Description

My Friends, The Enemy recounts the Falklands War from the viewpoint of the only Intelligence Corps serving with Intelligence Section, HQ 3 Commando Brigade. It is a personal account supported by intelligence comment assembled since 1982. Although Nick van der Bijl was a Staff Sergeant, his role, as part of the Intelligence Corps, meant that he was expected to provide expert intelligence to Brigade Headquarters about the Argentines. The fact that initially he knew nothing about them meant that he was very heavily involved in collecting and collating that intelligence from a variety of sources, including information from UK and after landing documents, prisoners of war and local people. The intelligence proved to be very accurate throughout the campaign. Controversially, the intelligence provided to 2nd Parachute Battalion at Goose Green was largely rejected in favor of less accurate information supplied by the SAS. Van der Bijl was one of the first into Port Stanley after the Argentine surrender and was part of an intelligence operation to search enemy HQs for documents, select several hundred Argentine officers for further interrogation before repatriation and interview several civilians as part of a counter-intelligence operation. My Friends, The Enemy is the first time that intelligence operations has been told by a prime witness to events from the start of the campaign to the finish.