Britain's Humiliation -- and Europe's

[SWJED]

6 April Washington Post commentary - Britain's Humiliation -- and Europe's by Charles Krauthhammer.

Iran has pulled off a tidy little success with its seizure and release of those 15 British sailors and marines: a pointed humiliation of Britain, with a bonus demonstration of Iran's intention to push back against coalition challenges to its assets in Iraq. All with total impunity. Further, it exposed the impotence of all those transnational institutions -- most prominently the European Union and the United Nations -- that pretend to maintain international order.

You would think maintaining international order means, at least, challenging acts of piracy. No challenge here. Instead, a quiet capitulation...

[SWJED]

Interesting thread over on the British ARmy Rumour Service board.

[Mark O'Neill]

6 April Washington Post commentary - Britain's Humiliation -- and Europe's by Charles Krauthhammer.

More rubbish from yet another polemicist civilian neo-con who has not served yet is an expert on military matters....

[goesh]

From the reference posted by SWJED:

"Re: They're free!
Posted: Wed Apr 04, 2007 5:13 pm

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Wonderful news for the 15, their families, and the nation!

Freedom with dignity; and an answer to prayer. "


A one Caubeen from that site posted that. Freedom with dignity. The truth of the matter is this: they could have come home covered in bruises with holes drilled in their teeth, burns on the bottom of their feet, minus a few fingers and an eye and there isn't a thing you could do about it. It makes you almost want to hug SAVAMA for the dignity they granted, eh Guv?

[Tom Odom]

More rubbish from yet another polemicist civilian neo-con who has not served yet is an expert on military matters....

Thank you. You saved me from saying that Krauthammer is just another neo-con/imperialist who loves to advocate expending the lives of other folks children.

Tom

[Stan]

I don't see the shame in coming home in one piece. I doubt those critical Brits have any idea what it was like for those 15 sailors.

Hmmm, the thanks we get. Roasted chicken and beef
Well, they did get to eat with their families !

Jedburgh recently told me they had better takeout in Iran

All things said and done, I agree with the British Admiral:

"acted with considerable dignity and a lot of courage."
"I think, in the end, they were a credit to us."

The crew's first night in Britain included a dinner of roast chicken and beef, and drinks with their families, the Ministry of Defense said.

While much of the country rallied behind the crew's return, others criticized them for offering apologies where none was required — namely for appearing in videos in which they admitted and offered regrets for entering Iranian waters.

But the head of the Royal Navy, Admiral Sir Jonathon Band, told British Broadcasting Corp. radio that the crew had "acted with considerable dignity and a lot of courage."

"They appear to have played it by the rules, they don't appear to have put themselves into danger, others into danger, they don't appear to have given anything away," he said. "I think, in the end, they were a credit to us."

Lastly, their dignified mission was fairly clear

Royal Marine Capt. Chris Air said in an interview days before his capture that his crew was gathering intelligence on Iran during their patrols. Sky said it held the interview because it thought it could hamper the crew's release.

A little more detail here:
http://news.yahoo.com/i/721;_ylt=AqS...xiVHj5lJ8UewgF

[goesh]

They came home intact because they had nothing to give up. What a thing for Admiral Rand to say, "they didn't give anything up". The question not being addressed in the Public arena is how are professional military personnel persuaded to be dangled on television admitting to things they know nothing about after being abducted at gunpoint? That's much like the question not being asked in the Public arena of what Iran will do if ever armed with nuclear weapons. The Public will never know the details of the debrief, after all, searching vessels for contraband is a very highly classified operation. The spin of it is this - maybe they shouldn't have been where they were at, therefore Iran was maybe justified in adducting them, obviously, because them poor homesick sailors and marines were treated ever so nicely. In the next abduction, Iran can blow a couple of them away then sincerely apologize and all will be well and they know it.

[Stan]

Hey Goesh !

