Taking Port Stanley

Wherever they have served, the Gurkhas have found that their reputation for fearlessness, toughness and discipline has preceded them. But even the Gurkhas were surprised at the stories which came out of the freezing shores of the Falklands (Malvinas) Islands, which the British retook from the Argentines in mid-1982. While it is not clear to what extent the fighting ability of the Gurkhas was employed, the British Army seems to have made full use of their potential for their psychological warfare.

A commando of the 7th Gurkha Rifles on leave in Kathmandu in June 1983 recalled that during the advance on Fort Stanley, military intelligence discreetly leaked information to Argentine captives that Gurkhas would be making a predawn attack on a crucial outpost. A few captives were equally discreetly allowed to escape, "and when we went there the next morning, the enemy had fled," recalled the soldier.

But the martial romance attending the Gurkha warrior took a beating from the Argentines. Buenos Aires' delegate to the United Nations, Eduardo A. Roca, expressed shock to observe "mercenary forces introduced into Latin America in order to bring about the restoration of a colonial situation." The Argentines also lodged a formal protest with the Nepali Permanent Representative at the United Nations, demanding an "immediate withdrawal of Nepali troops from the Malvinas."

In a magazine article, the Nobel Prize winning Colombian writer Gabriel Garcia Marquez, described the Gurkhas as "decapitators" who beheaded Argentine prisoners "with their scimitars at the rate of one every seven seconds (and) they held the severed head by the hair and lopped off the ears." Garcia Marquez provided no evidence to support this claim, which was ascribed to an extreme case of war jitters in Latin America. Certainly, Marquez's report contradicted the account of Falklands veterans who spent a "bonus" leave in Nepal. Some said they had been used mostly for "mopping up" operations that did not require much fighting.

In Kathmandu, the Nepali government clarified that Gurkha troops were recruited under "specific terms and conditions and are an integral part of the British and Indian armies." Meanwhile, the Argentines cancelled a planned expedition to Mount Everest in 1983, which may or not have been due to Falklands-phobia.