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| Syria-Lebanon-Iran |
| Iran raises the hostage stakes |
| 2007-03-25 |
| Hardliners demand British captives be used to teach West a lesson THE 15 British sailors and Royal Marines captured by Iranian Revolutionary Guards in a waterway separating Iran and Iraq were yesterday trapped in an outbreak of aggressive political brinkmanship that may mark a bleak turning point in the West’s relations with Tehran. Officials in London and Washington remained publicly optimistic that Iran would respond to international pressure and free them within days, despite claims by a senior military official in Tehran that the captives had “confessed” to illegally entering Iranian territorial waters on Friday in a pair of rigid inflatable boats known as RIBs. Yet there were ominous signs from Tehran that hardline religious elements were seeking to turn the incident into a major confrontation with the West. Several conservative student groups called on the Iranian government not to release the service personnel until five Iranians detained by US forces in Iraq earlier this year were released. The groups also called for the cancellation of United Nations sanctions imposed on Iran after a unanimous security council vote in New York last night. The new sanctions were in response to Tehran’s refusal to suspend its uranium enrichment programme, which may be used to build nuclear weapons. Iran shrugged off the vote and vowed to pursue its nuclear goals. “Suspension is neither an option nor a solution,” said Manouchehr Mottaki, the foreign minister. “I can assure you that pressure and intimidation will not change Iranian policy.” There was also a demonstration by 500 student radicals gathered on the Iranian shore of the Shatt al-Arab waterway, where the Britons were seized shortly after they had completed a routine antismuggling inspection of a dhow laden with vehicles. In a sinister echo of the US embassy hostage crisis in Tehran in 1979, the students chanted “Death to Britain” and “Death to America”. This shit is getting REAL old... The British captives were said by one Iranian source to have been moved yesterday into the notorious dungeons of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) at the Ghasre Firouzeh military complex in Tehran. Their seizure followed a series of embarrassing military setbacks for the IRGC, founded by the late Ayatollah Khomeini after the Iranian revolution of 1979, and which now answers directly to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme religious leader. There was widespread speculation that the seizure may have been a reprisal for the arrest by US troops of five members of the IRGC’s elite al-Quds Brigade, which has been accused by the Pentagon of arming and assisting Shi’ite militias in Iraq. The IRGC has also been stung by a series of apparent defections of high-ranking officers. Intelligence sources in the region had warned that the IRGC may have been planning retaliation for what it claimed was a western plot to destabilise Tehran’s military command. The Sunday Times last week quoted Reza Falker, a writer for the Revolutionary Guards’ weekly newspaper, as saying: “We’ve got the ability to capture a nice bunch of blue-eyed blond-haired officers and feed them to our fighting cocks.” Enough with the bellicose penis nonsense, huh? The Sunday Times article also quoted a Jordanian intelligence officer as saying: “In Iraq, the Quds force can easily get hold of American and British officers.” The Shatt al-Arab waterway was an obvious target for a premeditated kidnap. Its waters have been disputed for centuries and were a prime cause of the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. It is still littered with the wrecks of bombed-out ships. “The problem is that nobody knows where the border is,” said Lawrence Potter, a professor of international affairs at Columbia University, New York. “The British might have thought they were on their side, the Iranians might have thought they were on their side.” British officials have long been aware of the area’s potential navigational hazards. In June 2004 eight sailors and marine commandos were seized in a similar incident when Tehran accused them of straying into Iranian waters. On that occasion the men were blindfolded and paraded on Iranian television, then released three days later. Tehran never returned their boats. The British personnel seized on Friday were in Iraqi waters, according to their commanding officer, Commodore Nick Lambert of the frigate HMS Cornwall, who said he had “absolutely no doubt” about their position. After their uneventful inspection of the dhow, the Britons were on their way out of the area when they were surrounded by six larger vessels armed with heavy machineguns. The crews of the RIBs had rifles and pistols. A Royal Navy helicopter spotted the Iranian vessels towing the inflatables towards a military base on the Iranian shore. The helicopter made radio contact with the Iranians, and was told there had been no fighting and that nobody was hurt. US military officials publicly supported Britain’s claim that the seized sailors and marines were inside Iraqi waters, but sources in Washington privately acknowledged it was a