The West Gets Schooled
Mr. Blair and Mr. Bush - today you got schooled. A government, which I myself have little to no regard for, has handed you your hat. They have done what you, over the last five years, have been unable to do - conduct themselves somewhat reasonably with regards to the detention of foreign personnel.
And do you know where they learned that lesson? From watching us make a mockery of ourselves, of willingly allowing the debasement of our own supposed cherished freedoms and governing principles because of our own sheer apathy and ignorance.
Unlike our supposedly ‘civilized’ approach to dealing with those we detain - the British sailors and marines held by the Iranians were not shackled and forced to wear hoods, were not flown to undisclosed locations to be interrogated and tortured, and they will not rot in prison camps for years awaiting show trials. No video footage of Iranian military personnel will be uncovered showing the sailors and marines piled in human pyramids with their captors gleefully giving the thumbs up whilst resting against their naked, humiliated bodies.
We will see no such images.
Like it or not, how this situation was handled by the Iranians was, in a word - perfect, and could not have been better staged by the likes of the CIA at the height of their Cold War wizardry. While eliciting threats from the West over the detention of 15 people, and enduring months of whispered threats of military strikes against them (not to mention the fact that the United States has been responsible for encouraging and advising a Pakistani militant group that has been responsible for a number of guerrilla raids inside Iran), the Iranian government has played its cards in this instance as if it were the dominant showman at the World Series of Poker.
To call this a PR coup would be an understatement. The boys and girls in the Counter Intelligence wing in Langley must be thumbing through their playbook wondering if parts of it might have been leaked.
This is a lesson for all of us that ignorantly follow the rhetoric that flows from the mouths of power in Washington and London, those same idiotic voices that led the West to war in Iraq based on three quarters of fuck all. While we have blamed the Iranians for supporting the likes of Hezbollah in Lebanon, we look the other way when the United States uses the Ethiopians and Somali warlords as proxies. We ignore the fact that US special forces and air support aided them in driving the ICU from Mogadishu, and most of all, that the CIA and FBI have been holding suspected al-Qaeda militants from 19 different countries incommunicado in secret prisons in Ethiopia which are ‘notorious for torture and abuse’, among them at least one Canadian according to Human Rights groups and Western diplomats.
Today we have witnessed the end of probably the most successful PsyOp since the run up to the invasion of Iraq, one that has been successful on a global scale. And yet, not a shot was fired, not a person hurt. Its ultimate success was that it has revealed that which we refuse to believe or confront – our own hypocrisy.
Note 12.0: Happy 30th Birthday to Duane Storey. Have fun tonight, pal.
Want to bookmark or share this entry?
This entry was posted on Wednesday, April 4th, 2007 at 12:57 pm. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
April 4th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Happy Birthday, Duane! I hope it’s a special one.
April 4th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
It already is. Thanks guys…
April 4th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Schooled indeed. Yet again the american people are left asking themselves; how could this idiot actually be the president?
April 4th, 2007 at 1:35 pm
Years of the US trying to paint Iran as being part of the so-called “Axis of Evil” is gone; totally gone.
April 4th, 2007 at 1:36 pm
If you look very closely at the photo, you will see that at least two of the suits are slightly ill-fitting….oh the inhumanity!
April 4th, 2007 at 2:07 pm
Ahmadinejad said that “This pardon is a gift to the British people”. Regardless of the motivations for doing this, he could not made us look like a bigger bunch of assholes and I thank him for it. There is no possible way this could have gone better for the Iranians and I don’t think we will be seeing any attacks on them this Friday. What would truly make this Easter great is if the democrats finally grew a pair of balls and impeached the president.
April 4th, 2007 at 2:10 pm
i was flabbergasted when listening to the news this morning and quite frankly had a huge smile on my face when i heard that the sailors thanked iran for their forgiveness. i can almost picture ahmedinejed kicking his feet up on his desk and lighting a cigar.
that aside, you hit the nail on the head with this entry. this has gotta hurt the shit out of that smug uk pm and his pathetic (for lack of a better word) us counterpart. losers.
April 4th, 2007 at 2:32 pm
When our worst enemy isn’t so bad what does that say about us?
Matt, stop by Savannah Georgia when you go to carolina and ill put some grade-A LSD in your cup. i love you man.
April 4th, 2007 at 2:49 pm
Completely agree. As you quoted Fisk saying yesterday:
“The Iranians, you see, understand the West. And they understand it much better than we understand - or bother to understand - Iran.”
Can’t wait to read his take on this–should only be a matter of hours before they post tomorrow’s Independent.
On a related note: hasn’t it been a while since we’ve heard from Sy Hersh? His last article, “The Redirection” was the prelude (at least to the public) to the shift in policy that seems to have ‘wagged the war’ from Iraq to Iran.
I wonder what he’s up to.
Then again, maybe that’s a good sign: it wouldn’t be an official crisis without his take; by then we’re usually in too deep anyways. Abu Ghraib indeed.
April 4th, 2007 at 2:50 pm
damn it that was a brilliant post. not only was this situation described perfectly, but the perspective and truth in it was bang on. i’m full and i no longer need lunch.
