Following a long-standing dispute over the sovereignty of the Malvinas / Falkland Islands, war officially broke out 42 years ago on 2nd April 1982 when Argentine forces invaded the Islands. In response the British sent a task force to counter the invasion and fight to recapture the territory. The battle that followed was a challenge for both sides. For the British, the challenge was deploying a force so far from home with limited land platforms to supply the effort. For the Argentineans, despite occupying the Islands, only one airfield out of the three (Stanley) was paved but it still wasn't long enough to operate the fast jets from, so they had to carry out their attacks from the Argentine mainland

The British only had 42 Harriers to counter the attacking aircraft which comprised approximately 50 air superiority fighters and 70 attack aircraft. Initial attacks on Stanley were carried out by Vulcan bombers in the historic Black Buck raids successfully completing 8000 mile round trip missions from the British airfield at Ascension. The war caught the world by surprise and indeed created some challenging political situations where some nations officially backed Britain's interests, but were none the less committed to supporting the Argentineans with the technology that they had supplied to them. Initial attacks on British ships were carried out by A-4 Skyhawks, Mirage III's, Canberra's as well is Israeli supplied Daggers. The initial Daggers fared well boosting pilot confidence in the aircrafts ability to survive modern combat but later a Canberra and a Dagger were lost to defending Sea Harriers. On a subsequent combat between Harriers and Mirage III's one Mirage was shot down and another was damaged. Short of fuel, it tried to land at the Argentinian occupied Stanley airfield but was shot down by friendly fire. Although night combat air patrols were performed by the Harriers, they were deemed too valuable during the day role to make a major commitment during the dark hours. Following the initial Canberra loss, subsequent missions for this type of aircraft were only performed by night. The A-4's and Daggers continued in the Strike Role where as the Mirage was used as decoys to lure the Harriers away from the attack aircraft. Lack of A-A missiles and refuelling capabilities limited it's potential other than in this role. After a successful recapture of South Georgia by British forces, the full effort was turned to the Falklands. 74 days after the invasion by Argentinian forces, the islands were recaptured and the Argentinian forces surrendered. The conflict cost the lives of 649 Argentineans military personnel, 255 British and 3 civilian islanders.

Because of the founding of the IPMS Nederland SIG on the Falklands war and finding the Facebook page about this war, I also regained the interest I had in this conflict at that time (1982) and still have. I also collected a lot of info, especially recorded many videos from the various TV channels and of course, magazines and collected articles. Unfortunately, all the video tapes have disappeared over the years, but I still have the magazines etc. Recently I came across this Aztec decal set (2011), there is also a second set, and was really amazed at what the set offered on possibilities. The recently released booklet "The Falklands War 2nd April – 14th June 1982" by Valiant Wings Publications in the Airframe series with lots of modelling articles rekindled everything, partly because I still have some models in my stash fitting the period. I had to obtain this decal set.

The Decal Set

Aztec have provided these decals in two scales, 1:72 (set D72-048) and 1:48 (set D48-048). The decals come on three sheets with two colour and two B&W sheets of instructions. I'm really impressed with the number of individual aircraft that are catered for in this set. If you enjoy building your models with themes and have been looking to do a Falklands one, then you'll be very happy with this set.

The aircraft you can build are:

• British
  • Sea Harrier FRS.1 800 Sqn - XZ457, ZA193
  • Sea Harrier FRS.1 801 Sqn - XZ451, ZA175, ZA190
  • Sea Harrier FRS.1 809 Sqn - ZA177, ZA192
  • Sea King HAS.2, 825 Sqn RN - No. 97
  • Lynx HAS.2, 815 Sqn - XZ247, XZ691, XZ720, XZ728
  • Wasp HAS.1 - XT429, XS539
• Argentinian
  • A-4Q 1 ANAS Argentine Navy - 3-A-301, 3-A-304, 3-A-305, 3-A-307, 3-A-309, 3-A-312 (with selection of pre & wartime colours)
  • A-4P Grupo 5 de Caza, Argentine Airforce - C0207, C-222, C-228, C-236, C-242
  • Canberra 2BS, Argentine Airforce - B-108 (Not included in 1:48 set)
  • Mirage IIIEA Argentine Airforce - I-018, I-019, ?
  • MB339, Argentine Navy - 4-A-115
  • Pucara, Grupo de Ataque 3, Argentine Airforce - A-506, A-528, A-537
  • Sea King SH-3, Argentine Navy - 2-H-233, 2-H-235
  • Lynx, Argentine Navy - 3-H-142

The Reference Material

The instructions have lots of good and a few bad points. There is a wealth of information about colour schemes with plenty of side profiles and painting tips, for example explaining the variation in colour that can be found on the camouflaged Skyhawks. There are also photographs of the real aircraft and information about who flew the aircraft which makes for an interesting read. The slight downside is that the profiles are quite small and there is a lack of 3 view profiles, so you will probably need some support reference material to assist applying some of the decals. How readily available this support information is to come by, I don't know, so some replies from experts with good reference links would be most welcome. One of the things I really like is a paint chart for the aircraft contained that shows the paint numbers for the different paint manufacturers in comparison to the BS number - Humbrol, Model Master, Tamiya & Revell. Clearly a lot of research has gone into creating this set by Aztec and they've really tried to squeeze as much value into the set as possible reflected by the fact that you can build up to 38 aircraft from the set!

The Decals

The decal sheets are jammed with detail, and very fine detail it is. There are three sheets that contain not only the aircraft markings, but a wealth of stencils. On the whole, the register is very good and the colours sharp. The British high vis roundels suffer a slight overlap of the blue and red colours which is visible if you look closely. There are some small British low vis roundels where the pink part is very slightly off centre to the surrounding blue. How noticeable this will be when on the kit I don't know. I'm trying to be objective and critical here as is the responsibility of a reviewer, these really are minor issues in the overall excellent quality of the pack. In Aztecs intent to get as many decals onto a sheet as possible, care will need to be taken cutting the decals from the sheet as they are quite close together. I normally use a pair of scissors, but for these I would use a sharp scalpel knife.

Conclusion

There's a few minor issues as I've mentioned above, namely the aircraft profiles and the British roundels, but you don't get much more value crammed into a pack of decals than this.. It is clear that some important aircraft are missing from the whole, Wessex, Argentine Hercules and Vulcan stand out, but also others. Part 2 is of course complementary, but does not make it complete. The Argentinian Etendard has a separate set by Aztec As mentioned in the review, the Canberra is not included in the 1/48 set. If you have even the slightest interest in the Falkland conflict and build in 1/72 or 1/48th, then you really need this set in your collection! With 1 blow you get a beautiful Falklands collection, if you also purchase set 2 it can't go wrong.
Price-quality ratio is more than good (25 – 30 euros)

Thanks to Aztec for providing the decal set