Drama in the Persian Gulf (Tehran gets uppity)

[davidbfpo]

The Independent has the DoD video, not great quality and without anything in support e.g. mapping showing the boat's onward journey.
Link:https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-a8958376.html

[davidbfpo]

Previous post would not accept editing. Bellingcat adds in the NYT a commentary:https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/14/o...r-attacks.html

[davidbfpo]

I doubt many, indeed any readers of the Forum will need this, but it may help others understand the risks and how to mitigate them. Plus there are multiple links:https://theconversation.com/gulf-of-oman-attacks-how-merchant-ships-can-keep-safe-in-dangerous-waters-118952?

[davidbfpo]

A British blogger's commentary that ends with:

This remains a complex and fast moving situation, and more events will surely follow. But, for now, it is worth trying to capture some of the bigger issues as it moves along, and in time consider the lessons and impacts more broadly. Whatever else happens, the hope must be that this ends peacefully and not with an escalation into an ever more challenging proxy war, where the new threshold of gradually accepted use of low level violence suddenly leads to an accidental escalation of something significantly more widespread by accident.

Link:https://thinpinstripedline.blogspot....s-on-gulf.html

An IISS commentary by an ex-diplomat that ends - nearly - with:

Whatever the strategy of either side, it is possible that with an increased amount of tension, rhetoric and military personnel in the region a miscalculation trips both sides into uncontrolled escalation. That is a legitimate concern that surfaced with the downing of the drone. But even in the event of miscalculation, the escalation need not be automatic.

Link:https://www.iiss.org/blogs/analysis/...an-in-the-gulf

[AdamG]

The US may have withheld a physical military response to Iran shooting down a drone, but it might not have shown similar restraint with a digital campaign. Washington Post sources say the President greenlit a long-in-the-making cyberattack that took down Iranian missile control computers on the night of June 20th. The exact impact of the Cyber Command operation isn't clear, but it was described as "crippling" -- Iran couldn't easily recover, one tipster said.

https://www.engadget.com/2019/06/22/...-control-syste

[JWing]

Tehran And Its Iraqi Allies Respond Asymmetrically To Trump Admin’s Iran Policy

[davidbfpo]

A French newspaper article by a Canadian journalist familiar with the region; useful as gives a comprehensive overview of the region and more. After the recent White House announcement this is topical:

Yet, countries under sanctions rarely concede to ‘outside interference’, ‘imperialist pressure’ or ‘economic terrorism’. As an instrument of national power, the imposition of sanctions is a blunt tool that achieves little other than privation and enmity.

(Later) While the ‘maximum pressure’ campaign is significantly damaging the economy and causing suffering among ordinary Iranians, it has not altered Iran’s campaign of ‘maximum resistance’ — if anything, it has strengthened Iranian resolve to resist.

Link:https://mondediplo.com/outsidein/us-...by-other-means