Iran - is war likely?

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The whole situation is at the mercy of a subordinate field commander who might feel threatened , doing something stupid
for memory the last confrontation Navy versus iran was 1 / 0 for the US
the USS vincennes sucessfully shot down an iranian airbus with two hundred civilians on board ,
imagine the same ...now ... :bang:

there are reports , unconfirmed , of allied troops deploying on the iranian border
the set up is on the edge of an incident ,
neither government looks like taking a step backward , this is in danger of spiraling out of anyone control , without anyone wanting to


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I saw an interview on TV this morning with somebody who was somehow connected to the Iranian Embassy (an ex-Ambassador? Darn memory!), who talked a lot of sense. Sadly the TV station's international expert's comments could be summarised as 'bomb them'.

ain't that the truth.

 

Ricky they probably wouldn't waste the bombs if they didn't need too, i have a feeling it's gonna be a Goverment war, maybe a few snarl's here and there but i doubt it will turn into a open war....just yet....

If Iran would hand over the captures it wouldn't turn into a war but their being difficult, like always , i find Tony to be slightly annoying on any case, but the British troopers should be returned or Ricky might be right, Iran could get bombed.

 

The ex-ambassador guy was basically saying that all we need to do is figure out some common ground and wangle a way so that they can be released without Iran losing face. Iran may have stuffed up, but they sure as hell aren't going to admit it, and they sure as hell won't want to appear to have caved in to British pressure.

My guess is that if we handle this in a heavy-handed way, threatening etc, then Iran will step up and enter the staring contest and not blink. Not even if we end up invading. Hello Iraq #2. Or we could back down. :roll:

This does not mean we should get on our knees and apologise in a craven manner and let Iran 'win' the diplomatic argument. Unless it does turn out that we were, in fact, in the wrong.

 

how did an armed brit boarding party get kidnapped while on a merchant ship, did they deploy from a warship or is the zodiak deployed from shore ...how did this happen?...how did the iranians bring a superior force into play ?

 

If you look on the link I posted, they were deployed from a ship that was a fair distance away when they were seized. By the time they were on the Iranian vessel I presume it was too late to intervene.

 

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from various reports ..
on the way back from the cargo the two british zodiacs got bracketed by revolutionary guards speedboats.... r.p.g. and heavy machine gun pointed at them and told by bullhorn to keep cool and follows ,
probably the team radioed the situation took their GPS coordinates and played ball , all very proper .
a lynx heli came over by wich time more speedboats had come ,
the guy in charge, probably the frigate acting commander , decided the whole setup was too sticky and he was not competent to take it to a higher level
the navy come out as a professionnal mob , all the moves were cool and right

as I said before , the outcome if all goes well WILL BE a muffled british apology , even if britain is right thats the way it will be !!
ominously the iranians seems to have hardened their position since the first day ...
there must have been some arggi barggi in teheran about ..to take it down or to take it up
since the U.S. president is flexing muscle with military treats , now the iranians would not want to appears impressed and would puff their chests too
there also is the issue of a similar incident a few months back and reported U.S. armed recon on iranians soil in preparation to a tactical nuclear strike

the locals are VERY paranoia

as far as the iranians see it , the brits have fuckall business running around the persian gulf , bossing people around , they are invaders and should go back patroling porsmouth harbor

we shall see , a rescue mission is not realistic , prez carter tried that , it was a disaster


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iran wants control of the persian gulf ..after all ,it is the persian gulf ...this would be not so good for the rest of the world ...because iran is controlled by lunatics ...controll of 80 % OF THE WOLDS OIL plus nukes would prolly not be wonderful for anyone except the iranian elite ....think of the gulf as the iranian sudetanland while the west mimics chamberlain ...only worse

 

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All very true woody , still the iranians want to be shown some respect
throught their glasses it looks like georges W. bush has, since the axis of evil speech ,painted a very large target on their chest
in spite of them being good boys during 9/11 and the afghan war
there is reinforced U.S troops to the west , east and south of them ,
the rhetoric coming out of washington is of military strike ,wich they totally believe
the iranian shias believe also in self sacrifice and an allmighty final confrontation between good and evil :roll:

diplomacy is now done by TV flash news and newspares headline

for primary sources
u.s ...............http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/dpb/2007/
royal navy ... http://www.royalnavy.mod.uk/
iran ..............http://www.mehrnews.com/en/ .. ( pretty stiff and boring )
arab..............http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/


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the iranians are hip deep in supporting terrorism in iraq ,syria ,lebanon and lord knows where else ... they are building a bomb which they SAY they intend to use...and now they engage in tresspass of iraqie waters while kidnapping british troops ..they are governed by a brutal ,intolerant and repressive theocracy and are hostile to all the values which we members here hold dear ...what exactly are we supposed to respect about them ,jeag ? what has iran or any other islamifaciest country done within the last 5oo years or so that would earn them our respect ?....iran IS respected as one should respect a large cobra hideing in the high grass...and madmanijihad is right about one thing .... ,there will have to be a showdown soon enough between good and evil...one can only hope we dont dither on this task until it becomes infesible....

