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Razor's Edge: The Unofficial History of the Falklands War
For five years before the Falklands War, Hugh Bicheno was one of the top British spies in Argentina. As such, he gathered hard, corroborated intelligence on Argentine intentions over the Falklands - which the British establishment then chose to ignore. The reasons behind this British decision, and its disastrous and inevitable consequences in the South Atlantic, are the main story of this book.
There were three main players in the war, each of them trying to overcome their own cultural baggage. The Argentines were riddled with guilt: after years of fighting a morally repugnant campaign against its own people, the Argentine military saw a war for the Malvinas islands as a perfect opportunity to win back their self-respect. The hands of the Americans were also bloody from the likewise dirty wars they had sponsored and abetted in Central America. For Britain it was simply the last straw after decades of humiliation.
There were three main players in the war, each of them trying to overcome their own cultural baggage. The Argentines were riddled with guilt: after years of fighting a morally repugnant campaign against its own people, the Argentine military saw a war for the Malvinas islands as a perfect opportunity to win back their self-respect. The hands of the Americans were also bloody from the likewise dirty wars they had sponsored and abetted in Central America. For Britain it was simply the last straw after decades of humiliation.
383 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2006
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About the author
Hugh Bicheno
21 books16 followersHugh Bicheno graduated from Cambridge and later joined the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6). He is now a political risk analyst and an historian of conflict.
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
November 2, 2020
A military history book of a fairly recent campaign and to be honest one that makes you draw your breath at times as the writer pulls no punches and doesn't seem to think impartiality is necessary for a time such as this.
As such at times politically I found I veered from some of the assessments of figures within but a decent case is made for the war within this book, ultimately it seems a inherited policy of appeasement and fascism led to the rise of tensions which created conditions for conflict
There's little doubt too the writer knows his stuff and has researched it so any body blows you may take in regard the frank political assessments ..well ultimately they hold up.
A decent book on a era of history that although I recall didn't really before this seem to be a subject I wanted explore more.
As with such books unless you have a personal interest in the conflict the facts and figures can time seem a bit dry...but the more statistically minded will find much in these pages.
As such at times politically I found I veered from some of the assessments of figures within but a decent case is made for the war within this book, ultimately it seems a inherited policy of appeasement and fascism led to the rise of tensions which created conditions for conflict
There's little doubt too the writer knows his stuff and has researched it so any body blows you may take in regard the frank political assessments ..well ultimately they hold up.
A decent book on a era of history that although I recall didn't really before this seem to be a subject I wanted explore more.
As with such books unless you have a personal interest in the conflict the facts and figures can time seem a bit dry...but the more statistically minded will find much in these pages.
February 4, 2026
Ooh-boy, this is a polarizing book on a well-trod subject. I have so many things to say.
1. Don't read this as your first book on the Falklands War. It presumes some familiarity with the subject and, more to the point, has some strong points of view expressed in ways not normally seen in military histories written for the general public. I'll say more about this later.
2. It is called the "Unofficial History of the Falklands War" as it was written at the same time (2006) as the British The Official History of the Falklands Campaign, Vol. 2: War and Diplomacy and could not use that as source material.
3. That said, the sources are quite extensive including a large number of Argentinian primary sources. Bicheno was an intelligence officer and is fluent in Spanish. He served in Argentina during the Dirty War.
4. Because of #3, this is the most balanced account of the battles from the British and Argentinian perspective. Any image you might have of the Argentinian Army being full of poorly-trained, poorly-led conscripts is belied by the numerous accounts of Argentinian courage, especially at the NCO level along with lengthy defensive preparations that bedeviled the Brits.
5. The maps in this are simply unbelievable in scope and detail. Every battle is covered with multiple maps, pinpointing individual platoons, movements (and deaths where they occurred) of soldiers on each side. Artillery is positioned down to the gun. Every hamlet in the Falklands is included plus the names of innumerable inlets, bays, peninsulas, ridges, and mountains. Contour lines are drawn. Each Argentinian aircraft sortie against the islands is plotted when relevant to the day(s) of each battle. British fleet dispositions in and around the island are also shown.
