Back during my Navy active duty days, Iran threatened the U.S. Navy too .....
Iranian frigate IS Sahand (F74), April 18, 1988
Posted on 05/21/2008 6:13:17 AM PDT by nuconvert
Iran May Miscalculate in Taunting US, Panelists Say at AEI
Josiah Ryan/ Staff Writer
Washington. (CNSNews.com) - There is a danger that Iran may miscalculate the likelihood of a U.S. response as it taunts U.S forces in the Persian Gulf, experts on the Middle East said Monday at a conference held by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) in Washington, D.C.
Noting that Iran threatened the U.S. Navy in international waters earlier this year, and that it continues to provide weapons and fighters to U.S. enemies in Iraq, Kenneth Katzman of the Congressional Research Service compared the U.S. to a great white shark, and said Iran is now in danger of being "the one who teased the great shark one too many times."
"They are taunting the shark, trying to show they are not scared and they have been quite effective at that," Katzman, a specialist in Middle Eastern affairs, said. "But eventually the Great White Shark might bite you. I think Iranian strategists need to be concerned that they might be taunting the shark a little bit too much."
Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at AEI, said the Iranian Revolutionary Guard is showing signs of succumbing to the dangers of overconfidence.
"My biggest fear is that they will miscalculate, perhaps as Hezbollah did with the Israelis in 2006, and it will amplify into a larger dispute," he said.
Rubin said this overconfidence could quickly lead to a conflict.
"On the part of the Revolutionary Guard one of the greatest dangers that exists is the constant taunting," he said. "This suggests that the Iranians are testing the red line. They are not certain that that red line for us really is a red line that is set in stone."
Rubin was referring to incidents early this year in which Iranian watercraft appeared to threaten U.S. military vessels.
-- On Jan. 6, five Iranian speedboats made threatening maneuvers near three U.S. Navy ships in the Straits of Hormuz, which is where the Persian Gulf connects to the Gulf of Oman
-- On April 25, a ship contracted by the U.S. military fired warning shots towards two Iranian boats which, according to U.S. officials present at the incident, identified themselves as Iranian coast guard vessels.
Moreover, Katzman said he thinks that American reports of Iranian involvement in the Iraq war, as outlined to Congress by former U.S. Iraq commander Gen. David Petraeus, are credible and serious. \ul \ulnone"I have no reason to doubt the evidence that the U.S. military has presented showing most of the 170 millimeter rockets that are fired into the Green Zone -- at the rate of approximately 15 a day -- are indeed manufactured in Iran," he said.
Katzman added: "I have no reason to doubt General Petraeus' assertion that Iran is using Hezbollah operatives to train and direct special groups of Mahdi offshoot fighters."
Rubin went on to say that he believes allowing the Iranians to push the red line is amplifying the possibility that an armed conflict will occur. \ul \ulnone"I don't believe in the reticence on the part of some in Washington or that soft rhetoric is a smart move if one wants to involve kinetic action," he said.
"The greatest danger would be to stumble into some sort of conflict. The best way to defend against such an unattended conflict is to make the red lines as clear as possible. That will enable better diplomacy to work just as soon as there is an understanding of where the point of no return is."
The experts discussed the threat of Iran in a panel titled, "The Transformation and Rise of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps."
If the United States is going to do something about the Iranian situation, the time to act is anytime before Barack puts his hand on the Koran to take the oath as POTUS.
Then it will go whining to the media.
I agree with you. Obeyme will capitulate.
Lessons have been learned from Iranian kidnapping of weak British sailors.
Iran took note of that.
Back during my Navy active duty days, Iran threatened the U.S. Navy too .....
Iranian frigate IS Sahand (F74), April 18, 1988
I wish the Iranians would push the limit. They would get a whoopin’ they would never forget. We tolerate much...much more than we should but when we get pushed to far, something REALLY bad usually happens to other side. The problem is that most of the world seems to forget that we could turn the ME into a large pane of glass today. We don’t though.
Whoa!!
Stir fry!!
If that ever really happened, there would be anarchy. I know there are a couple of congresscritters who have taken their oath on the koran. That was a victory for our enemies. Hopefully God will not allow this scourge to continue, but I personally believe this is the war between good and evil in its infant stages.
I would like to think that the U.S. Navy vs. the British Navy would make the kidnappers suffer dearly if they didn’t return U.S. sailors in a similar situation.
Cool picture.
I know it’s not practical and probably not the best platform to launch a good ass kicking on the Iranians, but I would love to see an Iowa Class BB deliver some 16 inch salvos at some Iranian boats, who mess with our ships.
This way there will no taunting a for a second time.
I hope the Great White Shark does a lot more than just bite them.
“If the United States is going to do something about the Iranian situation, the time to act is anytime before Barack puts his hand on the Koran to take the oath as POTUS.”
I’d not go so far as to say the Koran, but his stated policies are disasters waiting to happen. We must do everything we can to prevent him from becoming President, it would be a disaster on a major scale in many areas, not least the economy. He’s vowing to fix it, but instead he would wreck it with discredited socialist policies and a “green at all costs” groundswell behind him. Glen Beck is playing a clip of Bill Clinton today, and Bill’s saying “We have to slow down the economy to stop global warming”. If anything the Clintons are less radical than Obama.
I believe the President will make the decision to strike Iran before he leaves office, and most likely sometime before the election. I saw a fairly recent poll indicating the majority of Americans believe Iran should be hit. Such a strike could well put McCain over the top in the general. I hate to mix political calculation with military action, but that is the realpolitik point of view. Two birds with one stone, as it were.
The Dems would to well to remember that probably more than half of the “80% who think the country is going in the wrong direction” think it’s going too far in the direction of a leftist, overbearing, expensive, ineffective, defeatist, anti-progress nanny state government. I’m certainly in that camp.
McCain ‘08!
maybe that’s what they want. Oil will go to $200+ and those missiles we launch would cost us hundreds of billions. They love tension.
One of the great unasked questions is this. Why doesn't the Sunni al Qaeda who fear nothing and are insanely suicidal attack Shia Iran whom they allegedly hate? The answer is obvious. They're in cahoots. They've the same agenda. A blow against Iran is yet another blow against international terrorism, like removing Saddam was.
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