The Falklands cemented Margaret Thatcher's place in British political history and restored the country's pride after years of decline. But the seeds of the conflict were sown by the Government's miscalculations and the battle was a close run thing. Defence correspondent Nigel Burton reports

STANDING alone in a San Carlos cemetery, Baroness Thatcher gazes solemnly at the graves of servicemen who lost their lives in the Falklands Conflict.

The Northern Echo: Argentinian bomb

DEFINING MOMENTS: An Argentinean bomb explodes on the Royal Navy frigate HMS Antelope

Deep in thought, the Prime Minister requested a moment alone at the military cemetery, built by Royal Engineers and Gurkhas to honour 14 comrades who made the ultimate sacrifice in 1982.

The graves, and those of many more Argentinian soldiers also buried on the islands, are a constant reminder of the conflict.

The Falklands crisis was a defining moment for Mrs Thatcher – and for Britain. But the decision to recapture the islands could have easily been the greatest political miscalculation since Suez in 1956.

In the euphoria that followed victory, people soon forgot the terrible mistakes that led to the invasion.

Desperate to cut the costly defence budget, the 1981 Defence Review proposed selling or scrapping the Navy’s aircraft carriers and assault ships and reducing the number of destroyers and frigates.

The plan, which included the withdrawal of the Falklands patrol ship HMS Endurance, would have emasculated the Royal Navy. It also encouraged the military junta in Argentina to take the Falklands by force rather than seek a peaceful solution. The junta was confident Britain did not have the stomach for a fight.

Foreign Office officials also missed the warning signs.

They might have prevented an invasion had Britain shown a willingness to defend the islands, as it had done in November 1977 (when two frigates and a nuclear submarine were sent to the South Atlantic for a sabre-rattling exercise in the face of Argentinian bellicosity).

Ironically, had General Leopoldo Galtieri waited a few more months, the Royal Navy would have been unable to recover the Falklands.

The Northern Echo: port stanley

British troops march into Port Stanley

The British had already done a deal to sell the aircraft carrier HMS Invincible to the Australians, and without two “flat tops” (the only other being the aging HMS Hermes) it would have been impossible to defend the fleet against enemy aircraft.

As it was, the Task Force faced formidable odds – outgunned and outnumbered, 93 ships carrying 15,000 men operating in hostile waters 8,000 miles from home with a supply chain stretched to breaking point. Only the superb professionalism of Britain’s Armed Forces gave the operation any chance.

To her great credit, however, when Mrs Thatcher made the decision to recapture the islands, she did not waiver – even in the face of US pressure to find a compromise and when Argentine Exocets began sinking British warships.

The Northern Echo: simon weston

Falklands veteran Simon Weston

She did not flinch to order the sinking of the General Belgrano and when the shooting began she would settle for nothing less than total victory.

Britain could have lost the Falklands conflict.

Had an Exocet sunk one of the aircraft carriers, or more of the Argentine airforce’s old iron bombs actually exploded, the Task Force would have been forced to retreat. But, somehow, luck was on our side.

Of course, Mrs Thatcher would have been the first to say: “You make your own luck” – and she would have been right. The carriers were protected by gallant frigates and destroyers, the Argentine airforce could not press home its attacks and our soldiers proved more than a match for a larger force of reluctant conscripts.

The Falklands conflict cemented Mrs Thatcher’s reputation as the Iron Lady (a sobriquet given to her by a Soviet newspaper in 1976). It turned her from a troubled Prime Minister, grappling unsuccessfully with rising unemployment and domestic social unrest, into a world stateswoman who rubbed shoulders with the leaders of the superpowers.

Victory also transformed Britain. It gave the people a renewed sense of self-confidence – of a job well-done – and a feeling the country could be great again after decades of decline.

To the victor goes the spoils; “the Falklands factor” helped Mrs Thatcher to a landslide General Election victory in 1983.

Reflecting on the victory afterwards she said: “What the Falklands proved was that we could still do it, and do it superbly.

There was a feeling of colossal pride, of relief, that we could still do the things for which we were renowned.

“When it was all over there was a tremendous sense of relief.

A feeling that whatever problems I have to go through now, at least I won’t have to go through that terrible period when every time the phone rings, every time the door opens, you worry.”