6. This is not a book about the SAS or SBS exploits on the Falklands. They get some brief mentions but you need to look elsewhere for their war experiences.
Now I'll get to the main takeaways that other reviewers have mentioned in their own ways.
Bicheno has several axes to grind here, notably the pusillanimity of the British government up to the actual Falklands invasion in April 1982. He fires both barrels at the government for being only too willing to sell out the Falkland Islanders to Argentina in order to save budget money. Chapter 2 is called "Guilt", Chapter 3 is called "Complicity" and chapter 4 is called "Shame"
In these chapters, the writing style is reminiscent of Internet warriors pounding out on their keyboards their unvarnished opinions to elicit clicks. I'll cite a few sentences from page 89 to give an example of this stylistic approach:
It may be that democracy inevitably produces government of the mediocre, by the mediocre and for the mediocre, which may in turn be no bad thing given the adage that a nation may be fortunate to produce great leaders but most unfortunate to need them... What remained amid the wrack of objectively failed social and economic policies was an ever-increasing class of parasitic government employees
--p. 91 as part of a lengthy discursion into the failures of the British post-World War II government and a descent into a hollow shell of its former self
Anyway, there's close to 100 pages of the background to the Falklands War including a tangled account of the Dirty War, ties to the Nazis, American involvement in supporting right wing governments, Jimmy Carter's weakness, cut after cut in British defense spending, and new to me, an account of the Argentinian occupation of South Thule island three years before the invasion where the Brits sent a nuclear submarine to warn off Argentina but never told Argentina the submarine was even there(!?) A better historian could have written all this more dispassionately but, I think, because Bicheno was an MI6 officer during this time and had plenty of contacts with the powers that be on both sides, was dismayed to find how entrenched the bureaucracies were - greedy British companies wanting to sell arms to a cruel Argentinian government, feckless British politicians only too willing to give up on the Falklands (even after the war started!), and Americans not covering themselves with glory.
Bicheno is hard to read here because he is so opinionated (and his opinions may be mostly right) and I almost put the book down.
However, once the invasion starts, he turns towards more conventional military history though is not shy about calling out British command blunders. His greatest animus is to the inter-service rivalries between the Paras, Marines, and Guards units - especially their commanders and higher level commanders who had "political" reasons for favoring certain attack approaches so every unit involved would get "glory"
1-2 stars for the preliminaries
4 stars the the actual land campaign
Again, don't make this your first book on the Falklands War
1. Don't read this as your first book on the Falklands War. It presumes some familiarity with the subject and, more to the point, has some strong points of view expressed in ways not normally seen in military histories written for the general public. I'll say more about this later.
2. It is called the "Unofficial History of the Falklands War" as it was written at the same time (2006) as the British The Official History of the Falklands Campaign, Vol. 2: War and Diplomacy and could not use that as source material.
3. That said, the sources are quite extensive including a large number of Argentinian primary sources. Bicheno was an intelligence officer and is fluent in Spanish. He served in Argentina during the Dirty War.
4. Because of #3, this is the most balanced account of the battles from the British and Argentinian perspective. Any image you might have of the Argentinian Army being full of poorly-trained, poorly-led conscripts is belied by the numerous accounts of Argentinian courage, especially at the NCO level along with lengthy defensive preparations that bedeviled the Brits.
5. The maps in this are simply unbelievable in scope and detail. Every battle is covered with multiple maps, pinpointing individual platoons, movements (and deaths where they occurred) of soldiers on each side. Artillery is positioned down to the gun. Every hamlet in the Falklands is included plus the names of innumerable inlets, bays, peninsulas, ridges, and mountains. Contour lines are drawn. Each Argentinian aircraft sortie against the islands is plotted when relevant to the day(s) of each battle. British fleet dispositions in and around the island are also shown.
6. This is not a book about the SAS or SBS exploits on the Falklands. They get some brief mentions but you need to look elsewhere for their war experiences.
Now I'll get to the main takeaways that other reviewers have mentioned in their own ways.
