Ships under attack in the middle east

Soldato
Joined
7 Sep 2009
Posts
2,635
Location
London
So someone else couldn't get to it first.

Right so had this been the US who went to collect it stating they did it for analysis it would have been ok?

Several posters including myself have suggested reasonable motives. So far only US and its allies seek to gain from this.
 
Man of Honour
Joined
19 Oct 2002
Posts
29,508
Location
Surrey
Right so had this been the US who went to collect it stating they did it for analysis it would have been ok?

Several posters including myself have suggested reasonable motives. So far only US and its allies seek to gain from this.

Iran (or the US): "Hey everyone we found a mine on one of the ships, come and look at it to see if it has any useful evidence." <-- This would be normal when finding a bomb.
Iran (or the US): <silence while removing unexploded mine> <-- This is suspicious.
 

NVP

NVP

Soldato
Joined
6 Sep 2007
Posts
12,649
Right so had this been the US who went to collect it stating they did it for analysis it would have been ok?

Several posters including myself have suggested reasonable motives. So far only US and its allies seek to gain from this.
Me included. But you asked a question which had a very simple answer.
 
Soldato
Joined
7 Sep 2009
Posts
2,635
Location
London
Iran (or the US): "Hey everyone we found a mine on one of the ships, come and look at it to see if it has any useful evidence." <-- This would be normal when finding a bomb.
Iran (or the US): <silence while removing unexploded mine> <-- This is suspicious.

Yes except we have a picture of men on a boat removing a device. That's all.

Let me try:

"Hi we are Iran, we have absolutely no reason to bomb a Japanese ship on the day when the Japanese minister is visiting to create new trade deals so we can struggle through our crippled economy. We will also pick up the mine afterwards when the world is watching"

Have I done it right ?
 
Man of Honour
Joined
19 Oct 2002
Posts
29,508
Location
Surrey
Yes except we have a picture of men on a boat removing a device. That's all.

Let me try:

"Hi we are Iran, we have absolutely no reason to bomb a Japanese ship on the day when the Japanese minister is visiting to create new trade deals so we can struggle through our crippled economy. We will also pick up the mine afterwards when the world is watching"

Have I done it right ?
I agree. I can't see an obvious reason for them to do it.

But if (and it needs to be proved) it was Iran removing a mine thrn it is suspicious.
 
Soldato
Joined
29 Dec 2014
Posts
5,758
Location
Midlands
Everybody loves a good conspiracy theory don't they :D

It's extremely unlikely that this is a 'false flag' or whatever attack, because the Iranians have already threatened to do this. Back in February Ali Shamkhani (Iranian Admiral) said;

“Apart from closing Strait of Hormuz, we have other options to stop oil flow if threatened,” “Iran has plans in place that will neutralise the illegal U.S. sanctions against Iran’s oil exports,” “We have many ways to sell our oil.”

By attacking tankers in the Strair of Hormuz, it basically causes enough upset and cancelled orders in the oil market, that Iran can benefit and essentially work around the US sanctions on it's oil market, which to me makes perfect sense, and seems like the most likely explanation - especially when you consider that less than 4 months ago they threatened to do this.

It's just a game of cat and mouse, Iran will basically try and push the boundary as far as it dares, to the point where there's a carrier strike group breathing down its neck, then retreat.
 
Soldato
Joined
12 Jul 2007
Posts
7,864
Location
Stoke/Norfolk
Let me try:

"Hi we are Iran, we have absolutely no reason to bomb a Japanese ship on the day when the Japanese minister is visiting to create new trade deals so we can struggle through our crippled economy. We will also pick up the mine afterwards when the world is watching"

Have I done it right ?

Not even close :)

How about this as an alternative:

"Hi we are Iran, we have targeted a Japanese ship to threaten Japan into reducing sanctions and giving us a trade deal to boost our crippled economy, plus show the US (who Japan is playing middle-man for in negotiations) that we're happy to escalate things to get our way. We will also try to hide the evidence of our involvement by picking up the failed mine but we didn't realise until after than there was a drone watching (because our speedboat has no air-search radar) and no-one wanted to radio us from Iran which would have confirmed our identity if we'd replied."

