The courage of an ex-fighter: "If you give me a fork, I fight with a fork" | Chronic

By Fedra Abagians
@trinityflux

The veteran Jorge Alberto Altieri He became famous for recovering the helmet that saved his life during the Falklands War and that an Englishman had put on sale. The traces left by a 74-day battle that killed 649 Argentines remained not only in the uniforms that the British took as spoils of war, but also in the bodies and in the memory of the soldiers who survived.

It was April 9, 1982 when he was summoned to go to war. A month ago, he had finished his military service and a policeman from Lanús told him that he had to appear in the regiment again. Her mother, who had lost her first police husband on duty, expressed a wish to hide him. "Mom, I'd rather die in the Falklands and not die here like a coward"he replied Beto Altieri, with 20 years old.

The first night in Monte Longdon slept outside. "We put a pilot on the ground and a poncho in place because it was raining, it was still raining in Malvinas, we were on duty every two hours, we were deeply asleep and badly eaten", he said ChronicAnd added: "The food was only on the mainland".

Mount Longdon was one of the cruelest places in the war and it was there that he spent his soldier days. On May 1, he and his companions had what is called a "baptism of fire", when a group of enemy planes flew over the area and a bomb killed them. a member of the engineering company 10.

With clothes wet with rain, with the body tired of not sleeping well and almost without strength. That's how Altieri was. "The food was bad, we had eaten once and it was soup, it weakened us, weakened us, we did not have the strength, we had to go up and down mountains, jump from stone to stone it was the fatigue we had "he counted.

The initial battle

On June 11 at 22:30, the fighting started. "I remember it like it was yesterday." At this time of night, the screams began because an English soldier had walked on one of the mines in front of us and had started the fight until we could not resist anymore because the difference was three or more. four English against an Argentinian "he said.

Argentine soldiers withdrew. With another partner, he proposed to go in search of a group of prisoners. They badumed the mission until enemy mortar bombs began to fall. One of them fell nearby and killed a sergeant. The shards hit his partner's legs and pierced Altieri's head.

He had one last memory before falling under the impact. "While I was in combat, I went into a tent to steal some cold food rations, a lot of canned food inside the jacket and that helped me a lot. the body does not pierce the shrapnel.he told.

Then, he said that since these splinters hit him, a new story began in his life: "I have to thank my colleagues, they came down from the mountain and took me several kilometers into the city".

Brands for life

Brain loss, paralysis of the right side and loss of one eye were the consequences of splinters that hit Altieri's head. He was hospitalized until April 1983 in Comodoro Rivadavia and was transferred to the last plane that left the Falklands for the mainland.

At age 37, there are still bodies to be recognized in Darwin's graveyard and the state was unable to restore to survivors or relatives of the dead anything that they had delivered in an unjust war , with young bodies, unprotected and in solitude. .

"We were not well prepared, but with courage, courage and patriotism, we showed the British side that even if we did not know how to read or write, we were fighting for our country with what we had: if you would give me a fork, I would fight with a fork, such is the feeling of the Argentine soldier "concluded Altieri.