This situation with Iran, is becoming something more than risible..
The Iranian Ambassador to the Court of St. James has told British officials, that while he had promised the return of Leading Seaman Faye Turney within a day, that commitment cannot now be met.
Today, that has been recinded, because, according to the Iranian Ambassador, Iran will not be 'bullied' by complaints to the United Nations about these detentions..
A second letter written by Turney has been released, questioning the British presence in Iraq and the Middle East in general.. intimating that British forces should be withdrawn on moral grounds..
This in itself, draws into question the first letter supposedly written by the only female member of the crew kidnapped last Friday, in which she describes her treatment, and that of her fellow prisoners, as 'humane, and with consideration'.
For indeed, there is no possible circumstance that a British serviceman or servicewoman would criticise their superiors in such a public manner, other than by coercion.
We have been told that the captives are being held in a military compound in Tehran. There are only two, one being an actual military camp just outside the city itself, the other being the Headquarters of the Iranian Secret Police, and that inside the capital itself.
This compound, is also the headquarters of the elite Revolutionary Guard Corps, a hardcore group who have frequently acted without official government sanction, and would appear to be outside the law..
This suggests that neither the Iranian President Ahmadenejad, nor the actual leader of the Iranian government, the Ayatollah Kameini, has control of this hostage situation, but are being dictated to by those within the Revolutionary Corps itself. That there can be no diplomatic resolution to this situation, for the simple reason the government in Iran has no influence.
The latest development, that being the continued detention of LS Turney, is ostensibly because Britain and the US are circulating a petition to be presented to the United Nations, condemning Iran for the kidnappings, and offering irrefutable evidence that it was an Iranian incursion into Iraqi waters, patrolled by British Forces under a UN Mandate issued by the Security Council itself..
This is a matter which could escallate beyond the point of no return for Britain, and as a consiquence, for the US.
If Iran continues it's intractibility, continues to produce patently false evidence, continues to push the Western powers and the UN, continues in their own particular way in it's attempts to 'humiliate' the West by parading the 15 captives on Iranian television, and continues with it's slightly veiled threats to try the captured troops on charges of espionage.. there will be little choice for the West, and the conflict will be expanded beyond the Sahtt al Arab, and into Iran itself.
Just what gain Iran might achieve, by forcing an armed conflict with such vastly superior forces, remains to be seen..
But again, it may not be the wishes of the Iranian government itself.. it may not be their choice..
It may well be that a fanatic group within the country, within the Iranian military, that is now dictating foreign policy..
But, regardless, the responsibility must be shouldered by President Ahmadenejad and the Ayatollah Kameini, and indeed the Iranian peoples themselves, for allowing such a group within their armed forces to hold such power..
And whatever the consiquences.. whatever the outcome of this fiasco.. it falls at the feet of the Iranian people, for if they support such action, and they themselves do nothing to make a movement towards removing fanatics from holding such power, then they have demonstrated either their willingness to go to war, or their inability to judge right from wrong, or their lack of any ethical sense, or their inability to exercise any control whatsoever over those who govern them..
As such, in any of those cases, each who follows the regeme, is guilty of complicity.
It would cause a deep rift between the West and the radical Islamic Middle Eastern States, should it come to any armed incursion into Iran, whether it was only to retrieve the hostages, or, to remove yet another corrupt and fanatical government..
But to simply allow any group to dictate to those working within a mandate provided by the UN, to do whatever they wish, relegates the UN into an impotent organ in that region.
And that, would be intollerable, and even worse, exceedingly unwise.
Iran expects Britain to conceed..
Iran expects the UN to bluster and bumble..
Iran expects the American public to walk away from their British allies, and demonstrate their lack of commitment to those who have constantly been their allies..
Iran expects to prove to the Arab community that the West can be compromised and humiliated..
And one can only hope, that Iran is wrong.