Why did this even happen ? Wasn't too long ago, the HMS Cornwall, or any other warship for that matter would have merely blown the 'other' motorboats out of the water.

Another resolution to the UN

[SWJED]

7 April Washington Post - Britons Recount Capture, Detention by John Ward Anderson.

Early during their two-week detention in Iran, a group of British sailors and marines were blindfolded, hands cuffed behind their backs, and lined up facing a wall in a prison in Tehran. Behind them, they recalled, Iranian guards cocked their guns.

Held in isolation by guards who spoke no English, barred from talking to one another, and so bereft of information that they thought perhaps no one knew they were missing, "Some of us feared the worst," said Royal Marine Capt. Chris Air, 25.

" 'Lads, lads, I think we're going to get executed,' " a voice said in the darkness, recalled one of the marines, Joe Tindell. After that, someone got sick, "and as far as I was concerned, he had just had his throat cut."

In fact, it was a bit of psychological intimidation, six members of the crew said Friday at a news conference, the first time they have spoken publicly about their March 23 capture by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and their time in captivity, which ended with their surprise release on Thursday. They spent long periods blindfolded and in isolation, and they were threatened with up to seven years in prison if they did not admit to invading Iranian waters, said Royal Navy Lt. Felix Carman...

[SWJED]

7 April Washington Post commentary - Mother Of All Blunders by Kathleen Parker.

On any given day, one isn't likely to find common cause with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. He's a dangerous, lying, Holocaust- denying, Jew-hating cutthroat thug -- not to put too fine a point on it.

But he was dead-on when he wondered why a once-great power such as Britain sends mothers of toddlers to fight its battles.

Ahmadinejad characterized as a gift to Britain the release of 15 British sailors and marines, including one woman, seized at sea last month. In reality, the hostages were the West's gift to Ahmadinejad.

When a pretender to sanity such as Ahmadinejad gets to lecture the West about how it treats its women, we've effectively handed him a free pass to the end zone and made the world his cheerleaders.

Not only does the Iranian president get to look magnanimous in releasing the hostages, but he gets to look wise. And we in the West get to look humiliated, foolish and weak.

Just because we may not "feel" humiliated doesn't mean we're not. In the eyes of Iran and other Muslim nations, we're wimps. While the West puts mothers in boats with rough men, Muslim men "rescue" women and drape them in floral hijabs.

We can debate whether they're right until all our boys wear aprons, but it won't change the way we're perceived. The propaganda value Iran gained from its lone female hostage, the mother of a 3-year-old, was incalculable.

It is not fashionable these days to suggest that women don't belong in or near combat...

[Dr Jack]

Ahmadinejad may look "wise" to some "while the West puts mothers in boats with rough men (and) Muslim men 'rescue' women and drape them in floral hijabs." To women in the Middle East, the perception may be different -- that the West offers women the opportunity to be integrated into society...

Ralph Peters wrote an interesting column in USA Today in 2005:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion...men-edit_x.htm

The Washington establishment would shrink from any such claim, but the Global War on Terror is a fight over the social, economic and cultural roles of women. The core issues for the terrorists are the interpretation of God's will and the continued oppression of women. Nothing so threatens Islamic extremists as the freedom Western women enjoy.

Equal partners

The sudden transition of women from men's property to men's partners in our own country unleashed dazzling creative energies. In the historical blink of an eye, we doubled our effective human capital — and made our society immeasurably more humane. Our half-century of stunning economic growth has many roots, but none goes deeper than the expansion of opportunities for women.

But such unprecedented freedom threatens traditional societies. Behavior patterns that prevailed for millennia are suddenly in doubt. Relationships that granted males the power of life and death over female relatives have disappeared from successful cultures. Defensively, the failing cultures left behind cling harder than ever to the old ways amid the tumult of global change.

It may well be that the West has the opportunity to illuminate the difference in how Faye Tunney is perceived -- in Britain, as a mother and service member; in Iran, as one to be manipulated and pitied.