Welcome back, Carter – Now comes humiliation phase of Navy boat seizure by Iran
Iran releases U.S. Navy sailors but openly mocks and taunts weak U.S.
Every confrontation with Iran has a phase which is much more important to the Iranians than the physical outcome.
It’s the humiliation phase, in which the Iranians get to exploit photos and video showing their opponents as weak and the Iranians as strong.
We saw it throughout the U.S. Embassy hostage drama in 1979-1980, in which the hostages were paraded in front of the cameras and crowds.
The 10 U.S. sailors were released earlier today after Iran seized two small U.S. Navy boats yesterday. Iran demanded an apology and is claiming it got one, though the U.S. denies that. There is no doubt, however, that the pathetic and delusional John Kerry openly thanked the Iranians:
U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday thanked Iran for its cooperation in the release of 10 sailors who had mistakenly entered Iran’s territorial waters, an incident that stoked international tension.
“I want to express my gratitude to Iranian authorities for their cooperation in swiftly resolving this matter,” Kerry said in a statement. “That this issue was resolved peacefully and efficiently is a testament to the critical role diplomacy plays in keeping our country safe, secure, and strong.”
Iran taunted, among others, the U.S. Congress, and made clear the seizure was to send a message:
#Iran's Top Commander Hopes US Congress Takes Lesson from Vessel Seizurehttps://t.co/HJ1b9TmLHU pic.twitter.com/m1YoXBFiz4
— Fars News Agency (@EnglishFars) January 13, 2016
Iran has now released video and photos of U.S. sailors surrendering. That’s a key visual image for the Iranians — they are powerful and we are weak.
BREAKING VIDEO: Iran state TV footage of moment of arresting 2 US boats & personnel pic.twitter.com/Ts4dbCBLyZ
— Sobhan Hassanvand ? سبحان حسنوند (@Hassanvand) January 13, 2016
Pictures published by #Iran state TV from the moment #US marine were arrested. pic.twitter.com/bcEKaJGPb9
— Abas Aslani (@AbasAslani) January 13, 2016
A female U.S. sailor was forced to wear a hijab:
https://twitter.com/LouiseMensch/status/687298742664429569
Much like the firing of rockets a few days ago near a large U.S. warship, the Iranians are taunting and humiliating us. And the Obama administration doesn’t care, because it doesn’t think the way the rest of us do. It’s in Jimmy Carter mode.
https://twitter.com/instapundit/status/687023376838209536
It would be foolish to think that the humiliation phase is just about ego. Rather, the taunting that takes place almost daily is a critical piece of the Iranian strategy — to show that it can do whatever it wants whenever it wants, including claiming to lock missiles on a U.S. carrier.
IRGC Navy Commander: Iranian Missiles Locked on US Aircraft Carrier #Iran https://t.co/ILMVXTZNRL pic.twitter.com/5WKI6bLrz1
— Fars News Agency (@EnglishFars) January 13, 2016
The lack of reaction from the Obama administration encourages the Iranians to believe they are right in their strategy.
The Iranians have Obama between a rock and a hard place. He has invested his legacy on the Iranian nuke deal, and nothing the Iranians do will shake him from his delusional belief that the Mullahs have changed.
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Comments
America will be damaged further by obama and humiliated by enemies, and maybe former friends, for the next 12 months, in ways we have not yet imagined.
Just wait till Obama acheives his life goal: reigning as Secretary-General of the United Nations. He will then become Supreme Know-it-All of the world. Our guns will be given to our enemies in the name of gun safety.
A person from any of the five countries with a seat on the UN Security Council cannot serve as sec gen of the UN. However, that may not extend to someone who renounces their citizenship or has dual citizenship and renounces their U.S. affiliation, devolving to single citizenship in, say, Kenya, OR vacating our seat on the Council through the Secty of State or Executive Order.
I don’t know if any of these would fly with the UN, but I certainly think obastard would try it and the UN would bend over backward to help him.
But as it stands right now, he cannot serve as UN sec gen.
that sounds reasonable except its not true at all … Obama most certainly can be the Sec Gen of the UN …
United Nations Charter, Chapter 15: The Secretariat
Chapter Fifteen of the Charter of the United Nations
Signed in San Francisco, California on June 26, 1945
Article 97
The Secretariat shall comprise a Secretary-General and such staff as the Organization may require. The Secretary-General shall be appointed by the General Assembly upon the recommendation of the Security Council. He shall be the chief administrative officer of the Organization.
