Posted on 03/25/2007 5:17:55 AM PDT by Dog
THE official notification, delivered in secure calls yesterday morning to senior Whitehall figures, was the latest dramatic behind-the-scenes move to get to grips with a crisis that is now engulfing the government.
After a day of shadow-boxing with a notoriously slippery regime, Tony Blair is set to up the ante: the plight of the Shatt al-Arab 15 is officially a crisis and he will need the Cobra team to handle it.
The clutch of VIPs will gather in an operations room several floors below Downing Street as early as this afternoon to plot an escape from a military spat that now threatens to become an international incident.
The decision came just 24 hours after the crew of HMS Cornwall had been caught in the confusion of direct confrontation with Iranian vessels in the searing heat of the Gulf.
As the crew members were surrounded in their two rubber dinghies, the Cornwall's commander, Commodore Nick Lambert, frantically radioed back to his own top brass for instructions.
The response to the inquiry, which had been immediately patched through to Ministry of Defence headquarters in Whitehall, was to hold fire.
The order to show restraint has been observed throughout the forces and the British government in the 48 hours since, but it is unclear how long both sides will be able to maintain control.
Foreign Secretary Margaret Beckett's first response to the gathering crisis on Friday was to keep to diplomatic conventions. After a hurried phone call to Blair, she immediately summoned Iran's ambassador, Rasoul Movahedian, to her office to explain their behaviour.
After a meeting described by officials as "brisk but polite", Beckett emerged to stress that she was "extremely disturbed" by events.
It was an understated description of the deep concern now gripping the government. Not only was Blair's administration alarmed at the risk to the 15 military personnel, which included at least one woman, but it was in no doubt over Tehran's ability to use their plight to make a wider point.
During a flurry of diplomatic activity in the hours after the snatch, the Iranians' rhetoric repeatedly elevated their action, and the alleged motives of the British, to a multinational affair. It was the eve of a second UN Security Council resolution imposing sanctions over Iran's refusal to halt its programme to enrich uranium. The Shatt al-Arab 15 were, from the start, pawns in a perilous international game.
"It looks like too much of a coincidence," a senior Foreign Office insider confirmed.
The response was a no- nonsense demand for Iran to relent - and Britain freely used the international community to back up its case. Beckett dispatched the UK chargé d'affaires, Kate Smith, to confront the government in Tehran, armed with the insistence that the British sailors had been in Iraqi waters.
In the meantime, Blair made a personal call to European allies, including EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, to secure a public denunciation of the Iranians' actions.
"It was impressed on everyone how important it was to raise the diplomatic temperature, rather than keep a low profile and let them make a song and dance of the situation," one defence official said.
"There is nothing to be gained in provoking a confrontation, because that would be playing into their hands. But neither should we let them have it all their way. We tried that before and we're still trying to get our kit back."
The smaller-scale precedent, the taking of six British marines and two sailors on the same waterway in June 2004, was a painful lesson. The personnel were only returned after they had been paraded blindfold on Iranian television and admitted entering Iranian waters illegally. Three years on, the government is still pressing Iran for the return of its boats and kit, including valuable radar equipment.
The degree of concern felt across Whitehall was demonstrated yesterday, when Movahedian was called back to the Foreign Office, this time to see Beckett's minister, Lord Triesman. The British were clearly attempting to warn off Tehran before it could begin to use the servicemen and women as a significant propaganda tool.
It was, however, a race against time - and through it all, the diplomats and the politicians were acutely aware that Tehran has built a foreign policy on disregarding diplomatic niceties.
Top level COBRA is an acronym for Cabinet Office Briefing Room A, where its meetings are held.
Tony Blair, senior ministers, police and security chiefs all take part. It is called after events such as 9/11, 7/7
and can evoke emergency powers such as suspending Parliament or restricting movement.
Except for the Germans, Russians & Japanese, the casualty rate during WWII was nothing compared to WWI. For example, the UK lost 1m vs 350k; France 1.4 vs 250K. In fact, while the US lost 350k in WWII over a much longer & wider global scale, we lost 55k in less than 6 mos of fighting in WWI.
What an insulting and incorrect comment.