Bicheno has several axes to grind here, notably the pusillanimity of the British government up to the actual Falklands invasion in April 1982. He fires both barrels at the government for being only too willing to sell out the Falkland Islanders to Argentina in order to save budget money. Chapter 2 is called "Guilt", Chapter 3 is called "Complicity" and chapter 4 is called "Shame"
In these chapters, the writing style is reminiscent of Internet warriors pounding out on their keyboards their unvarnished opinions to elicit clicks. I'll cite a few sentences from page 89 to give an example of this stylistic approach:
It may be that democracy inevitably produces government of the mediocre, by the mediocre and for the mediocre, which may in turn be no bad thing given the adage that a nation may be fortunate to produce great leaders but most unfortunate to need them... What remained amid the wrack of objectively failed social and economic policies was an ever-increasing class of parasitic government employees
--p. 91 as part of a lengthy discursion into the failures of the British post-World War II government and a descent into a hollow shell of its former self
Anyway, there's close to 100 pages of the background to the Falklands War including a tangled account of the Dirty War, ties to the Nazis, American involvement in supporting right wing governments, Jimmy Carter's weakness, cut after cut in British defense spending, and new to me, an account of the Argentinian occupation of South Thule island three years before the invasion where the Brits sent a nuclear submarine to warn off Argentina but never told Argentina the submarine was even there(!?) A better historian could have written all this more dispassionately but, I think, because Bicheno was an MI6 officer during this time and had plenty of contacts with the powers that be on both sides, was dismayed to find how entrenched the bureaucracies were - greedy British companies wanting to sell arms to a cruel Argentinian government, feckless British politicians only too willing to give up on the Falklands (even after the war started!), and Americans not covering themselves with glory.
Bicheno is hard to read here because he is so opinionated (and his opinions may be mostly right) and I almost put the book down.
However, once the invasion starts, he turns towards more conventional military history though is not shy about calling out British command blunders. His greatest animus is to the inter-service rivalries between the Paras, Marines, and Guards units - especially their commanders and higher level commanders who had "political" reasons for favoring certain attack approaches so every unit involved would get "glory"
1-2 stars for the preliminaries
4 stars the the actual land campaign
Again, don't make this your first book on the Falklands War
November 24, 2022
Bicheno has written a scathing indictment of both the British Foreign Office, Parliament, and the MOD. He pulls no punches in discrediting all three organizations in there dealings with the Argentines and how those dealings led to the invasion of the Falklands. This history takes up most of the first three chapters. Then the organization becomes some what choppy. The next chapter is called Preliminaries, but it covers mostly the air war and covers the air war until the end of the conflict in mid June. Then the actual invasion and the hump across East Falkland to Stanley. This is a great work that shows how the politicos fouled up the operation on both sides and how close for England this operation was. Many histories of the Falklands war make the fight sound like the Brits just dusted off the copy of "Defence of Her Majesties Possessions: Falkland Islands." The whole operation was much more adhoc and dam near a failure. Lucky for the islanders British professionalism from all ranks was far superior to the Argentines. A great example of this comes from a quote from a Argentine prisoner about being fed: 'When the British fed us they made sure that each man got the same share, but the few times they let us feed ourselves fights broke out and some did not get to eat." Pros vs those who use the services to gain position and perks Those chapters covering the professionalism of the Brits and the almost suicidal heroism of the Argentines are the best part of the read.
January 20, 2019
An amazing and very comprehensive book on the Falklands War. The detail of the military movements and dispositions of both sides in the conflict are without parallel. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It contained much previously unpublished material and I am very surprised that it wasn't and isn't a best seller on the subject.
February 16, 2026
Loved this different take on the conflict. Still remember when the Falkland's was invaded & thinking "Why has Argentina invaded Scotland?". Closer run thing than we knew.
February 16, 2026
Indepth study of the Falklands war.
December 5, 2009
Ich hätte Bicheno ja Bias vorwerfen können, aber seine Vorurteile gegen ARgentinien wurden von anderen Quellen bestätigt. Interessante Darstellung.
May 22, 2012
An excellent read...good mix of the political and the tactical...doesn't pull any punches.
June 23, 2020
One man's opinions and ideological drivel. Disappointing.
January 7, 2016
Riveting account of the Falklands war and just how close the uk came to a disastrous defeat
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews