Iranian Face-Off
- 01.08.2008 - 12:05 PMOn Sunday, five armed Iranian speedboats threatened three U.S. Navy warships in the Strait of Hormuz. Before turning back, the Revolutionary Guard boats dropped white boxes in the path of one of the U.S. ships, and broadcast the bridge-to-bridge message, “I am coming at you, and you will explode in a few minutes.” So, why aren’t today’s newspapers plastered with stories about five sunken terrorist boats in international waters?
In 2006, Revolutionary Guard commander Yahya Rahim Safavi said on Iranian television:
The Americans have many weaknesses. We have planned our strategy precisely on the basis of their strengths and weaknesses. When their commanders encounter a problem, they burst into tears. We did not see such spectacles in the eight years of the Iran-Iraq War.
Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman treated the terrorist provocation as if he were a municipal magistrate passing out a fine for a seatbelt infraction. In no uncertain terms he let the Iranians know that they had acted in a “reckless and dangerous” manner.
Last March when eight Royal Navy sailors and seven Marines from the HMS Cornwall giggled and praised their Revolutionary Guard captors, many Americans imagined that this low point for the great Royal Navy would look rather different with American sailors. Incidents such as Sunday’s give little reason for hope. We don’t know if the encounter was an aborted attack or not. But it points, yet again, to the fact that Tehran is not the rational player talk-advocates (like Mike Huckabee) suggest. Iran’s goal is escalation.
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January 8th, 2008 at 3:21 PM
Why isn’t their goal probing our defenses and reactions? If they wanted escalation, it’d be easy enough to provoke.
As much as I’m opposed to war with Iran and fear a Gulf of Tonkin incident, if the accounts are true, some shots across (or into) the bow might have been appropriate. If we’re going to be in the Gulf, it’s not useful to appear a pitiful helpless giant.
January 8th, 2008 at 4:08 PM
The reason why we don’t see Iranian flotsam in the Straight of Hormuz is because our naval commanders exercised restraint. The Iranian move is not irrational though, their audience is different. If our commanders had not exercised restraint, the headlines in the Islamic world would have read something like “American Imperialists annihilate guardians of Islamic waters” To gain that sympathy in the rest of the world, what would have Iran lost? The answer is a few sailors and a few small boats. While it may be irrational from our perspective to sacrifice a few lives to instigate an opponent into potentially doing something stupid, in the context of world opinion that is, it is not irrational in the context of a weaker nation confronting a larger and stronger foe. Escalation is a very effective strategy, particularly given our inability to effectively strike, debilitate and control Iran. Our lack of a credible threat or retribution demonstrates our weakness, which only becomes clearer in an escalating confrontation.
January 8th, 2008 at 6:09 PM
It was wise of the US to refrain from initiating any serious military action against the Iranians, as long as they stopped short of a direct physical attack on our ships - precisely in order to deny them the propaganda coup they may well have been hoping for. Had they actually inflicted any damage on our ships - not to mention any casualties on our forces, however, we would obviously have had no choice but to take real, “hot,” military action.
Just as obviously, in such an event the current election campaign would be totally transformed. Foreign affairs would immediatley become issue number one, with clear implications for the immediate fortunes of the Dems and the GOP candidates in the election campaign.
Is it cynical to say out loud what we all know, namely, that only a serious, bonafide international crisis is likely to keep the presidency in Republican hands?