They don't call it the "Lost Generation" for nothing. During the first 2 years, before sentiment turned against the war, it was considered a noble undertaking to volunteer & fight. The soldiers climbing out of those trenches and getting mowed down by the tens of thousands in a single day weren't just mechanics; they were comprised of entire graduating classes from Oxbridge ie the future leaders.
The ones who survived where either (a) extremely lucky, or (b) most likely, those performing supporting roles or simply not engaged in battle.
Do you think the United States government will ever, for any reason, use a nuclear weapon in defense of our country and its people? Just curious.
Another editorial posted here noted the internal strife the Iranian government is dealing with. Evidently the locals are growing increasingly restless and unhappy and are showing it. One way to tighten things up at home is to face a foreign enemy, in this case the Anglo-American coalition.
Uh, excuse me, but I regret this memory-loss perception that 15 British sailors might just offset the injustice of earlier "hostage-taking," that is to say, the Iranians arrested in Iraq. How predictable that Iranian "students" (like those who took charge of the US embassy back in the Carter malaise, no doubt) would come up with this jarring juxtaposition!
If there's anything the Iranians begin to offset, it's the 170 US military lives lost (and hundreds more wounded), directly as a result of Iranian weaponry supplied to insurgent forces in Iraq. Most Iraqis, of course, would rightly add to that their own killed and wounded. Given the Bush administration gun-shy approach, I think we may be confident there's plenty of evidence supporting those Iranians' involvement in Quds' supply of weaponry, i.e., their bold acts of war against Iraq and the Coalition.
I may have been born at night, but it wasn't last night.
HF
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There is a book (now available in paperback ):
Unholy Alliance: Radical Islam and the American Left (Paperback) by David Horowitz (Author)
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And reviews:
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Editorial Reviews
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Fascinating Analysis of Leftist Goals, August 13, 2006
| Reviewer: | N. Sincerity - See all my reviews |
The complete and utter idealogical hypocrisy of the Islamofascist-Leftist alliance is distressing, but as Horowitz reminds us,
In response to a WMD attack on American soil, and depending on who's charge....yes it is possible.
True, but pulling on the tigers tail is not a way to ensure your long term survival.
However, they seem to have calculated correctly that our response would be only verbal, and are sitting back now and laughing their asses off at our impotence.
Why are you babbling about WWI? It has nothing to do with today except that it was a prequel to WWII as far as Arab imperialism goes, which set the stage for the conflict we are in now
Very well thought out and hopefully correct answer, IMHO.
The Cobra Team!
Oh, the humanity
It's sad that so many in the British government are clinging to the idea that they DID'NT lose round one a couple of years ago.
It's sad that so many in the British government are clinging to the idea that they DID'NT lose round one a couple of years ago.
Sorry for the double post. Too much caffeine.
Here's a good move for the UN Security Council to enact right now: vote to instruct all nations to immediately stop selling oilfield equipment and spare parts to Iran until Iran 1) returns the 15 Britons, and 2) agrees to permanently stop uranium enrichment. Then put together a coalition to enforce the ban on oilfield equipment sales. If Iran runs out of money, then just give them Ag equipment and supplies so they can still feed their people. Watch how fast the mullahs agee to take that deal when those fat oil cash flows stop rolling in. It's time for an all-out effort to boost oil production capacity outside of Iran and then shut down Iran's oil industry. I would bet that Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the UAE, Qatar, Oman, Brazil, and Russia have already increased oil production capacity enough to make up for all of Iran's lost production. Those independent oil companies here in the US have also done a remarkable job of increasing US production. Our production is up about 1 MM barrels per day from 4 years ago.
Yes, so the US troops captured by the Iranians in 2003. The US really taught the Iranians a lesson in that case didn't they! Similarly, noone has reacted to Iranian insurgent aid in Iraq. We 'limey poofters' have have been much tougher on terrorists and rogue states in the past than your governments have been.
"Imagine a police sergeant, sitting in his squad car, watching a bunch of criminals take on his own men, who were simply patrolling and enforcing the law. Rather than simply going to the aid of his men, the sergeant calls the precinct, who tells him to do nothing, but keep watching!"
That happens during every Liberal, Commie, Hippie, Peacenik march.
If NATO got involved they'd probably just put the French in charge anyways.
Weakness always means more hostages.
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