Wednesday, January 9, 2008
Of the recent incident at the Straits of Hormuz, Ralph Peters says:
January 8, 2008 — EARLY Sunday morning, the US Navy lost its nerve and guaranteed that American sailors will die at Iranian hands in the future.
As three of our warships passed through the Straits of Hormuz, five small Iranian patrol craft rushed them. As the Revolutionary Guard boats neared our vessels, an Iranian officer broadcast a threat to our ships, claiming they'd soon explode.
The Iranians tossed boxes into the water. Mines? Just in case, our ships took evasive action.
The Iranians kept on coming, closing to a distance of 200 meters - about two football fields. Supposedly, our Navy was ready to open fire but didn't shoot because the Iranians turned away at the moment the order was given.
We should've sunk every one of them...
...The Iranians may even have had an escalation plan, in case we opened fire. President Ahmedinejad and his posse may seem contemptible to Washington, but the Iranians think several moves ahead of us: We play checkers, they play chess.
In contrast, the Boston Globe suggests that:
President Bush should leave no doubt that America does not want an armed conflict with Iran and should call for agreed-upon rules for avoiding similar confrontations in the future.
Dealing with Iran isn't a matter of diplomacy and it isn't a chess game. It's child’s play. Iran shouts "think fast!" and if they make us blink, they can say "HA, HA, made you blink!!
Then they go and brag about it to all their friends.
Anyone who has spent any time in a playground knows that the next time, they'll try to make us cry uncle, just like they did to Britain when they captured those 15 sailors.
There are many complex recommendations for how to deal with these antics, but the simplest would probably be to anticipate this bratty behavior and to stop blinking. Didn’t we learn anything in kindergarten?
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, p.30
The Washington Post has raw video of the encounter, here. I know there's good audio out there as well.
How silly is the Boston Globe? As though you need clearly defined rules to understand that zooming around American ships, tossing stuff in the water and saying "You'll blow up in a few minutes" is over the line.
How silly is the Boston Globe?
Asking the left (or the media) to deal with belligerents like Ahmadinejad is hopeless. They just don't get it.
How would the New York Times Corporation owned Boston Globe react if someone were to dash into the offices of the Boston Golbe and drop boxes in the offices shouting "you'll blow up in a few minutes"?