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Different Phase

I think we might be getting somewhere:

U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair said that efforts to release 15 British sailors and Marines seized by Iran will enter a “different phase” if negotiations fail.

The U.K. is using diplomatic channels to make the Iranian government understand that the eight Royal Navy sailors and seven Royal Marines “have to be released,” Blair said today in an interview with the U.K. television show GMTV.

“I hope we manage to get them to realize they have to release them. If not, then this will move into a different phase,” Blair said. “We cannot have a situation where our servicemen and women are seized.” Asked what he meant by a different phase, Blair didn’t elaborate. “We’ll just have to see,” he said.

Frankly, I would like to hear more out of President Bush or perhaps some unnamed senior U.S. officials on this, but this is a British crisis for the Brits to manage and take point on.  Hopefully, and presumeably, the British have been offered the full range of U.S. options, without reservation, and the United States is the big stick Blair has been carrying while speaking softly.

Here’s the Daily Mail’s assessment:

Painful though it is to stand by while brave British service personnel are held prisoner, it would be a grave mistake to give him the satisfaction he seeks.

Meanwhile, in another front of the Great Jihad on Violent Extremist Nutjob Islam:

The State Department’s point man on Iran, Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns, suggests Tehran’s reaction to stricter sanctions is another move in the wrong direction.

“That’s an unfortunate response from the Iranian government,” he said. “When you’re in a hole, stop digging. They’re in a hole. That was a major repudiation of Iran the other day at the Security Council. Fifteen countries voted sanctions for the second time. Mandatory Chapter 7 sanctions.”

Re the Brits: Indian master of the dhow they were searching says he was anchored in Iraqi waters. Hardliners in Iran as recently as yesterday say they want to try the Brits.

Prior Posts:

Carter’s Legacy

Kharnival 300

Kharnival of the Iranities

Topics: Iran, Britain

  Posted by Jules Crittenden at 9:53 am on Tuesday, March 27, 2007

11 Responses to “Different Phase”

1. SoldiersDad Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 12:40 pm

   The “Current Phase” is pretending is was a big misunderstanding.

   The next phase will be demonstrating beyond a reasonable doubt that it was a deliberate act of war against Great Britain ordered by the Government of Iran.

2. C-Low Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 2:40 pm

   “A new phase”

   Maybe a good start of a new phase especially sinse this is the SECOND TIME British soldiers taken hostage maybe just maybe a good start would be open recognition of a change in the British ROE so that “this will not happen again”. And by that I mean it to be said a thinly veiled threat that next time here on out it will be a hot exchange at attempted taking.

   Will this happen doubt it likely more pandering word games maybe a hollow threat immediatley clairified as not meant and the Brit making it as out of line.

   I would be fully supportive in backing up the Brits but we BETTER not let the Brits pressure US into giving up those Iranian terrorist “diplomats” we are working for intel. We just cannot allow ourselves to get cought in the Israeli trap of hostage trading with ever larger unballanced demands for hostages. That will basicly put a price on every US / Westerner citizens head just waiting to be cashed in by X radical zipper head.

3. Bill's Bites Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 3:06 pm

   2007.03.28 Iran/Brit Hostage Crisis Roundup

   Britain’s Hostage Crisis It is time to stop appeasing those who kidnapped the servicemen For more than four days British sailors and Marines have been imprisoned in Iran. They have been interrogated, psychologically abused, denied access to the outsi…

4. Old War Dogs Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 3:07 pm

   Bill’s Nibbles // Open Post — 2007.03.27

   Please feel free to use this post for comments and trackbacks not related to other posts on the site. If you leave a trackback your post must include a link to this one and, as always, comments claiming the sun

5. RebeccaH Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 3:51 pm

   Thank God Jimmy Carter isn’t president right now.

6. CavMedic Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 4:31 pm

   I would like to hear more from our leadership about this (even if it is just the standard “we support our allies” chatter). I looked over some Brit message boards over the weekend and they were pretty hot-even some who were posting at the Guardian, if you can believe that.

   Without their usual apologists on the left giving them cover, I’m thinking they might just have to make this thing go away pretty quickly.

7. saltydog Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 7:10 pm

   Does anyone know whether our guys have the ok to fight if attacked at sea like that? I’d like to think that we wouldn’t allow ourselves to be taken without a fight.

   Dear lord, who would ever before have thought to ask such a question in the middle of a war? That one would have to ask is a disgrace. Anyone who would deny the most basic right of self-defense, especially when the person in danger is in that situation because they’ve been put there, is utterly immoral. Double that when the person denying the right is the one who put them there in the first place.

8. Grimmy Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 9:36 pm

   saltydog:

   I cant find the quote to link to but according to a USN spokesman, US personnel are not only allowed to defend themselves is such situations, but are required to do so.

9. Green Says:
   March 27th, 2007 at 9:54 pm

   “Frankly, I would like to hear more out of President Bush … ”

   It is hard for Bush to talk bold when Congress seems hell-bent to undermine him. Maybe better to stay quiet and mysterious than speak loudly and carry no stick.

10. Grimmy Says:
    March 28th, 2007 at 2:58 pm

    It actually became a different phase in regard to Iran the day Iranian involvement was verified in the Iraq AO.

    The problem is, no one wants to stand up on it.

    It will be at least a full 50 years, long enough for every single politico, msm talking head and diplomat that grew up under the rules appropriate for the Cold War to die, before we can really expect to have governments that will treat acts of war as acts of war.

11. JammieWearingFool Says:
    March 28th, 2007 at 9:55 pm

    Iran Just Begging For It

    OK, it’s been about 28 years now that they’ve been due their comeuppance. Time to smack these pissants down.

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