Challenge

Lt. Cmd. Daniel Dawes RN, Lt Lauren Greer RN and their lover Bonny McAdam, have recently escaped conflict in their homeland. Bonny and Daniel have created an idyllic love nest in a cottage on the banks of the River Dart. Lauren is an instructor at the nearby Britannia Naval College at Dartmouth. Daniel flies SeaKing Helicopters from RNAS Culdrose. Bonny is studying at Exeter University. The three are about to be drawn into a far away war and an adventure that will challenge and change their lives forever. The year is 1982. In Argentina the Military Junta led by General Galtieri is losing its grip and fears it will overthrown by a popular uprising. A distraction is needed to take the peoples eyes of the border war with Chile and the violent repression by the state security police. The long-standing dispute over ownership of a small group of islands in the South Atlantic offers such a distraction. In Britain the Conservative government of Mr's Thatcher is also in political trouble. Her radical policies have made her the most hated Prime Minister on record. John Nott, the Minister of Defence, announces a huge cut in defence spending. The fund raising is aimed at offering the electorate a big tax cut bribe before the next election. The Royal Navy is the prime target and most of its large ships are to be sold off. The two aircraft carriers, HMS Hermes and HMS Invincible will be past to their new owners by December 1982, along with, landing ships, support vessels and many smaller warships. The Royal Navy is to be reduced to inshore defence and fisheries protection. This is the most radical defence cut ever attempted by a British Government. These announcements and the notice that HMS Endurance is to be recalled from her South Atlantic Falklands base, does not go unnoticed in Argentina. Britain will no longer have the capability to defend the Falklands and Argentina will have the glory of retaking the Malvinas. Plans are made to invade in December 1982. However a misunderstood piece of intelligence deceives the Argentineans. A movement order to a Royal Navy atomic submarine in the Mediterranean is understood to be redeployment to the South Atlantic. They panic and bring forward invasion plans. They must invade now at the end of March. They calculate that Britain won't resist. Are not all the signs clear? They are disbanding their once mighty navy and HMS Endurance is gone. Galtieri says: 'We must strike now for the glory of the motherland.' He hopes to keep power a little longer.