ocean.

Commander River Brown, captain of the Royal Navy's nuclear submarine HMS Conqueror, has been tracking the cruiser General Belgrano for over thirty hours.

The General Belgrano is an aging light cruiser—formerly the USS Phoenix, a veteran that survived the attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. After being sold to Argentina and undergoing modernization, it remains essentially a warship designed forty years prior, displacing over 13,000 tons and carrying more than 1,000 officers and men. Escorted by two destroyers, it patrols the high seas south of the Falklands.

The Conqueror spotted it and immediately reported it to London.

The message was relayed via satellite communication link back to fleet command at Northwood and then to the wartime cabinet at 10 Downing Street. After a discussion described by participants as "brief but intense," Thatcher authorized the attack—

Although the General Belgrano was outside the 200-nautical-mile no-navigation zone declared by the UK at the time, and according to later analysis its course appeared to be heading away from the Falklands rather than towards them, the logic of the wartime cabinet was clear: sinking a capital ship would be a devastating blow to the enemy's morale, and this opportunity could not be missed.

At 3:57 PM, HMS Conqueror launched three torpedoes after taking up its attack position. Despite being equipped with Tigerfish wire-guided torpedoes, the Tigerfish's reliability was only 40%, and the captain was unwilling to take the risk at this time.

Ultimately, the captain decided to use the Type 84 torpedo, which had been in service since World War II. Each torpedo carried an 800-pound warhead and was simple, reliable, and lethal.

The Conqueror fired three torpedoes, two of which hit their targets.

The first bullet struck the armor belt fifteen meters behind the bow. Although it penetrated the hull, it was stopped by the armor and did not cause significant structural damage.

The second missile struck three-quarters of the ship's hull, penetrating to the vicinity of the engine room before exploding. The shockwave from the explosion blasted upwards through two decks, and seawater surged into the ship like soda.

The attack killed 275 officers and soldiers on the spot. The ship's electrical system was destroyed, making it impossible to send out radio distress signals. A large amount of seawater poured into the hull through the torpedo's tear, and all the drainage pumps stopped due to the power outage.

At 4:24 p.m., Captain Bonso ordered the ship to be abandoned.

The General Belgrano sank slowly into the cold waters of the South Atlantic at 55 degrees 24 minutes south latitude and 61 degrees 32 minutes west longitude, taking 323 lives—nearly half of the total number of Argentine casualties in the entire Falklands War.

The two escorting destroyers did not realize what had happened until after the Belgrano sank. They turned around to search for survivors, but it was already dark. The rough seas had scattered the lifeboats everywhere, and some people had frozen to death in the icy water and strong winds.

Meanwhile, about 40 nautical miles south of the sinking General Belgrano, at a depth of 120 meters, a submarine not listed in either side's order of battle was quietly hovering.

The Soviet submarine's captain clearly monitored the entire process using passive sonar: the Conqueror launched a torpedo, followed by two muffled explosions—the sound waves traveled so far and clearly through the seawater that the vibrations could be felt even forty nautical miles away.

What followed was a continuous noise that lasted for more than twenty minutes—metal structures breaking, bulkheads collapsing, and bubbles gushing out in large quantities. This was the final cry of a 10,000-ton warship as it died.

The captain saved the sonar recorder data completely and then ordered the submarine to turn back, but they encountered an accident on the way back.

During routine monitoring, the sonar operator detected another underwater target—approximately 8,000 yards away, at a similar depth, with a very low speed, almost hovering in place. After analyzing the noise characteristics of the propeller, the sonar operator reported a judgment that immediately changed the captain's expression: "Suspected Los Angeles-class attack submarine."

Damn, the Americans are here too! Oh no!

Soviet submarines were much less stealthy than the Los Angeles-class submarines. If they could detect American submarines, then it was highly likely that American submarines also knew where the Soviets were.

"How to do?"

The captain pondered for a moment. He knew it wasn't surprising that American nuclear submarines were also operating in this area—the CIA and British intelligence agencies had cooperated fully in this war, and the Americans had provided Britain with a large amount of satellite intelligence on the movements of the Argentine Navy. It was perfectly reasonable for one or two American submarines to be in the vicinity collecting signals intelligence.

But the fact that they were discovered is another matter entirely.

"Captain, the Americans have spotted us."