You don’t know what you’re talking about. You can go dig through the UN site for the detailed rules on who may serve as secretary general to absolutely 100% verify, but here is a quickie from Wiki. See the section “Term and Selection”. Read the last sentence of the first paragraph: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secretary-General_of_the_United_Nations
We went through this same fear-mongering fairy tale when Bubba left office. Others and I looked it all up then. I don’t post crap I know nothing about. Yu should try it yourself.
I wonder who the two dumbshitz were who up-thumbed your really-stupid-for-LI-standards post.
I see you’re incapable of admitting you’re wrong.
My personal opinion is he and Michelle will be satisfied to live a life of ease off the taxpayers for the remainder of their lives. He has been the laziest president we have had and all he really wants to do is play golf.
…and take selfies
Well……..he might want to be a part-time Imam on rainy days.
Professors Without Borders find a way.
Reason 1,987,460 to get us ALL but completely OUT of the UN…
And tell the UN to hit the road.
One may rightly assume we live with a rule of law but…
We live in an increasingly lawless world, a world of intentionality and not of rule of law. The UN/world rule of law is relativistic. It deals in intentions and false flags in order to redistribute power/kudos to themselves and to dole out a pittance to others, aka, their good deed for the world.
As shown in the following article. Universalists are ready to do what is necessary to make Obama Sec. Gen of the UN:
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2015/02/to_become_un_sec_general_obama_must_solve_the_existence_of_israel_.html
Obama campaigned at west Point for UN role a World President:
http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/052814-702509-obama-campaigns-at-west-point-to-be-united-nations-secretary-general.htm
America has no foreign enemy more dangerous this nation than the fraudulent schumck enough of us elected to its hold its highest office.
This is the most powerful military in the world under Barack Obama’s leadership.
Sickening.
Kerry, as always, is a disgrace.
When is surrendering America called treason?
Kerry => Disgrace.
Obama => Dangerous.
Hard for me to imagine this ending well.
Did iran return the boats too?
According to AP, yes:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_IRAN_US_NAVY_BOATS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
The USA… the new and improved version of France… we surrender without even putting up a fight. The old term was “surrender monkeys”, but telling the truth would be branded as racism.
How do any Democrats not hide in shame? I live in a rural area, where for the most part, there isn’t a hair’s breadth of difference between Dems and Repubs. Most are center-right. How do any of them hold their head up and even pretend to support this administration is beyond belief. Partisan politics shouldn’t trump this level of common sense.
Not only do they not hide in shame, they hold their haughty heads high and laud the achievements of their leader and their party. Damned near every Democrat in the HOR and Senate supports Obama and Kerry. They have no shame…they don’t even know the meaning of the word. The sick irony is they consider themselves patriotic and it is we who are un-American. That is how far down we have come as a country.
Mechanical problems my arse! Two boats, both with dual diesel engines. No single failure would have disabled all four engines or prevented one boat from towing the other. What a load of horesecrap.
I was wondering about that. I don’t know these boats at all but I found it very, very hard to believe that both broke down at the same time.
Originally and again later after the dust settles a bit, it was reported that only one boat had mechanical problems. There was interim reporting that it was both boat. In either case, the whole story is phantasmagorical. Two vessel failing at the same time, same place? Or, one failed but for some total clusterf%*k of a reason, the other couldn’t tow it? They couldn’t radio for assistance while the capable vessel prow-pushed/prodded the disabled vessel from drifting into Iranian waters? Or were they even really in Iranian waters?
I don’t believe any of this fairy tale. This was be design.
And then there’s the question of what two small boats were doing the Persian Gulf without escort or air cover.
Just pulled up the maritime boundaries in the persian gulf. There is a bubble of space around Farsi Island (supposedly where they were detained) that Iran claims as it’s territorial waters. I’m not altogether sure the rest of the world, (much less the US navy) recognizes that bubble as Farsi Island essentially falls on the boundary line if you extend the line through the bubble. Iran maintains a military outpost on Farsi Island. A direct line course from Kuwait to Bahrain would just skirt that bubble. This may have been a “right of navigation” exercise that Iran decided to crash the party on and Obama didn’t have the testicular tissue to press.
Here is a link to a picture of these boats.
http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/03547/iran-boat_3547991b.jpg
The media initially speculated that these were two of the Navy’s state of the art Mark VI patrol boats. THe pics show that they are in fact the older version CB90 patrol boats.
Here is a nice cutaway of the CB90: http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/metalgear/images/d/da/CB90_internal.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20111208165816
Apparently the boats weren’t swift enough.
