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Iranians Taunt American Navy

Newspaper current event by VnutZ on 08 January 2008, tagged as military, iran, middle east, and world affairs

In the international waters of the Strait of Hormuz, the American Navy reported harassment by Iranian Revolutionary Guard ships. Five Iranian ships allegedly taunted the American vessels to include a radio transmission declaring, "I am coming at you. You will explode in a couple of minutes." The incident was confirmed by the Iranian Foreign Ministry although downplayed as "an ordinary issue that happens for the two sides every once in a while and after the identification of the two sides the issue is resolved." Five Iranian fast boats came within 200 yards of the two navy destroyers and frigate during the incident. As the Iranian ships departed, white boxes were dumped into the sea in front of the American warships which have not yet been identified.

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2 Nerd-Its - +
Amazed The Iranians Are Still Alive by VnutZ :: NR8

I'm actually somewhat impressed the Navy didn't sink them. If a ship were headed towards me at high speed broadcasting threats of blowing me up - I would think that pretty strong evidence of hostile intent. It's clearly a situation in which the Navy could (and probably did) record the radio transmissions and could even setup quick video in order to prove the actions that led to the defensive measure.

It's one thing to wait for gunfire prior to retaliating. It's quite another to wait for a "suicide bomber" to detonate prior to retaliating. Especially considering a ship laden with explosives could easily put a sinkable hole into a warship.

I know we've got some former Navy folk on the site - any comments?

Posted 08 January 2008, Hide, Reply
2 Nerd-Its - +
Denials As Expected by VnutZ :: NR8

Until the video was released, Iran didn't deny anything and as a matter of fact seemed to concur with the events even though they downplayed them as "normal." But the Pentagon released a four minute video allegedly recorded from the ship's deck of the fast boats circling around the Navy ships. Naturally, the Iranians denied the evidence was factual and declared it fabricated.

Playing devil's advocate here, its definitely not hard to argue that video fabrication has become very easy in these times with the ready availability of Apple's video tools or applications on the net (both legit and pirated) for video editing.

So what can anybody take for fact these days?

Posted 09 January 2008, Hide, Reply
2 Nerd-Its - +
Iran Releases Official Version of Incident by VnutZ :: NR8

Today, Iran aired a five minute video on TV showing the Strait of Hormuz incident. The obviously edited does not depict continuous footage and uses selected clips of audio. It shows very little fast boat activity. Spokesmen for the Navy indicate the video "appears to be truthful showing three ships making a transit of the Strait of Hormuz" and adds "clearly the video is edited to include only the verbal context the Iranians wanted to include."

Posted 10 January 2008, Hide, Reply