April 4th, 2007 at 2:54 pm
This was quite well executed indeed, hopefully if the operations to strike Iran had any chance of occurring, today’s event’s may have swayed them. Let’s hope at least, that the rumors of a strike are not true.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:01 pm
I think Ahmadinejad is a political genius at times, and believe it or not I have a fair bit of respect for the man but I will agree some of his views are unacceptable (ex, his hatred for Israel). He isn’t afraid to face the West and is willing to stand up for what he thinks is right for his country. And then he goes and does something like this… just pure genius, mind you American media will put there spin on it and try to make him out to be the bad guy. And a large portion of Americans will buy it.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:15 pm
And W was on the news yesterday complaining about Speaker Pelosi visiting Syria because Syria was not in the “mainstream” of the world community.
30?? pffft. He’s just a kid. Happy B-day Duane
April 4th, 2007 at 3:31 pm
I will undoubtedly get slammed for this comment but I feel I have to at least throw the question out there: should a country be applauded for undoing something they should not have ever done in the first place?
If the point of this thread is to illustrate just that the US can learn a thing or two about how to treat detainees, then point well-taken. You are absolutely bang on Mr. Good. However, if I steal someone’s dog and then return it to the owner and tell him it’s “a pardon” and “a gift”, even if I haven’t harmed it, should I be held up as a model to others in the grand scheme of things? Of course the location of the capture is indeed disputed territory. So we may never know who was in whose waters. (Although I’m not sure what Britain would have to gain by cruising a lowly frigate into Iranian territory, much less the inflatable rafts the sailors were captured in) But IF all the rhetoric was stripped away and the facts revealed that the Revolutionary Guard captured at gunpoint 15 sailors doing a routine search of a merchant vessel just for ‘PR’, I would simply suggest that praise for not hurting them would not be my first reaction.
I just offer another viewpoint, feel free to disregard.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:46 pm
That is, for sure, a good point. But is it any more defensible than the US capture of Iranians in Kurdistan and their attempts to paint them as proof positive that Iran is aiding the insurgency? In fact, the Anglo-American alliance has gone to great lengths to use Iran as a scapegoat for numerous incidents in Iraq, all for the same purpose.
The point made here is that the government played the same game that the West has for the last five years and shown them up without firing a single shot or harming a single person. I am not saying that I condone their actions, but the point must be made and it must not be disregarded with regards to our own conduct when it comes to detainees.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:53 pm
No doubt.
It’s a case of Two Wrongs…. Let’s hope there’s a Right in there somewhere… eventually.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:56 pm
Very well put.
April 4th, 2007 at 3:56 pm
It’s one black kettle calling the other kettle out to fight, but all the pots seem to get along… I’m just incredibly thankful this didn’t escalate any more. Everything bad that could possibly happen, could happen in ONE day, and it’s been that way for too damn long. Perhaps it’s time to start getting positive?
April 4th, 2007 at 4:26 pm
dlogan - we’ll see about positive once we find out what kind of sabre-rattling Bushie will do once that 3rd carrier battle group parks in the Gulf. :(
April 4th, 2007 at 5:40 pm
Grzybov, your first point only holds water if you believe the British sailors where in Iraqi waters. That as still not be proven beyond a shadow of a doubt.
If they where in Iranian waters then Iran had every right to arrest them. If you were driving your gun boat off the coast of Carolina the US coast guard would arrest you in a second, and I would imagine they would probably shoot first then arrest anyone who is still breathing.
It is just a matter of who you choose to believe at this point. The leaders of 2 countries that have lied to the world for 4 years and unjustly invaded a country or Iran.
April 4th, 2007 at 6:04 pm
This is still a regime that executes teenage girls for heavy petting and denies the Holocaust, let’s not be ready to offer merits just yet.
April 4th, 2007 at 6:31 pm
Very true J_R. Nothing has been proven and I doubt it will. Britain has provided their argument which makes some reasonable sense, but by no means do I blindly take it to be gospel.
Under international law though, warships have sovereign immunity in territorial seas. Also don’t forget the Cornwall was there under the authority of the UN Security Counsel. So even if they were technically on Iran’s turf, Iran still had no right to do anything other than tell them to scram.
Again, that’s not to say the US would not have done the very same… if not blown them six ways from Sunday (*trying to picture an Iranian aircraft carrier cruising into Chesapeake Bay*) But anyway you shake it, I fail to see how any part of what happened can be justifiable.
April 4th, 2007 at 7:59 pm
Ouch! I can’t imagine what Bush and Blair and their ilk are thinking at the moment. That’s gotta hurt.
April 4th, 2007 at 9:00 pm
Grzybov - when it comes to this subject I defer to Craig Murray.
April 4th, 2007 at 11:18 pm
I just hope Ahmadinejad doesn’t go and do something stupid later on. What the world needs right now is an Iran that stands up to the West, not one that gets invaded.
