Brothers in Arms
by ASH Smyth
November 2022
ASH Smyth looks out over mist-covered mountains, on Remembrance Sunday.
On Liberation Day—June 14th—last year, I closed my Falklands Radio Breakfast Show with 'Brothers in Arms', by Dire Straits.
This was almost entirely because, the night before, I'd been rewatching the final episode of The West Wing season two, in which the song famously features. You know: the one where Mrs Landingham has died, and Jed Bartlet shouts at God in church Latin(o), then gets caught in a rain storm, before going in front of the press to say he has MS, but will be running for re-election anyway.
In accordance with Howard Male’s rules on what constitutes legit coincidence, I should stress here that, though this must have been my sixth or seventh (or eighth or ninth or tenth) rewatching of The West Wing, I’ve never watched an episode in isolation. I simply happened to have landed on the ‘Two Cathedrals’ episode that evening.
Anyway, concerned about striking the right tone in an otherwise peppy morning radio show – and already on edge about having to do my first Liberation Day parade immediately afterwards – I thought the minor key and tempo of the song were apt, at least. Perhaps too apt? I asked then-colleague (now Member of the Legislative Assembly) and former member of the Falkland Islands Defence Force Gavin Short if he thought anyone would find it troubling, emotionally, and he said no: he thought people would love it. For my own peace of mind, though, I felt I’d better quickly look it up on Wikipedia, just in case it turned out to be pro-IRA, or something.
To my relief and surprise (I’m not sure even Gavin knew, in fact) the song was written, I learned, in 1982, about the Falklands War, and released three years later, on what happens to be my birthday. It was also apparently the very first CD single.
This all seemed encouragingly auspicious. So I played the song, and to my knowledge there were no objections—though I must admit, sitting alone in the studio, it made me quite emotional.
“There was an awkward two-minute silence right in the middle of the Breakfast Show.”
November 11th and/or the Remembrance Sunday that only occasionally falls on the same day, are, of course, traditionally about commemorating the fallen of the First and Second World Wars (to which the Falkland Islands, like most outposts of the former Empire, was not immune from contribution, alas). But this year, the 40th anniversary of the Falklands conflict, we have found ourselves having two cracks of the whip with regard to a more Falklands-specific remembrance. Thanks to a combination of local Covid regulations and RAF logistical hurdles, a lot of ’82 veterans couldn't make the trip in June, so a slew of extra events have been put on for them around Remembrancetide, instead.
And thus it was that, on Friday, November 11th, because it's autumn now in the UK and the clocks have gone back, there was an awkward two-minute silence right in the middle of the Breakfast Show, which I did not feel could sensitively be followed with much of our usual repertoire. I knew what would work, though: so, without a jingle, introductory words, or anything, I quickly ditched the opening of the second hour, and eased back in with Dire Straits again.
Coming home that lunchtime, I made myself some grub, sat down, and stuck on the next episode of—but naturally—The West Wing. It was the 'Two Cathedrals' episode. The one that ends with Jed Bartlet standing, soaking wet, hands in his pockets, eyeballing the press… and 'Brothers in Arms'.
