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Iran Prepared to Block Gulf Oil and Wreck Western Economies
Iran's recently-concluded war games concentrated on preparations to block the Persian Gulf and wreck Western economies in the event that the United Nations Security Council tries to place harsh sanctions against it.Forty percent of the world's oil and gas sails through the Persian Gulf, and an Iranian blockade would cause an inflationary spike in energy prices and a fuel shortage that could cause catastrophe for the West, which is dependent on Iranian crude to fuel their gas-hungry economies. Public affairs consultant Lenny Ben-David, a former senior Israeli diplomat in Israel's embassy in Washington, pointed out on Cutting Edge.com Monday that the Islamic Republic stopped, searched or photographed several Western ships durng the eight-day war games. The Revolutionary Navy searched a French and an Italian vessel for "environmental" checks, buzzed the U.S. Eisenhower in what American officials called a close encounter,' and patrolled the Gulf, also known as the Straits of Hormuz, stopping and checking destroyers and cargo ships. The Iranian Air Force also drove away a U.S. reconnaissance drone that was monitoring Iran's massive Gulf military exercises that concluded last Thursday. During and after the war games, Tehran issued daily press releases boasting of new and advanced speed boats, an anti-submarine torpedo and advanced arms for attacking ships. Ben-David noted, While the press focuses on the Iranian military exercises, uranium enrichment, and long-range missile development, the navies of dozens of countries have been relatively quietly gravitating toward the Persian Gulf. The war games exercises in the Gulf sent a clear signal to the West regarding what may be in store if it succeeds in placing tough sanctions against Iran as a way to try to force it to comply with international rules on the development of its nuclear program. Posted by: tipper 2010-05-18 |
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