Sonar operators detected a sudden decrease in the noise of the American submarine's propellers, indicating that the submarine had switched to an ultra-quiet navigation mode—a clear signal.

The two nuclear submarines then faced off for nearly thirty-five minutes at a distance of about eight thousand yards in the dark waters of the South Atlantic.

No one fired, no one emitted active sonar pulses, and no one made any move that could be interpreted as hostile. The two captains—one Soviet and one American—made the same judgment in their respective command rooms: this was not the flashpoint for World War III, and it was not worth risking their lives for a war that did not belong to them.

Thirty-five minutes later, the Soviet submarine began to slowly turn and quietly left the area at a speed of less than four knots. About twenty minutes later, the sonar signal of the American submarine also began to recede into the distance, heading north—towards the location of the British task force.

The two submarines disappeared into the depths of the ocean, like two shadows that met unexpectedly in the darkness, stared at each other for a moment, and then turned and walked into their own darkness.

This standoff did not appear in either side's public records.

...

When news of the sinking of the General Belgrano reached Buenos Aires, Galtieri's reaction was exactly as everyone expected—anger, followed by even greater anger.

The Argentine government immediately declared it an act of "British piracy" and rejected the peace settlement proposal put forward by the Peruvian president fourteen hours earlier—although ironically, the British side had expressed its willingness to accept the proposal.

Facing one of the world's oldest and still powerful navies, the British Navy would make any adversary think the worst.

Therefore, the Argentine Navy decided to avoid conflict with the Royal Navy's surface and submarine battle groups for most of its ships, and Galtieri did not intend to send the navy into action even after obtaining intelligence from the Soviet Union.

However, naval aviation is not subject to this restriction.

At the naval headquarters in Buenos Aires, Admiral Anaya gathered his air force commanders together.

A nautical chart of the South Atlantic lay spread out on the table, its known positions marked with red and blue pins. The blue pins represented the British task force—their positions came from two sources: one was the Argentine Air Force's own maritime patrol aircraft, and the other was data transmitted through special channels. The precision of this data both excited and puzzled the Argentine intelligence officers, as it was a level of accuracy only reconnaissance satellites could achieve, and Argentina had none.

Some of the officers present had actually guessed the source of the data, but no one cared; all they needed to know was where the British carrier strike group was at that moment.

In the operations room, Anaya announced a decision: Argentina would no longer be on the defensive; the naval air force would take the initiative and use all available means—especially Exocet missiles—to attack the core targets of the British task force.

"Our objective was to destroy the British core aircraft carrier. We lost a capital ship, and the British will pay the price!"

On May 4, the British destroyer HMS Sheffield was spotted by an Argentine Navy Neptune patrol aircraft. After verifying that Sheffield's coordinates were basically consistent with the intelligence provided by the Soviet Union, the Argentine naval air force launched a full-scale attack. Four Argentine Étendard attack aircraft, carrying Exocet missiles and deployed on Tierra del Fuego, immediately took off and launched a surprise attack on the British task force under the escort of Mirage fighters.

Chapter 20 The Royal Navy: Never Retreat!

May 4, South Atlantic Ocean, about 5 nautical miles east of the Falkland Islands.

HMS Sheffield was on radar patrol duty. Its captain, Captain Salter, was drinking coffee in the command room. The radar screen showed nothing but sea clutter. The officers on duty in the combat information center exchanged information casually. The entire warship was shrouded in a numbing atmosphere of routine.

There was nothing on the radar, and the monotonous patrols that lasted for more than ten hours made everyone start to relax.

"Captain, your black tea is ready!"

"Okay, George, don't make me another cup. I'm going to rest for a while. You should rest too," the captain said to one of his sailors. Then he carried the tea out of the bridge, with the bosun following behind him.

"It's so quiet. There isn't a single enemy on the sea. It's so different from the war I imagined."

"Ah, it seems the Argentinians have all withdrawn their fleet," the boatswain said, taking a sip of his red tea.

"But that doesn't matter anymore." The captain leaned on the railing, looking at the distant sea. They were already close to the shore, and pigeons could be seen perched on the mast from time to time.

"Captain, you seem to be in a good mood."

"Of course! Everyone will be able to return to England alive. Our lady in Downing Street is also working hard for the country. We, the Royal Navy, must also step up our efforts!"