the captured UK sailors
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faceless
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Joined: 25 Apr 2006

PostPosted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 1:36 pm    Post subject: the captured UK sailors Reply with quote

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that they were actually in Iranian waters, and even if they weren't they shouldn't be anywhere near it in the first place. If there was a navy ship from a country that has obvious antipathy towards Britain and it was within one mile of British water I'd expect them to be captured too.
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luke



Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Location: by the sea

PostPosted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 4:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

i think they were, i think probably this was deliberate - the way the bbc had interviewed the girl the day before, the indie and bbc etc all having people on that particular boat ready to start the propaganda

it just seems all to convenient ...

Quote:
'There is something very fishy going on. HMS Cornwall is a state of the art ship with a radar tracking system that would have seen the Iranian boats as they left port. Why did the captain of HMS Cornwall not go to cut off the Iranians?. Why did the gemini boats not fight or at least run away when they saw the six boats coming?. No RN captain would send its people out without protection! Either the captain is an incompetent fool OR he was ordered to stand by and do nothing!' -- Beryl Hutchinson, Larnaca, Cyprus

'Knowing the waters well and having been myself 'captured' by the IRG, something smells here. Cornwall had the eye in the sky (helicopter) watching overhead, the zodiac boats can do 30 knots and the interdict was approx 2 miles from Cornwall. How did they not see the Iranian fleet steam up and 'surround' the zodiacs? How do you surround a rubber dinghy capable of 30 knots. Or is this the issue the USA has been needing to justify an offensive move against Iran?' -- Phillip Carr, Sherborne

The above people made these comments in the BBC 'Have Your Say' section of the BBC News website. If you know anything about the military and how things are done, there is absolutely no way that these poor sailors and marines were accidently allowed to be captured - this was a carefully planned 'psych op' to escalate British and overseas public opinion into accepting military action against Iran.
Poor Faye Turney -- interviewed by the BBC just moments before she went out on this 'routine' search of a 'smuggling' ship. We all know from our research into 9/11 that you have to believe in huge coincidences if you are to believe the official story. Well how about this ... there are currently thousands of British servicemen and women operating in Iraq and the Gulf and, guess what, not only does the BBC embed itself with the actual ship that was going to be involved with this major news story (along with selected newspaper journalists), but they also just happen to interview the young woman a couple of hours before she goes out on patrol. The 'hidden hand' needs a human face to get the most from this sort of operation -- if it were just fifteen hunky males in trouble, we would be concerned but not that concerned ... but a young mother with a three-year-old waiting back home for Mummy to come back, now that's something to really get people animated about.

Now to the actual capture itself. The military always, when they put their people into harms way, ensure that close support is available in the form of immediate firepower and reinforcements. The only exception to this are Special Forces who are trained to operate independently of other friendly units and to be able to operate behind enemy lines without immediate backup. A boarding party from a Royal Navy ship are not Special Forces, even though half of them in this particular case were Royal Marine commandos. The normal procedure for a Royal Navy boarding party is for their ship to place itself in a position were it can give covering or warning fire from its most appropriate weaponry, which in this case would have been shipboard mounted GPMGs (General Purpose Machine Guns) and the ship's helicopter. In other words, the boarding party's ship would be no more than 1800 metres (effective range of a mounted GPMG) away from the designated ship to be searched. So what happened in this particular case -- how far away was HMS Cornwall from this freighter? If it was further than two kilometres then that boarding party was deliberately sent out to be captured ... and if Cornwall was within two kilometres then why no support given with warning shots?

HMS Cornwall is bristling with radar and high tech surveillance devices -- how come they did not pick up the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's patrol boats as they were approaching the RN boarding party? And what about the helicopter -- one report says it was sent away when it was seen that the boarding party had received a friendly welcome from the suspected freighter. If that's true, then this is a break with normal SOPs (standing operational procedures).

It is also reported that the Cornwall had communication problems with the boarding party -- now problems with radios do occur, but the ship should have been close enough for other forms of communications to be used (lights, rockets and signal flags) in order to alert the boarding party as to the Iranian patrol boats movements. We also learn from other sources that Commodore Nick Lambert, senior naval officer in the area, was desperately trying to sort out Rules of Engagement with the Ministry of Defence in London and that hesitation here prevented any action from being taken to save the boarding party from capture. Excuse me! Rules of Engagement are decided before deployment and are constantly reviewed, and at no time would you put your people into harms way without knowing your latest Rules of Engagement.

One final thing -- the Rigid Inflatable Boats (RIBs) used by the boarding party are capable of over 30 knots and, as we have seen when Greenpeace use them effectively, are extremely manouvreable. I just find it very strange that skilful avoiding tactics using excellent boatmanship (which you would expect from the Royal Navy), but not firing any shots to exacerbate the situation, were not used by the boarding party to get back to the Cornwall -- assuming of course the Cornwall was at a distance offering 'close support'.