I'd suggest that neither of our two fanciful stories are accurate but I like the fan fiction anyway!
 
Soldato
Joined
12 Jul 2007
Posts
7,864
Location
Stoke/Norfolk

"If Japan doesn't offer us an improved deal or reduce sanctions, well with all the tension here at the moment we can't guarantee the safety of your ships and no-one wants to see your economy, which imports 95% of all it's oil from the Middle East via the Gulf of Oman, take a down turn due to a lack of oil do they? However, if you give us a decent trade deal your ships will be perfectly safe, we proud Iranians will guarantee it by protecting them ourselves"

Again, all fan fiction where life isn't black/white but instead realpolitik is various shades of grey, which I'm sure you'll find just as funny as my last reply :)
 
Soldato
Joined
25 Jun 2011
Posts
5,468
Location
Yorkshire and proud of it!
Was wondering if anyone had a bit more background on it - it doesn't seem to be specifically targetted at anti-war or even pro-war or any other specific target that I can see - the more I've googled it the more scatter shot it seems other than having a vague target of reporting on ongoing military and civil unrest.

Increasingly censorship is being done by algorithms without human intervention. Hence YouTube taking down history channels that talk about Nazi germany and similar the last few weeks. So expect some random collateral damage in attempts to censor unwanted information and views.
 
Man of Honour
Joined
13 Oct 2006
Posts
90,805
Increasingly censorship is being done by algorithms without human intervention. Hence YouTube taking down history channels that talk about Nazi germany and similar the last few weeks. So expect some random collateral damage in attempts to censor unwanted information and views.

There may be some element of that i.e. social media sites using an algorithmic approach to match a certain complaint or something but seems to be more than that with a variety of platforms from bigger organised entities through to smaller hosting, etc. involved.
 
Caporegime
Joined
18 Oct 2002
Posts
33,188
haha, further to my previous post on what the Iran deal meant, and how it could have progressed, and how it was the first step towards building a better deal and Trump unilaterally pulled out of it rather than building on it because he's an idiot. He's now basically begging everyone else who stayed in on the deal to hold Iran to it. Guy is a complete moron and those who said he was right for pulling out are being made a fool of by the very man they defend blindly.

Trump gave up power by pulling out of that deal and now he's unable to himself demand that Iran stick to the deal. This is why no other leader in the same position would have done the same thing, it was amongst the stupidest things he's done in his life and that is saying something.
 
Caporegime
Joined
29 Jan 2008
Posts
58,898
Let's see. It's been days. I'll happily be corrected. However, everything about this stinks.

Not particularly, you're just trying to rationalise their motives from your own pov/values etc...

The evidence so far doesn't really stink. Iran has been making noises about disrupting shipping in that area, ships were previously attacked, ships attacked again, Iranians seen removing what looks like a mine, rather suspiciously they don't bother mentioning this but rather the US captures video of it, US releases photos of where the removed mine was placed on the ship...

So far it just looks like Iran attacked some ships, placed some mines above the waterline so as to not necessarily intend to sink them.
 
Soldato
Joined
29 Jul 2010
Posts
23,738
Location
Lincs
The evidence so far doesn't really stink. Iran has been making noises about disrupting shipping in that area, ships were previously attacked, ships attacked again, Iranians seen removing what looks like a mine, rather suspiciously they don't bother mentioning this but rather the US captures video of it, US releases photos of where the removed mine was placed on the ship...

So far it just looks like Iran attacked some ships, placed some mines above the waterline so as to not necessarily intend to sink them.

That's just a far too boringly sensible deduction there dowie, I much prefer the ISIS frogmen theory! :p;)
 
Soldato
Joined
7 Sep 2009
Posts
2,635
Location
London
Not particularly, you're just trying to rationalise their motives from your own pov/values etc...

Sure in the same way you are doing. Nothing about what I and others have said is irrational considering the allies US has in the region.

Even Germany a Western ally has not accepted the video as proof.
 
Back
Top Bottom