April 4th, 2007 at 11:42 pm
It would be nice to have a credible voice of international weight call “us” on our bullshit. But we’re not exactly there yet. The tactics used to demonise the Persian President have many faces, and this has only squashed one of them. People who complain he’s a holocaust denier or supporting the insurgency in one way or another don’t necessarily have a lot of infallible evidence, but they have a lot of whatever they’ve got, and this good gesture is only a little to counter it.
I’m glad Iran proved to be the better nation, and was anxious to see everyone’s reaction, but I don’t consider this personally a great victory. I know that anyone I talk to who’s a Bushie will give me Grzybov’s POV. They need more proof…
I’d consider an overhaul in the media concentration a victory, but the day that happens is the day the world changes…
April 5th, 2007 at 1:00 am
@b-rad: The president is just a symptom of a larger problem, our (as an American, I speak from a perspective of ownership) inability either through general apathy or lack of monetary grease to influence the direction of foreign policy such that it’s responsible. That’s also not to mention the culture of Machiavellian politics we have here. I personally believe it’s a combination of the three. The precise mixture of which is probably left to the philosophers.
We, as a people, own these strings of foreign policy disasters and we are unable to stop them happening. Until they take away our ability to vote (oh how I wish we had a parliamentary system), we will always own the problems even if we don’t care to accept responsibility for them.
April 5th, 2007 at 4:45 am
“This is still a regime that executes teenage girls for heavy petting and denies the Holocaust, let’s not be ready to offer merits just yet.”
Though this is a good point, I feel like I have to point out that even though there are many policies and laws within Iran that are questionable at best, those do not negate their handling of this situation. They should be applauded for how they managed the incident, but I don’t think anyone is saying that this wipes the slate clean of everything else. This situation has been an excellent example of how blanket statements (that I have personally heard) demonizing Iranian people do not apply, and how even a country that some consider to be on the list of our worst enemies are much more complex than the British and American propoganda would have us believe.
April 5th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
Grzybov, “gift” or no gift, I appreciate someone in the world finally pulling up their pants when it comes to this.
Forgive me, but I think this is one of the greatest things to have happened since Bush came into his unrightous rule.
The end.
Ps. I do appreciate your opinions lol.
April 6th, 2007 at 9:39 am
I was gonna point this out a few days earlier, but had to evidence to support my contetion. Now I do.
Although this wasn’t an Abu Ghraib of sorts, I believe it was somewhat premature to suggest the following as Matt did:
“Unlike our supposedly ‘civilized’ approach to dealing with those we detain - the British sailors and marines held by the Iranians were not shackled and forced to wear hoods, were not flown to undisclosed locations to be interrogated and tortured, and they will not rot in prison camps for years awaiting show trials.”
Obviously the Iranians wouldn’t release any evidence of detrimental treatment as they’re fighting a propaganda war, but it’d be safe to assume that whent he cameras were off the actions that took place wouldn’t fall under the category of ‘civilized’ either.
According to this CBC story, and contrary to Matt’s quote above, the sailors content that they WERE blindfolded, they WERE interrogated and they WERE held in undisclosed locations (albeit, still in Iran). I think it’s naive and premature to suggest that a country such as Iran that operates largely on a primitive and barbaric legal system would have treated these prisoners much better than we should’ve expected.
http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2007/04/06/british-navalcrew.html
April 6th, 2007 at 10:04 am
In every picture I’ve seen of them they were smiling, talking amongst themselves, not once have they looked upset. Kind of strange when you consider the pictures we’ve seen of the iraqi people in piles.
April 6th, 2007 at 10:57 am
UPDATE:
Nothing from Fisk yet, but I did find Chomsky’s take on tomdispatch.com –
http://www.tomdispatch.com/index.mhtml?pid=182214
April 9th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
“Like it or not, how this situation was handled by the Iranians was, in a word - perfect,”
Not really…
The sailors after returning to the U.K. mentioned a little something about violent abduction, separation, and interrogation. The only perfect thing the the Iranian government managed was to build a T.V. facade around their respectful and decent treatment of the sailors. Perfect enough that you fell for it.
April 9th, 2007 at 6:30 pm
Fell for it…hmm, like the entire populations of democracies in which the media is supposedly free fell for going to war? I didn’t fall for anything, and their treatment was nothing compared to how detainees have been treated in the war on terror and Iraq.
This entry is about propaganda and its effects, no matter who is behind it. Were the Brits tortured? Were their naked bodies piled so that their captors could take snap shots? There is no question that they were held against their will, probably terrified, and interrogated, no to mention held in isolation. But were they held in small metal boxes like, say, the Tipton three were at Camp Delta?
The point is - the Iranians knew better - from our example - not to venture even remotely close to there. That is the point.
Robert Fisk was correct in his assumption that they know far more about messing with us than we do them. They know far more about us period than we do them. Villify them all you wish, it was a PR coup without question, and the statements of the detainees themselves could, in fact, be nothing but MOD damage control, which would be why they’re breaking with regulation and allowing them to sell their stories to the press.
But it’s crazy to think that, right? Because we would never lie, nor deal in falsehoods. Correct?