The Ministry of Defence should give us an accurate, minute by minute, account of what happened, but my belief is that we will never know the full truth. Let's hope that some of the Navy personnel involved will speak out.
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fritz



Joined: 29 Apr 2006
Location: Florida

PostPosted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 7:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Confused
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luke



Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Location: by the sea

PostPosted: Fri Mar 30, 2007 10:41 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

thinking

Quote:
The Associated Press
Thursday, March 29, 2007
BAGHDAD: At a critical period in the crisis over Iran's seizure of 15 British sailors and marines, the Iranian consul in Basra charged that British soldiers on Thursday had surrounded his office in the southern city and fired shots into the air. Britain denied the allegation.

The Ministry of Defense in London said the shooting was an exchange of gunfire after British troops on a foot patrol near the Iranian consulate were ambushed.

But Iranian Consul-General Mohammed Ridha Nasir Baghban said British forces had engaged in a "provocative act" that "could worsen the situation of the British sailors."

"British forces should rely on wisdom and not react because of the British forces' detention. This reflects negatively on bilateral relations," Baghban told The Associated Press in a telephone interview.

Baghban claimed British forces surrounded the consulate about 10:00 a.m. and fired randomly into the air.

In a statement distributed to journalists, British forces in Basra denied any aggressive action against the Iranian consulate, saying that a patrol was ambushed near the consulate and that it was returning fire.
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faceless
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Joined: 25 Apr 2006

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 10:43 am    Post subject: Reply with quote



so they've been released properly now - unharmed and apparently treated well. Compared to the outrageous way that Iraqis and others have been treated by the British and American armed forces, I say well done to Iran for showing those fuckers how to behave.

I could propbably be called a traitor for that - but I couldn't give a toss. I'm disgusted by what these bastards are doing in MY name.
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luke



Joined: 11 Feb 2007
Location: by the sea

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 12:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

i agree faceless. its really annoyed me the media coverage the past few weeks, you wouldn't think there were people languishing in guantanamo bay whilst being forced fed and tortured, without charge or trial, for years on end.

i think it was hazel blears last week on question time who said the tv footage of the arrested britains was the most wickedest thing she'd ever seen ... where has she been the past few years? did she miss the pictures from abu ghraib?! i was going to post a picture up as a comparison, but i don't like looking at the pics

i've just seen on the bbc as well blair saying that the killings of the britains in basra today is related to iran - bollocks, like anyone in iraq needs helping making bombs, but he says it, no evidence, and the bbc will keep on repeating it
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faceless
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Joined: 25 Apr 2006

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 12:49 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

luke wrote:
like anyone in iraq needs helping making bombs, but he says it, no evidence, and the bbc will keep on repeating it


Also, I'd guess there's probably dozens, if not hundreds, of american and british troops who will have been killed by weapons which had been captured by the "insurgents". But that's not really the kind of story that makes "good" headlines.
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nico



Joined: 12 Dec 2006

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 12:58 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I completely agree with you faceless and Luke,

Now watch the press release for the next few days, and you'll see how blair will toughen up his language against Iran.
Probabely the army is now interrogating each soldier and dictating them what they should and shouldn't tell the media, once they are free to go home.
there is no doubt in my mind that they were in the Iranian waters, otherwise there would have been much more noise by the government and that president sure humiliated blair.
The Iranians have been weak in diplomacy in the past. I think they are catching up with the west.
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Lostinthestates



Joined: 28 Feb 2007
Location: Bethlehem, USA

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 1:19 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I think Iran really played their cards extremly well! They showed humility towards their captures by treating them really well - they made their point not to fuck with them and then they released them saying 'Look you in the west who consider us Middle-Eastern people all as Barbarians we know how to treat our detainees!'. I was very impressed with how Iran handled the position. I bet old Bushy is going to come out with some more crap though soon about how we need to bomb Teheran now to teach them a lesson!
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vegas
Diamond Geezer


Joined: 29 Apr 2006
Location: Dallas Texas

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 4:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

once bitten twice shy. you would hope this will not happen again. They need to be able to use their weapons and have a helicopter gunship flying overhead and blow the chancers out of the water should they come too near.
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faceless
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Joined: 25 Apr 2006

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 4:55 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

vegas wrote:
once bitten twice shy. you would hope this will not happen again. They need to be able to use their weapons and have a helicopter gunship flying overhead and blow the chancers out of the water should they come too near.


So you think that what the media and governments are telling you is true? Just as in the case of the reason to invade Iraq in the first place? Once bitten twice shy indeed...
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vegas
Diamond Geezer


Joined: 29 Apr 2006
Location: Dallas Texas

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 5:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

the 3 reasons for all of this is oil oil and oil once that runs out who gives a monkeys what happens in that region.
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faceless
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Joined: 25 Apr 2006

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 5:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

If that's ok with you then hell mend you.
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Lostinthestates



Joined: 28 Feb 2007
Location: Bethlehem, USA

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 6:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Wow Vegas that is a very heartless and short-sighted view. You don't really feel that way do you???
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vegas
Diamond Geezer


Joined: 29 Apr 2006
Location: Dallas Texas

PostPosted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 6:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It's not my view it is just facts. Without oil the politicians will not have the desire to send kids as cannon fodder. So these regions will be left to determine their own fate. I don't see what is short sighted in accepting the facts.
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