Article 13 of the Geneva Convention (III), governing the treatment of prisoners of war, requires Iran to protect prisoners against “insults and public curiosity.” This photograph — including a female sailor apparently forced to wear a headscarf – is a quintessential example of “public curiosity” and would be interpreted as insulting throughout the Muslim world. (And if you don’t think Iran is in a state of armed conflict against the United States, tell that to the families of hundreds of American soldiers who’ve lost their lives to Iranians and Iranian-backed terrorists.) The sight of members of the American military, disarmed and under Iranian control, is of enormous propaganda value in Iran’s ongoing war against the United States.
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/429697/irans-propaganda-victory-one-illegal-image?LLAo779vAPQlYcaB.01
Rags, you know full well that Iran is not a party to the Geneva Convention.
Not to worry, obama will make all the women in the U.S. military forces start to wear head scarfs or hijabs or hijibs or just plain old head bibs (darn autocorrect). Then he’ll apologize for not doing it sooner.
Problem solved, the obama way.
Muslims don’t respect anyone who gets captured without fighting. The same thing happened with the Barbary pirates when Jefferson was president. I’m not saying the Navy men should have fought the Iranians, or that I would have (I probably wouldn’t have), I’m just saying.
This is the diplomatic version of pantsing someone in front of a group of middle school girls, or a mega wedgie. Not damaging, but fun for the person who does it.
Dead in the water or not a modern U.S. riverine craft on patrol is anything but defenseless. Two of them are capable of inflicting extreme damage if the situation calls for it. Had the Iranians sought a hostile engagement they would have been swimming themselves. An unfortunate PR circumstance for sure, but I’m inclined to trust the chief-of-the-boat’s judgement. He’s the one floating in shit. Optics are for somebody else to worry about.
I agree. I can’t fault our sailors.
Wasn’t Kerry on a similar boat in Vietnam when he received shrapnel from his own grenade for which he was awarded a Purple Heart?
The Iranians just “swiftboated” Obama
Nah, the Dims enjoy seeing the US Military being humiliated.
I believe Kerry was in a much smaller boat with only one or two sailors.
Nope. Swift boats were bigger, and had a larger crew which justified them being commanded by an officer instead of a chief, which was the case with the boats you’re thinking of.
Iran or not, here’s my question. What does this say about the state of readiness of the United States Navy? Those boats HAD to have known that they were getting close to being in trouble. They should have called someone (sat communications, hello?), and there should have been ten armed helicopters and 20 fighters flying overhead to protect those guys.
No doubt the guys on the boats will be the sacrificial lambs, but some damn brass hat’s head should roll for not being there to help our guys and prevent their capture. Why not make him pay for the boats that the enemy wouldn’t return.
Merde, merde, pure bloddy merde!
I have zero problem believing this went up the chain all the way to the WH and came back down to do nothing, apologize, be nice, protect the nuke deal I’m touting on nat’l TV.
Valerie didn’t want to upset her kinfolk.
how long does it take to get 50 miles off course after your engine fails?
I read that one of the two ran aground and thats when the Iranians showed up. Where was the rest of the f**king Navy? Do they not monitor these little craft when operating on their own.
“Ran aground.” Are you kidding me? The video released by the Persians clearly show both CB90s tied together and bobbing up and down in the sea.
Something here stinks.
It will be interesting to hear what the captain and crew of these boats have to say (or not say).
Taking an American Man of War (has this become “Person of War” yet?) should be unthinkable. Spitting in the wind…. junk yard dog….tugging on Superman’s cape….. you don’t mess around with Jim. Unthinkable.
There was a time when Iran would have soiled itself at the sight of American warships on the horizon.
But now?
When Iran ‘tested’ those rockets they were snatching our pants down and laughing.
Today they put us in a headlock and gave us noogies.
Next they plan to bend our arms behind our backs and force us to yell, “Uncle!”
Obama believes America deserves this.
Maybe ok to poke the eagle in eye now, but in 12 months with President Trump, the islamic fascist regime will not dare…
I’d sink Farsi Island.
If I was the Admiral of that Carrier Group, I would steam toward DC and make a point! What the “O” has done here is mutiny!
I don’t deny the propaganda value of the pics and their political value for domestic consumption in Iran and among Muslims abroad. But, I think Iran’s behavior points to something deeper and more sinister. This isn’t mere posturing and grandstanding. The Iranian regime is testing us. Staging a deliberate provocation to see how we’ll react. And, their assumptions and instincts about our feckless and toothless response having now been confirmed and validated, they will be encouraged to continue their belligerence — both in deeds and in rhetoric — and to undermine U.S. and allied interests. Next time, it won’t be about merely taking some photos and bandying them about.