difficult case to prove. The Iraqi military commander in nominal charge of territorial waters cast further doubt on the British claim. “We were informed by Iraqi fishermen . . . that there were British gunboats in an area that is out of Iraqi control,” said Brigadier-General Hakim Jassim in Basra. “We don’t know why they were there.” Yet the main concern in both London and Washington was that legal niceties would rapidly become irrelevant if the incident spirals into a stage-managed confrontation over Iran’s nuclear weapons programme and its alleged subversion in Iraq. Yesterday’s UN resolution presents Tehran with a tougher sanctions regime, and several US analysts speculated that the Iranians may feel they have nothing to lose by precipitating a diplomatic crisis that has conveniently distracted popular attention from recent setbacks to the country’s nuclear programme, a source of intense national pride. A Russian decision to suspend supplies of nuclear fuel to the Bushehr reactor in southern Iran had shaken confidence in the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. But the Shatt al-Arab incident has “helpfully changed the subject”, said one Iranian opposition source. The Tehran foreign ministry’s spokesman, Mohammad Ali-Hosseini, yesterday accused Britain of “illegal and interventionist” entry into Iranian waters. Kate Smith, the British chargé d’affaires in Tehran, was summoned to the Iranian foreign ministry on Friday to receive a formal protest. Geoffrey Adams, Britain’s ambassador to Iran, had been out of the country and was returning this weekend. Most worrying for London were recent belligerent remarks by Khamenei, who was said by an Iranian source yesterday to have personally approved the order to abduct the Britons. Khamenei's severed head belongs on a lamppost in downtown Tehran. The fact that the IRGC has custody of the captives will further complicate efforts to find a diplomatic solution. The force, considered the elite of Iran, operates independently of Ahmadinejad’s government. Sources in Tehran said the British prisoners were almost certain to be suffering similar conditions to those endured by the eight captives held in 2004. They were subjected to mock executions and told they would be put on trial as spies. If Tehran concludes this time that its status in the Middle East will be enhanced by a show trial of British “aggressors”, this crisis could last for months. Give them 24 hours-- then Qom gets glassified. |
| Posted by:Dave D. |
| #17 So we are at something like 48 hours and still dithering about what to do...... Since there has been no mushroom clouds erupt over the greater Tehran metropolitan area, I can only deduce that the testicullarly-challenged West will remain so. And whatever fate befalls the 15 Brits will be on not only the Heads of the various States, but all that sat idly by and (maybe) engaged in some major-league hand-wringing. (If only I were wrong) |
| Posted by: USN, ret. 2007-03-25 21:13 |
| #16 I couldn't give a candy-coated crap if the Brits were parading through downtown friggin' Tehran in full battle-rattle: the message the West needs to be sending out now is "Do not f*ck with us. EVER." It is also the only message we should be sending. Instead, the mixed signals coming from the West require a supercomputer to decipher. The Islamic world is in dire need of adult supervision. STERN supervision, that will insist on peeling back the Foreskin Of Ignorance and applying the Wire Brush of Enlightenment with firm, brisk strokes. I remember when you first posted this and it made me laugh just as hard then as it did now. Great writing! Iran and the entire MME (Muslim Middle East) must be made to feel the West's pain. Until we ensure that they bleed a torrent for every paper cut they inflict against us there will only be more of the same. The MME must be made to writhe in agony with every atrocity Islam commits. Muslims must be subjected to such intense devastation that they rush to slit the nearest Wahhabi imam's throat with each new attack on the West. |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-03-25 15:34 |
| #15 Old Patriot you just got my vote for 2008. Fred Thompson will have to wait. |
| Posted by: jds 2007-03-25 15:06 |
| #14 “They probably felt they didn't need to.” Hmmm… I seem to recall a little something called sovereignty. And like it or not, for the time being, I believe that still applies to Iran. One would think providing evidence of their positions would clarify the situation rather quickly. (Notice I didn’t say “resolve” the situation) Timidity. Fear of confrontation. Fear of being thought less than "nice". The suggestion that the commander sat idle and watched 15 of his comrades captured so as not to offend the Iranians seems like an odd explanation. My understanding is that RN interdiction crews are not only tight knit but also tough sonsobitches. |
| Posted by: DepotGuy 2007-03-25 14:09 |
