Falklands and Patagonia: the good old neighbourhood. Fernando R. Coronato 1 & Jean F. Tourrand 2 1 CENPAT-CONICET, Puerto Madryn, Argentina ; coronato@cenpat.edu.ar 2 CIRAD, Montpellier, France ; tourrand@aol.com Introduction The Falklands War was experienced in Patagonia differently to the rest of Argentina. The Patagonian people have the impression of having "lived" the war, whilst in the rest of the Argentine it was a distant show to watch on TV and did not prevent football on Sundays. Due to the geographical proximity the war was a palpable experience for Patagonians, who experienced it through blackouts, the daily count of war-planes coming back, the restrictions on access to the coast, changes in radio programming, and finally, after the defeat, the landing of the POWs at Puerto Madryn, Chubut, and to a lesser extent at other Patagonian ports. This article argues that the Patagonian feeling of closeness to the war, stems not only from geography but also from old socio-historical links between Patagonia and the Falkland Islands; which had been partially reinstated in the 1970s but were destroyed by the war. These links go back to the beginning of the integration of Patagonia in Argentina, a century before the war, and developed around sheep colonization of the region from 1880 onwards. Although overlooked by official historiography, these links had a key role in the development of the region between the years 1880-1920, and created the feeling of sharing a common geographical and social space. For instance, in the colloquial language of the Patagonians before the war, the Falklands were simply called "the islands" without elaboration. This familiarity of language reflects a closeness that goes far beyond geography and has its counterpart in the islands themselves where Patagonia was known simply as "the coast", or "the mainland", terms that did not differentiate between the Chilean and Argentina sectors. Even if some authors have briefly discussed the links between the islands and the mainland, the subject was neglected for decades and also the rupture caused by the 1982 war led to the expunging of these links so as to obliterate their very existence. Falkland Islands families who settled in Patagonia in the late 19th century remain in the region, and many of the farms they founded still exist. Suffice it to just scrape the layer of nationalism and chauvinism that covered Patagonia from the 1930s to find an integrated regional system spreading itself beyond the political boundaries, hardly affected by three different national administrations. The memory of the bonds, sometimes even family ties, was not entirely overshadowed by the policy of deliberate aloofness from 1940 to 1960. A timid outbreak came after the 1971 agreements on communications. Despite the official and regulated character of these agreements, very different from the casual conviviality of old times, the Patagonians could finally rediscover their old neighbors. But the door slammed shut in 1982 and radio programs in English of some of the Patagonian coast stations fell silent forever.