Breathless reporting:
Iranian boats 'provoke' U.S. Navy ships
Five Iranian boats provoked three U.S. Navy ships in international waters on Saturday, CNN reported on Monday.
Interesting....
There are also reports of a "threatening" radio transmission.
"I am coming at you. You will explode in a couple of minutes," CNN reported, citing U.S. officials.
but wait
At one point a radio message from one of the Iranian boats warned, "You are going to blow up within minutes."
Ok, sounds about the same... why is this an issue?
Check out the reporting on this... why equivocate and put 'provoke' in quotes? Either they were provoked or they weren't. But beyond that semantic hedge is a whole bunch of problems. Unidentified sources. Inconsistent reports. Unconfirmed events. Ah the dulcet tones of The Mighty Wurlitzer ring across the land....
Now... lets look at the Straits of Hormuz, an extremely narrow waterway chock full of ships, both military and civilian.
Ships moving through the Strait follow a Traffic Separation Scheme (TSS), which separates inbound from outbound traffic to reduce the risk of collision. The traffic lane is six miles wide, including two two-mile-wide traffic lanes, one inbound and one outbound, separated by a two-mile wide separation median.
No one reports where in the straits this event allegedly occurred. No one reports whether the US ships were in a lane, out of a lane, near Iran's shore, or any other information.
The fact is these sort of close encounters are routine. The claimed radio transmission is suspicious to me. Why? Because it was in English? That is odd, but not as weird as telegraphing an attack on a fully armed set of ships that can sink you faster than you can say "Allah akhbar." If someone really wanted to start a conflict they would actually pull a trigger without any warning. They certainly wouldn't be going "nanny nanny boo boo" over the radio.
Oh, and by the way, if Iran wanted to sink a ship, it has surface to surface Silkworm missiles they can use to sink anything they want in that narrow body of water.
Now this is serious stuff. How serious?
"It is the most serious provocation of this sort that we've seen yet,"
Really? Who said that?
said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.
Oh.
Of course this is not happening in a vacuuum:
Tensions between the U.S. and Iran have been higher than normal for months as the Bush administration has called for sanctions against Tehran because of its nuclear research. Washington believes Iran is trying to develop atomic weapons.
Gee.... all of Washington? As in the 16 Intelligence Agencies that said they have no reason to believe there is an active program? Interesting bit of overstatement.
Additionally, the U.S. has accused Iranian agents of fostering uprisings and attacks against American forces and their allies in neighboring Iraq. The two nations haven't had formal diplomatic ties since the 1979 Iranian hostage crisis.
Interesting. So now we are back to Iran is the threat to Americans in the Front on the Global War on Terrorism. That brings up another thread from the President, in an interview that was embargoed until today
Mr. Bush said he is "not willing to credit the Iranians yet" with ceasing to supply weapons to insurgents fighting U.S. forces in Iraq.
"I don't have enough evidence," Mr. Bush said. "I think so long as we're finding sophisticated (roadside bombs) — that could only have been manufactured in Iran — that are killing innocent people inside Iraq, that's cause for concern."
Last week, the spokesman for Gen. David Petraeus, the top U.S. general in Iraq, told The Washington Times that he had seen a decrease in attacks using weapons provided by Iran.
Makes sense to me... the number of attacks are decreasing so...let's INCREASE tensions with Iran. Apparently "There are known unknowns and unknown unknowns" will be trotted out once again to support the newest "one percent solution" this administration is going to foist on us.
The fact this is being circulated in the media right before Bush's trip to Israel, where we know they are claiming "rock solid" evidence of a nuclear program fuels my suspicions.
I'm sorry. Color me skeptical. No one is speaking on the record, the details are not consistent, inflammatory claims are being made to infuse this with an alarmist tone, and we know the Israelis are pitching "rock solid" evidence to support a plan of attacking a nation no one has declared war on.
Of course the ratcheting up of the tone is supported directly by the President who worries about a potential threat due to the
government's decision not to be honest with the
world, not to be transparent, not to listen to the IAEA
Taken out of context, you might be forgiven for wondering why he is worrying about Israel's nuclear arsenal. The point here is this is the same "He has ignored UN resolutions" argument in new clothes.
The same press conference concerns me because Bush is adamant that
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. First of all, I'm going to get a lot done next
year.
Q Of course.
THE PRESIDENT: I really am. You know, there's this great myth
about how the President, because there's an election, or because it's
the last year of his presidency, not much is going to get done. Quite
the contrary. We'll get a lot done.
Given gridlock in Congress it is only my speculation at this point that starting a third (world) war is about all he can do to get "a lot done" in the next few months. Unfortunately, by the time I can recast my suspicion as a "slam dunk," the smoking gun will be a bunch of mushroom clouds over parts of the Middle East.