| #13 Iran and its mullahs has to go. Nuke Qom, Tehran, and Bandar Abbas, for starters. Destroy every choke point in the nation. Take out anything that even might possibly be capable of hiding a nuclear facility, every airfield, every port, every gas pipeline, every refinery, and any building more than two stories tall. At the same time, do the same thing to Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Send two divisions of Marines (even if you have to call up the old farts to martial that many troops) and shut down the United Nations, put everybody aboard whatever cruise ship is in US waters, and send them to Africa, along with their families. NEVER let them back in, even if they're "American" citizens. Send two divisions of Army troops to take control of State, investigate anyone that's living beyond his/her salary, and deport them with the UN group. Fire Rice and replace her with John Bolton, and tell Congress they have 24 hours to confirm him or the President will issue arrest orders for treason for anyone that voted for that stupid "surrender" document. Nationalize the National Guard, order ALL reservists to active duty, and nationalize State, County, and Local police. Shoot every member of the ACLU, and meet "peace demonstrators" with an M-1 and a beehive round. STOP PRETENDING WE ARE AT "PEACE": WE HAVE BEEN AT WAR FOR MORE THAN 30 YEARS, AND IGNORED THE FACT. It's going to take drastic action to recover from the sins of the past. The sooner we start, the sooner we can get this damned war over with. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2007-03-25 14:01 |
| #12 I couldn't give a candy-coated crap if the Brits were parading through downtown friggin' Tehran in full battle-rattle: the message the West needs to be sending out now is "Do not f*ck with us. EVER." The Islamic world is in dire need of adult supervision. STERN supervision, that will insist on peeling back the Foreskin Of Ignorance and applying the Wire Brush of Enlightenment with firm, brisk strokes. DD that's some of the best I've sincerely Bravissimo! |
| Posted by: RD 2007-03-25 13:46 |
| #11 Ima thought Rachel Carzone outlawed DTT. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2007-03-25 13:32 |
| #10 Just you wait: I haven't invoked the Dremel Tool Of Tranquillity yet... |
| Posted by: Dave D. 2007-03-25 12:56 |
| #9 YIKES, DD! that hurt just to read it! |
| Posted by: Frank G 2007-03-25 12:44 |
| #8 "First and foremost is; Why havenÂ’t the Brits provided conclusive evidence of their position?" They probably felt they didn't need to. "Second is why didnÂ’t the Brits take action at the time of the capture?" Timidity. Fear of confrontation. Fear of being thought less than "nice". "IÂ’m gonna go out a limb here but me thinks maybeÂ…just maybe they indeed were within Iranian territory." I couldn't give a candy-coated crap if the Brits were parading through downtown friggin' Tehran in full battle-rattle: the message the West needs to be sending out now is "Do not f*ck with us. EVER." The Islamic world is in dire need of adult supervision. STERN supervision, that will insist on peeling back the Foreskin Of Ignorance and applying the Wire Brush of Enlightenment with firm, brisk strokes. |
| Posted by: Dave D. 2007-03-25 12:31 |
| #7 It's WAR, When will Blair quit Fucking around and realize it? |
| Posted by: Redneck Jim 2007-03-25 12:22 |
| #6 I dunno folks? Something doesnÂ’t smell right on this one. The obvious assumption is that the Iranians are up to their usual nefarious activities but there are still a couple of unanswered questions. First and foremost is; Why havenÂ’t the Brits provided conclusive evidence of their position? (ie; Satellite imagery, GPS coordinates) Second is why didnÂ’t the Brits take action at the time of the capture? IÂ’m gonna go out a limb here but me thinks maybeÂ…just maybe they indeed were within Iranian territory. |
| Posted by: DepotGuy 2007-03-25 12:13 |
| #5 What we should do: Give 24 hours to get them back, then start bombing the government and religious sites. If the UN condemns us, withdraw all funding. What we will do: . |
| Posted by: Jackal 2007-03-25 09:09 |
| #4 Time to up the ante for Iran. Iran is a second or third rate power annoying the rest the world. Time to swat the pests hard. |
| Posted by: JohnQC 2007-03-25 08:23 |
| #3 “The problem is that nobody knows where the border is,” said Lawrence Potter, a professor of international affairs Well shit that's easy. The international offshore border is exactly where the United States Navy says it is. |
| Posted by: Shipman 2007-03-25 05:05 |
| #2 ... hardline religious elements were seeking to turn the incident into a major confrontation with the West. Far be it from us to deny them their wish. And they should not expect one cent of aid, no matter what. Bing-effing-oh, Kalle. There must be an end to nation building. Let it please begin with Iran! |
| Posted by: Zenster 2007-03-25 03:07 |
| #1 They're asking for it. They've been asking for it over the last 28 years. Yes, Qom must go. Next, we should destroy Tehran -- like Berlin and Tokyo. After that, national strategic policy should be principled, systematic destruction of any capital host to anti-Western tyranny. Starting with Syria, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, and North Korea. Give their people 7 days unconditional warning -- either they get rid of their tyrant or we destroy their capital. And they should not expect one cent of aid, no matter what. Ceterum censeo, Mecca delenda est. |
| Posted by: Kalle (kafir forever) 2007-03-25 00:44 |