 

"good boys" as in not blatantly attacked us yet?

 

"Good boys" as in they openly supported Bush's invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan... With media and money and everything...

Of course, the support probably stems more from disdain for Iraq than any love for America... Its no secret that Iran and Iraq hate each other since long before their war in the 80's, and it must've seemed a dream come true when America decided to invade two of Irans' very hostile neighbors...

Now thanks partly to that support... Iran, instead of being wedged between two disorganised hostile nations, finds herself wedged between two countries under US control, who also happen to be hostile Whoops!

 

Well woody, we're talking about invading them... So what have they done WRONG? You can't go off invading countries just because they bad-mouth America, offend western values (might be sometimes rude to women), and don't stick out their necks for nobody... (that would limit it down to invading everyone except America and maybe Britain )

So lets see, reasons to invade Iran...

They have a half built, decrepit rotting excuse-for-a-nuclear-plant designed to power civilian homes, and which doesn't work yet
- Unimaginable! Cleary responsibe countries like North Korea would never dream of building such a threatening facility

They caught some Brits... who were in their waters
- And who will probably be returned very soon, its not unlikely that the Brits might actually be the ones at fault here

Their president is short and doesn't like America
- Much like 99% of the region

Of course it cannot be denied that invading Iran would be very geographically convienient for the US... I mean, they have forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, it would be a good bet they could pull it off... North Korea however is simply too far away to be dealt with right now.. Even though unlike Iran, who have a few photos of green cooling rods, they've been dancing around the UN with their nuclear weapons for years... If only global justice wasn't contingent upon geographic location

 

Realy? They were damn more ready to compromise than current US administration. 80% of world oil? Come on where do you get those information? Currently if you count in heavy oil reserves Venezuela has largest reserves (according to OPEC). Control of straits of Hormuz is not realy the issue (except in the case of war). Every country has right to deny shipping trough their territorial waters (even with intl.maritime provision of harmless passing). If that is a problem for US&co they can send their tankers trough Omani and UAE territorial waters.

Watching to much FOX lately?

Acctualy if US&co attacks Iran from those two countries (or any other country for that matter) their forces in those two countries would have a real trouble controling them. Most of the right now "good boys" (i.e. those that support US efforts) owe much more to Iran than to the US&co. Certain US actions during the 1980's (like supporting you know who) in genocidal attempts in the north and south of Iraq are far from forgotten. As is not support to N. Alliance by Iran during late 1980's and trough 1990's. Basicly the only poeple willing to help guys now in de facto control of Afganistan at that time.

As for GPS coordinates.
1. border goes in the middle of waterway (shipping chanel) not the channel Shat el Arab as such. Waterway i.e. shipping chanel is not fixed but it is moving.
2. "correcting" GPS coordinates for press release is realy not that difficoult.

My guess is that no side is realy shure about the border in the area.

 

Really? Been watching too much al-Jezeera lately?

I'd trust Fox before I'd trust the Iranian News network.

 

Acctualy i rate fox and Al Jazzera as propaganda with latter having at least some journalistic form.

One of my sources:
Dealing with Tehran
Assessing U.S. Diplomatic Options Toward Iran
by Flynt L. Leverett
PDF version:
http://www.tcf.org/publications/internationalaffairs/leverett_diplomatic.pdf

 

Don't confuse editiorial bias with propaganda.
I'm not doubting your sources, just the attitude towards things US. So Al Jazzera has better journalistic form than Fox news in your opinion. In my opinion Fox has actually has journalistic integrity, and is not a propoganda organ, although I rarely agree with their opinions.
I would still trust Fox over anythign coming out of an Arab news source.
You help diminish your own arguments wiht statements like that ("watching too much Fox").

 

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for information
aljazzera is gulf arab and rather moderate , they are vocal on the subject of israel but very arab mainstream including their condamnation of the iraki war
when you read them , its what every moderate arab think
they are not pro iran by no stretch of the imagination
the gulf arabs monarchies are very wary of the persians with their populist appeal , their nearly clean elections and their militancy
in easter province of saudi arabia and in bahrain there is stong shias minorities wich have been oppressed since ever and are regarded as a fifth column and peasant filth by the aristocratic desert bedouins .

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Latest:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6517075.stm

The 2 different versions of events:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/6502805.stm

Interesting to see the differences...

 

Based on what exactly? Nothing has been announced and whilst I would be surprised if the SBS or SAS weren't on some kind of readiness, I can't believe that they're about to parachute into the middle of Terhan.

Aledgedly, there's no sign that they're about to be returned, and considering the last occasion which the British admitted quite quickly was a mistake, and considering the Iranians have been remarkably flexible when it comes to the co-ordinates they gave and considering the captives appear IMO to have been on the recieving ends of a kicking (Their lips appear remarkably puffy under what appears to be make-up to me...), I don't trust the Iranians to return our guys and girl any time soon.

TBH I resent the implications here.

The Iranians have had to correct their co-ordinates here, not the British, infact they had to alter the original postions they gave to make them appear inside their waters, the British have not had to do so.