Miguel Angel Rodríguez, former Malvinas combatant, is an example of struggle and resilience. It is part of the Association of Malvinas de Avellaneda Fighters, from which it helps peers and inspires children and young people interested in learning about its history. He is an athlete and educator. Its history is the story of hundreds of soldiers who fought for our country and today feel the commitment to give back to society what the country has given them.
INFANTRY REGIME 6
This story begins when he was 21 years old and was called to appear in the 6th Infantry Regiment of Mercedes, Greater Buenos Aires, three days after the landing of the first troops on the island Soledad, Malvinas.
“They had called several friends and I thought that it would not touch me, because on April 2 they had called everyone. So 3 days later, when I returned to my house, my sister waited for me at the door with the letter”.
The following days passed in a dizzying way. Between the preparations in the Regiment and the transfer of the troops to Río Gallegos, Miguel Ángel ended up stepping on Soledad Island on April 13, 1982.
"We had to walk about 10 hours until we reached our position, where hundreds of fox pits were waiting for us. They were hollows of 40 centimeters wide by 1 meter and high peak. There we spent endless hours of the war. My whole life I traveled more than 500 times in the well”, he said.
The early morning of May 1 was surprised by the blast of shots from an airplane. A projectile fell 800 meters from its well and the splinters devastated all around. He did not touch an inch of skin.
“Since that night I could not close an eye. Especially since I knew that part of our section was on the other side of the island to send us an early warning if the English arrived to disembark. Two days later the rationing was over and gradually we decided to look for waste in the dump. Until that day we had 22 days without bathing”.
The English troops entered the island on June 13 and the surrender occurred the following day. A week later, Miguel Ángel returned home with a backpack, 11 letters and a telegram sent by his mother. He was alive and I could not believe it.
The penultimate train he took, whose final destination would be Mercedes, gave him a couple of situations that he would cherish for the rest of his life. The most emotional:
“A man on the train asked us where we came from and my colleagues and I-we were 3- we answered that the war. Then he quoted us the next morning to his place to compensate us for what we did for our country: that morning he dressed us from head to toe”.
74 DAYS IN MALVINAS
Miguel Ángel Rodríguez spent 74 days fighting in Malvinas. Remember, as if it were yesterday, the sound of the cannons that the British were firing from the boats, but also how pious they were when offering them food, when the English troops had already taken the island, and was outraged to see that the same officers had hiding the food of his Argentine soldiers.
The present lives it as if it were the last time and every day he is grateful to be alive. His days pass between the talks to children and young people of the first and the baccalaureate, who gives anything to hear their stories, the Association of Former Combatants of Malvinas de Avellaneda, and weekly talks with support groups of ex-combatants. He is a marathon runner and competed in the 2004 fighters' Olympics. And from there on, in any marathon he can. Live with your family and feel at peace with yourself. "If they called me to fight, I would go back without thinking”.