Table of Contents
The Falklands (Falkland Islands)
Overview
A group of tree-less, windswept semi-antarctic British islands in the South Atlantic, the islands are better known for the wars fought over them than for anything else. This is possibly because sheep and penguins ounumber the human population of the islands roughly 500,000:1. British service personnel also outnumber the civilian islanders (known as Bennies, or Sills depending how polite the Bootnecks, Tommies or Brylcreem boys are meant to be), by a ratio of 1.5:1. Despite this, the islanders are a jolly sort, ready to break out their Union Flag shirts, and rattle off patriotic songs in their (reportedly) half-scottish, half-westcountry accents should they be invaded again (which, to listen to your average hormonal teen Argentine, will happen in the next five minutes).
In the First World War
The islands were to prove the site of one of the war’s first major naval encounters. The Kaiserlichemarine scored an early victory against an undergunned Royal Navy force and looked certain to seize the islands and their strategic coaling station. However, the plucky Britischer pigdogs managed to rally at half-time before sending the dastardly hun to Davy Jones’ locker, whereupon there was much rejoicing on the British side, kind of not-mirrored in the halls of the German Empire. Indeed, it is said that steam literally shot from Kaiser Wilhelm‘s ears, and the ends of his iconic moustache caught fire.
In the Second World War
The islands were to prove strategically important in the second world war, by being a part of the world not directly involved in the war, thus meaning the war was not truly a world war. The monumental achievement of such a small group of islands proving much of the world’s terminology wrong has, as yet, not been officially recognised.
The Falklands War
Argentina vs. the UK and all that jazz.
The Falklands in alternate history
As Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series states, the Lizards don’t think water (and therefore islands) are useful for anything, the islands, compounded by being British, and therefore destined to be forgotten by the author, cease to exist.
Alison Brooks of soc.history.what-if fame once wrote a humorous Double Blind What If article that masquerades as a review of a book about the OTL Falklands War (making it an ATL, fictional war within the timeline the review comes from). The “review” ironically points out the many seemingly improbable things that happened during the course of the OTL war.
See Also
The Falklands Timelines and Scenarios
The Falklands Points of Divergence
Useful Resources about The Falklands
British Caribbean overseas territories - Caribbean overseas territory of the United Kingdom.